Branded hair oil business – over Rs 5,500 crores
Cool hair oil – 10% of branded hair oil & growing at over 15 % annually
Navratna, (Rs 300-cr brand) which is known nationally for its ‘Thanda-Thanda, Cool-Cool’ campaign, has 70% market share in the cool hair oil category, has had a free run so far. And it has been doubling its sales for the last three years even though it is among the costliest hair oils (Rs 25 for 50 ml and Rs 47 for 100 ml) in the therapeutic segment in India. (Emami – an Rs 700 crores company)
FMCG major Marico has a dominant 50 %-plus market share in the branded hair oil segment with two best-sellers: Parachute and Nihar.
Competition
But Emami’s Rs 300 crore brand may be facing tough competition soon (at present, its biggest competitor is a small regional player – Himgange) with FMCG majors now gearing up to try their luck once again in the category. Marico, for example, is currently prototyping two differentiated cool oil variants – Nihar Naturals Coconut Cooling Oil in Bihar and Parachute Advansed Coconut Cooling Oil in Andhra Pradesh. The last one is significant as Emami will for the first time face tough competition from a seasoned player in its stronghold – the southern markets where Navratna enjoys a virtual monopoly with a market share of 98 %.
Dabur also joined the fray recently with its Super Thanda hair oil priced at Rs 47 for 100 ml, in addition to Re 1 sachets. This again is significant as almost a third of Navratna’s sales come from the semi-urban and rural markets through Re 1sachets.
Emami’s Strategy
Emami, which launched the Navratna brand in the early 90s, will continue to cash in on its first-mover advantage and is focusing on the health aspect – the oil has just graduated from just a ‘Thanda-Thanda, Cool-Cool’ relief positioning to a stress buster that gives relief from headaches, insomnia, tension and fatigue. Emami is in fact looking at a 15-20 % growth this year. The company has gone in for brand extensions as well. Apart from Navratna light oil and Navratna extra thanda oil which help keep the buzz going, the company has also gone in for Navratna cool talcum powder and deodorant talcum powder.
“Creating sub-brands and brand extensions building on ‘cooling’ is one of our strategies to create a larger brand recall. So, in future too, we will introduce products and build on this successful ‘thanda-thanda, cool-cool’ concept,” Agarwal of Emami says.
Brand Ambassadors: The brand ambassadors are also being chosen carefully. The hair oil was first launched in the interior markets of north India with actor Govinda as the brand ambassador. As the market spread to more urban and youth markets, mega stars Amitabh Bachchan and Shah Rukh Khan were roped in to make the product more aspirational.
The next stage was to add more regional flavour to the portfolio and that prompted Emami to have actor Chiranjeevi in Andhra Pradesh, Surya in Tamil Nadu and Upendra in Karnataka to promote the hair oil.