The Onam season is approaching, a time when the marketing focus of most brands shifts to the state of Kerala. Being the biggest festival of Kerala, Onam is a time when Keralites lavishly spend on consumer durables and many other products. That brands, both national and local, pin their hopes on this harvesting festival of Kerala, is no surprise.
Onam is also a time when major brands launch new products and attractive promotional activities in the market. According to industry experts, 50% of Kerala’s annual sales accounts to Onam sales alone.
exchange4media spoke to a few brands to know about their sales targets and marketing campaigns during the upcoming festive season.
LG Electronics India is planning an extensive campaign highlighting flagship technologies of LG during Onam. Themed ‘Celebrating health and happiness’, the promotion includes attractive offers on a number of home appliances and consumer electronics products range.
“The ‘Health and Happiness’ promotion is an extension of LG’s 21-year anniversary celebrations themed ‘The year of innovation’, whereby, LG has been focusing on innovative products and features that improve the quality of life, focusing primarily on products which enhance health of customers via environment and energy conservation,” said Amit Gujral, Chief Marketing Officer, LG Electronics India.
“LG Linear Inverter technology for instance in Refrigerators keeps food fresh for 14 days. LG Stainless Steel Tank Water Purifiers provide the purest water as against conventional plastic tank water purifiers. Similarly, LG Steam Wash Washing Machines provide one of the most hygienic washing results to keep allergens away. We have many more such health and hygiene conscious products,” added Gujral.
LG Electronics India is targeting Rs 600 crore Onam sales this year, which is a growth of around 20% over last year.
Sony India has set itself an aggressive target of 35% growth in BRAVIA television business in the Kerala market. The period for this target started in May during the football season and ends in the month of September.
Sony India has also announced promotional offers across its product categories. The company has always been bullish in this market and hopes to receive an overwhelming response this year as well. Sony plans to achieve Rs 170 crore sales from July to September alone on the back of its premium product line-up, exciting festive offers, finance schemes and marketing promotion activities with Malayalam superstar, Manju Warrier.
Sunil Nayyar, Managing Director, Sony India, said, “Kerala has always been a significant market for Sony India’s market landscape. With a wide range of innovative and premium products across categories, festive offers, easy finance schemes and promotional activities in Kerala, we are confident that we will make the much-awaited Onam celebration a grand one for all our customers here.”
Satish Padmanabhan, Sales Head, Sony India, said “I am very happy to share that we witnessed phenomenal sales growth for our television category during the football season, thereby maintaining a strong market position. Taking our success forward, we have introduced exciting festive offers for our customers in Kerala for the Onam festive season. We aim to achieve Rs. 170 crore sales from July-September 2018 this Onam season.”
“Customers will get assured gift on purchase of select BRAVIA televisions, Home Theatres and Cameras, which will drive the growth this season,” added Padmanabhan.
Whirlpool India Limited has launched ‘Celebrate Onam Style’, an exciting promotion for Kerala that gives customers an assured gift with every purchase of Whirlpool products and a chance to win another Whirlpool product via a lucky draw contest.
“Kerala is an important market for Whirlpool and has always been a state that is most jubilant during festivities. In line with the festive mood, we are happy to announce this exciting offer on our new range of home appliances especially in the Kerala market. Whirlpool has always been committed to providing the best of quality and world-class technologies through innovations and our services,” said KG Singh, Vice President-Marketing, Whirlpool India.
Festival seasons are very important for jewellery business also.
Talking to exchange4media, MP Ahammed, Chairman, Malabar Group, said, “25 to 30 per cent of our sales come during the festival seasons. As you know, these seasons vary from state to state. For Kerala it is Onam season, for Tamil Nadu, it is Pongal, for Karnataka and Andhra Pradesh it is Ugadi and for the rest of the country, it is Diwali. So we launch a new range of jewellery every festive season to suit the requirements of regional buyers. Some important days are Raksha Bandhan and Dhanteras. Akshaya Tritiya also has now become a very important day for the sale of jewellery in all the states that we are operating in.”
“Our advertising budget for Onam is Rs 20 crore. Our advertising budget is always based on projected turnovers. In this festive season, we expect to do sufficient turnover, matching our budget plan. The market is good and sales are encouraging. We are hopeful to cross the target successfully,” added Ahammed.
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