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<ul><li><keyword id="8758553" type="UNKNOWN" weightage="20" keywordseo="the-kellogg-company">The Kellogg Company</keyword> came to India 25 years ago and continues to hold on to its leadership position.</li><li>It has used sampling, along with coming up with products at competitive price points to create an edge for itself.</li><li><keyword id="868842" type="PERSON" weightage="20" keywordseo="Sumit-Mathur">Sumit Mathur</keyword>, Director of Marketing, Kellogg South Asia, who talked to us about the brand’s marketing strategy, the audience’s reception to some of its recent innovations and why sampling will continue to be important for it in the future too.</li></ul> India is a tough market to crack when it comes to the breakfast cereals category. We are a country where breakfast has always meant warm home-cooked food, considering different parts of the country have an array of breakfast options to offer. How do <keyword id="2201606" type="PERSON" weightage="20" keywordseo="breakfast-cereal">breakfast cereal</keyword> brands then make themselves more appealing to the tough Indian audience? Moreover, with faster lifestyles, more and more of the younger populace is choosing to skip breakfast, thereby making it tougher for these brands. The Kellogg Company has been present in India for the past 25 years now. While other brands including <keyword id="75190" type="DOMAIN" weightage="20" keywordseo="Nestle">Nestle</keyword>, Marico and <keyword id="6505353" type="COMPANY" weightage="20" keywordseo="MTR-Foods">MTR Foods</keyword> have tried to enter this otherwise unorganized category, Kellogg’s has been able to retain its leadership position. Over the years, it has educated people about the importance of breakfast, through its campaigns and has also let people know about all it has to offer through solid sampling exercises across the country. We recently caught up with Sumit Mathur, Director of Marketing, Kellogg South Asia, who talked to us about the brand’s marketing strategy, the audience’s reception to some of its recent innovations and why sampling will continue to be important for it in the future too. Edited excerpts: Q) As a brand, sampling has been an intrinsic part of your marketing mix. Will it continue to be a critical strategy for the brand, going ahead? Our job is to get consumers to try our products. For a category like ours, you are required to create several touch points for consumers to experience it. Sampling, along with the right price architecture, helps in achieving that. In our range of innovations launched over the past two years, sampling amongst other promotional activities are a key focus for the company as it helps consumers to experience a product closely before they develop an affinity towards it . Q) Tell us a bit about your recently launched campaign ‘Breakfast Se Badhkar’ and the thought behind it. As an organisation, we live by the purpose of ‘Nourishing India’s Potential’. We have demonstrated it in several ways. We recently announced our ongoing programme of offering a bowl of Kellogg’s cereal with milk to children from underprivileged sections of society as their daily breakfast. We are also on our mission to driving a behaviour change in many urban Indian consumers who skip or skimp breakfast due to lack of time. The new masterbrand campaign is our attempt to bring alive our purpose and drive this behavioural change. The film explains how breakfast is the morning hero to help children achieve their best that day and every day. This insight is supplemented with an endearing and relatable touch where a mother’s concern for her kid is captured in the phrase ‘Ek chammach aur’. Q) You have been speaking about how youngsters are choosing to skip breakfast, owing to their lifestyles. How are you making yourself more appealing to this young TG? We have seen two megatrends gaining relevance among our consumers - the rise of snacking and of health-conscious consumers. It’s even truer with today's generation whose lives are only getting busier, they understand what’s good for them and are ready to look for it and consume it. A lot of our recent innovations are based on these trends. Whether it is <keyword id="774503" type="COMPANY" weightage="20" keywordseo="Kelloggs">Kellogg's</keyword> Chocos Fills for the teenagers to consume as a snack between lectures and their on-the-go life or Granola and Muesli for the young multi-tasking generation. Q) Last year you had launched a few very localised flavors. How has the uptake been so far? Are you looking at launching more Indian flavors anytime soon? Consumers in India and the world over are going back to their roots. They want traditional goods infused with convenience. This gave birth to the ‘Real Range of Kellogg's Corn Flakes – Thandai Badam, Kesar Pista Badam and Rose Badam last year. Created in consultation with celebrity Chef Ranveer Brar, these variants are inspired by flavours that Indians have a strong cultural connect to. These flavours have received tremendous response from the consumers and its success is not a surprise to us since our earlier range of Kellogg's Corn Flakes with Badam and Honey flavours have work equally well in the past. Q) India is a tough market for a category like cereals, owing to the presence of Indian ghar ka khaana. How are you helping bring about a behavioural change in consumers? In a country like India with such diverse food habits, any food player including a breakfast company like ours, there are people who have the time to prepare and eat home-cooked hot meals in the morning and then there is an audience which is nutrition-seeking but time-starved. Our mission is to understand that segment of audience and partner them in providing them with a convenient and nutritious solution. And breakfast is not just important for one set of people, it’s important for any one to start their day right and achieve what they set out for that day. This brings to the point on our mission for the brand to driving a behaviour change in many urban Indian consumers who skip or skimp breakfast due to lack of time. It is reflected in the breakfast education that we do in schools, our feeding programme of Bright Start which currently has 5000+ children enrolled in daily morning meal of Kellogg’s cereals and milk. And that’s what our latest Masterbrand communication is aimed at. Q) How are you approaching smaller cities? Is there a significant demand for cereals there? Has there been any growth in demand in the past few years? Currently, Kellogg’s is available in more than 2,700 towns and over 550,000 outlets. The demand for cereals is only increasing. Q) K was a great innovation. How has the uptake been over the years? Are you planning some innovations in the product? All innovations from the house of Kellogg's are meant to solve a unique problem for a consumer. We have had multiple launches of products in different format and price points in the past couple of years. The recent launch of Kellogg’s Chocos fills, a crunchy cereal snack made with a delicious chocolaty filling and with the goodness of three nourishing grains – rice, oats and wheat has received a very good response. In fact, Kellogg’s Chocos fills was recognised as one of the breakthrough innovations in the FMCG space in 2019 by Nielsen. The ‘Real Range’ of Kellogg's Corn Flakes with three traditional flavours - Thandai Badam, Kesar Pista Badam and Rose Badam is another example of how consumer insights were used by us to carry out innovation. We added granola with almonds and cranberries to our portfolio in 2018. While consumers continue to seek more and more nutrition in the food choices they make, taste remains the primary driver of that food preference. Kellogg’s Granola is that tasty, oven-baked creation carefully crafted to cater to both, taste and nutrition. Q) Going ahead, what will be your broad marketing strategy and key focus areas to grow your market share? Kellogg’s marketing strategy stems from the fact that we are category leaders and we can further grow this category through our product portfolio and proposition. Hence, it is critical to remain salient in the breakfast occasion and simultaneously extend into ancillary occasions. Because a Kellogg’s cereal is nourishing with milk in the morning as breakfast and is equally nourishing when consumed straight off the pack as an evening snack. The key enablers to building brand salience revolve around building a robust, sharp and relevant portfolio; that ranges from the premium and goes straight to the affordable consumption packs to attract more consumption. Another enabler to this is to get consumers to try our food more and more. Hence, our key dollar of investment is in-store, both from the visibility and sampling point of view.

