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France’ President butter to capture India after a soft launch year ago
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Friday, 12 October, 2018, 08 : 00 AM [IST]
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Manjushree Naik and Shraddha Joshi, Mumbai
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France’s President butter is all set to capture India just by getting noticed on hoardings and bus stops and the outlets that sell the product.
The globally popular butter brand made its India forays in October 2017 with a soft launch. This different kind of launch was a strategy to study consumer preferences and then capture markets. One year later, the strategy seems to have paid rich dividends as south major Thirumala Dairy Products Pvt. Ltd, under its flagship Lactalis Group of France, is now focussed on reaching all Indian states.
Explains Samay Bhardwaj, brand manager, President, Thirumala Milk Products Pvt. Ltd, in an exclusive interaction with FnB News: “We did the soft launch in key metro cities like Chennai, Kolkata and Mumbai by putting up hoardings in various places like bus stops. Our primary aim was just to make the product reach the retail outlets. We look forward to increase our presence digitally by next year. The soft launch helped us reach our target. We have got a good response from Mumbai and Bangalore.”
He adds, “The company focus is to reach all states in India, wherein it has already covered more than half of them. It further aims to make President butter available for all those who have an incontestable love with butter across India.”
Bhardwaj delves deeper into the launch strategy. “ President butter started off with initial trial offers to give consumers the opportunity to try butter the way it should be at a discounted price of Rs 225 per 500g, Rs 46 for 100g and chiplets box at Rs 63 of our key salted variants.”
He is of the opinion that President, like any other brand, had worked towards expanding across India and it is inevitable for any brand in the modern FMCG market to come across road-bumps, but that is the beauty of the industry altogether.
Though claimed to be across half of India, the product has a strong presence in south India. Bhardwaj shares, “ As President butter is made at Thirumala’s factory in Kanchipuram, it was undeniably logical to move first in southern markets, but that hasn’t stopped the brand from expanding itself well into northern, eastern and western markets as well today.”
Interestingly, the product is made with the same technology that is used in France but with locally procured milk. Bhardwaj states, “President butter today is available in numerous countries across the world but had never entered the Indian market except for imports. Imported butter at such high price points was never a feasible choice, and we wanted to give Indian consumers the real taste of butter, with the same technology as we use in France but with locally procured milk at an affordable price. Our quality speaks for itself when it comes to the aroma, smoothness and spreadability of President butter.”
As for bringing other Lactalis products to India in the future, Bhardwaj reveals, “ It would be difficult to share market statistics as of now, but we could say that we have made a prominent impact in the category in key chains across India, hoping to see President reach even further in 2019 and onwards.There are always several prospects of product & brand extensions, but a more realistic approach as of now is to further understand changing trends and categories in India.”
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