Household Products Limited

Q1. No, the company should launch nationally. The data to support this is as follows:

The actions we suggest for this product are: i) Change the fragrance – jasmine is so been there done that ii) Maybe target those segments where Jaimala is not a leader iii) Use the non-animal fat appeal in a different way; appeal to the animal conservationists, the self-styled Maneka Gandhis and those who have an issue with rubbing animal products all over themselves. Q2. Process followed to introduce the new product 1) Idea generation a. High price sector b. More profitable, faster growth 2) Concept development a. Perfume section selected out of soaps with medical benefits, perfumed soaps and soaps with cosmetic appeal b. Jasmine has connotations of luxury c. New added benefit- Purity- made from pure vegetable oil 3) Business Analysis a. Feasibility report b. Pricing- Rs. 7.50 per cake 4) Product & Advertising development a. 2 different jasmine perfumes developed b. Product test- Comparison with each other and with Jaimala, 3 panels of consumers consisting of women in the age group of 18-35 years chosen. One of the perfumes was found to be superior to the other and marginally more preferable than Jaimala’s. This perfume was chosen. c. Advertising campaign- focus on purity and luxury 5) Test marketing a. Indore and Hyderabad chosen as test towns- test run 9-12 months b. Indore- assumed to be more responsive to the ‘purity’ benefit c. Objectives- i) Match Jaimala’s market share ii) To emerge with a distinct image of a luxury soap d. Initial support expenditure to promote the brand scaled down. e. Promotion: Launch conference, display contest, advertising in the local press and slides in cinema houses, discount coupons.

Q3. Decisions taken at critical stages – i) Product Concept – no major problems, but vegetable oil in soap – is it really a good idea? Will it be received well by target consumers? Is there any data to back it? People didn’t buy the claim of vegetable oils. The whole brand idea – purity and luxury; the jasmine fragrance and all that; were they able to get the message across? Just because Jaimala succeeded, doesn’t mean everything else will succeed. ii) Product development and testing – surveys revealed that people only marginally favored the Jaimala brand. Was this survey really representative? The project seems to have been lit up when the data indicated only small advantages. Management seems to have been steering by intuition. iii) Advertising – development and testing – the advertising copy is all good, until the part where they start talking about ‘Pure vegetable oils’ – doesn’t sell the concept. Vegetable oils are associated with healthy cooking, not good hygiene or looks or any other soap-like qualities. iv) Planning of test marketing – Jasmine as a flavour might have been associated with Jaimala; giving our soap the same flavour could confuse the customers.