Why sampling continues to be a key marketing strategy for Kellogg’s

<ul><li>The year 2020 was a roller coaster ride for businesses of all kinds and sizes and negatively impacted <keyword id="47276" type="PERSON" weightage="20" keywordseo="Economic-growth">economic growth</keyword> worldwide. </li><li>However, after June 2020, one industry that continued to see stable cash flow and income was FMCG. </li><li>In today’s feature, we speak to leading FMCG brands on their outlook for 2021 as we move forward. </li></ul>The pandemic has taught the brandverse to be prepared for the unexpected. Owing to the fear of contracting the virus by going out, brands had to rethink and realign their strategies to reach out to consumers in new ways. Online shopping platforms opened up their services to deliver 24*7 and people started hoarding daily essentials, including FMCG products. So, many FMCG brands partnered with e-commerce platforms like Dunzo, Flipkart, Grofers, BigBasket, etc to deliver within the comfort of consumers’ homes. Consumer habits also evolved with COVID and ‘immunity’ became the buzzword in the FMCG industry. Marketers reverted by launching ready-to-eat meal options and immunity-based packaged goods. However, with COVID vaccine now a reality, consumer sentiment is already picking up and the economy is in revival mode. Going by the latest reports, 2021 will augur well for small retailers leading to an increased sales from local markets and <keyword id="6513856" type="COMPANY" weightage="20" keywordseo="kirana-stores">kirana stores</keyword>. According to <keyword id="346535" type="COMPANY" weightage="20" keywordseo="Nielsen-India">Nielsen India</keyword>, after an unprecedented decline of -19% in the Jan-Mar quarter, FMCG industry displayed signs of recovery in Q3’20 with a 1.6% growth (versus Q3 ‘19). In 2020, rural markets outperformed urban India and became critical for FMCG giants. Brands relied on rural markets to drive growth during the trying times. FMCG witnessed a double digit growth of 10.6% in Q3’20 in Rural India, while the bigger cities (&gt;1 Lakh population including metros and Town Class 1) played catch-up. The rural markets bounced back in Q3 handsomely on the back of support provided by the government as well as good agriculture, reverse migration and a lower unemployment rate. With immunity being the focus in the ‘new normal’, new launches have been made in the health and hygiene basket including categories like hand sanitisers, floor cleaners, toilet cleaners, antiseptic liquids. These new launches contributed to 37% (in value) of all new launches in the COVID period (Nielsen India). According to Kantar Worldpane, FMCG sector in India is expected to report a 4-5% volume growth in FY21, driven by rural areas that are expected to grow two percentage points ahead of the urban regions that are hit harder by COVID-19 pandemic. While COVID-19 has curtailed economic growth in the FMCG sector, experts are now optimistic that the industry will see an appreciable improvement this year. Here are some of the trends they expect to see in 2021: R S Sodhi, MD, GCMMF (AMUL): <cmsannotation type="cmsannotation" annotationid="The biggest impact i" comment="inlineshare" text="The biggest impact in FMCG food is the shift among the consumers from loose and unbranded to trusting packed food and affordable brands in Tier II and III. There, people have come from loose to smaller packs and brands.">The biggest impact in FMCG food is the shift among the consumers from loose and unbranded to trusting packed food and affordable brands in Tier II and III. There, people have come from loose to smaller packs and brands.</cmsannotation> I don't think the demand in high end consumer products will grow as much now. There'll be a tremendous increase in demand for branded FMCG products that are affordable, available in smaller packs and mainly cater to Tier II III cities. For the past two years, at Amul, we have been trying to ensure we reach the towns that have over 10,000 population, which helps us cover the 15 to 20 bigger villages around those towns. Currently, we are working with 10,000 distributors. We have already covered 50% of these 10,000 population towns in India and in another one year, we'll cover all the towns. We're mainly investing in Tier II and III cities, opening our own branches and depots all over India. We recently opened a centre in Leh. Anil Viswanathan, senior director, marketing (chocolates), insights and analytics, <keyword id="2200852" type="COMPANY" weightage="20" keywordseo="Mondelez-India">Mondelez India</keyword>: The pandemic has accelerated the growth of snacking. As per Mondelēz International’s recently released second annual State of Snacking report, 9 in 10 Indian adults (88%) say they are snacking more or the same (22%) during the pandemic than before it, with millennials being especially likely to say they prefer snacks over meals (85%). A majority expect this trend to continue, saying they plan to continue eating small snacks throughout the day, as opposed to fewer large meals (82%), and that snacking will be part of their “new normal” even after the pandemic ends (81%). Ultimately, 8 in 10 believe “the current pandemic will have a long-term impact on how we consume snacks as a society” (81%). This unprecedented year has also brought about a significant behavioral change especially on how consumers are purchasing snacks. A majority say they have started to buy snacks online more often than they do in-store or offline (74%), with 8 in 10 planning to continue shopping for snacks online once the pandemic is over (81%). A similar percentage also say the pandemic has opened their eyes to so many more ways to get snacks than they knew existed before (80%), including half who have discovered snacks to try on social media (50%). It was also very heartening to note that, even while at home this year, Indians are social snackers. With health and safety continuing to be a priority, consumers are trying to strike a balance between indulging and being mindful (80%), and in doing so; they (80%) are relying on trusted snacking brands like Cadbury, OREO, and Bournvita, seeking assurance of safety and superior quality. At Mondelez India, we understand the role our products play in our consumers’ life and the aim is to leverage these trends to empower them with more choice, creating greater shopping opportunities and innovating, while keeping our promise of consumer-centricity intact, throughout our growth journey. Sudhir Langer, CEO, Raymond Consumer Care: Conscious Communication Today’s young ‘woke’ consumers were already moving away from the excesses of consumerism and leaning towards sustainable conscious brands before the pandemic and lockdowns hit their lives. The all-round strain of the pandemic from volatile job markets and a possible looming global recession to health and environment concerns; along with the way lockdowns were framed as health versus economy predicaments—as if one has to be sacrificed for the other—has left many questioning the very basis of our consumer-driven economy. I feel, the months in lockdown have only strengthened that introspection and has further fueled the young consumers’ move towards purpose and value, making them think-twice before buying by taking in to consideration the long-term impact of their spends not only on their finances, but on their own beliefs, on society and on the planet. So, with conscious consumption here to stay, when consumers buy, it is going to be as much for brand values as it is for product payoff. Keeping this in mind a big communication trend I see emerging as we move into 2021 is brands engaging more purposefully with deeper more sentient conversations. These could include brands talking about their environmental and sustainability efforts, community initiatives, health impact and most importantly value addition. Fortunately for us this is not a shift to adapt to; but a way of operating. We have always believed in empowering, enabling and operating consciously. Hence, it’s not only our communication like our recent Park Avenue Germ Protect soap film about our protagonist helping his community but at every level we are constantly taking steps to enhance efficiencies for a better world like our soon to be launched sustainable and eco-friendly packaging. Sumit Mathur, Director Marketing Kellogg South Asia: The pandemic is a black swan event that brought several changes at the economic and societal levels. Consumers had to face economic stress which made them more discretionary in their consumption choices. Our virtual connects with over 450 consumers amidst the lockdown made it clear that items which they do not deem to be too essential are unlikely to find a place in their shopping carts. Come 2021, only brands solving a real consumer problem or adding value to their lives will be on top of their minds. It has become increasingly important for brands to feel the pulse of the consumer and provide authentic solutions to stay relevant. Kellogg’s has paid attention to the consumer’s shifting needs and adapted with agility to ensure it solves consumers’ nutritional demands in the most convenient manner and this will continue to be our focus in the coming year.

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Why sampling continues to be a key marketing strategy for Kellogg’s

Samarpita Banerjee

FMCG: The trends to watch out for in 2021

Karuna Sharma

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