Stockholm syndrome & Ramdev Patanjali Ayurveda marketing

Ramdev can’t hope to win in fmcg space dominated by women power. Yogis who consider women as bad influence thus refusing to respect them as wife or a life partner must not hope to have a bright future. I appeal Ramev to come clean on this and clarify why he refuses to love women as life partner. To those women who suffer from Stockholm syndrome my humble appeal would be to stand up and fight for equality. Don’t by products sold by celibate religious people of any religion because they stand for misogyny that makes life of women difficult on earth.

Agreed India remained under foreign rule for centuries. Accepted the Indians didn’t get independence as result of war against the occupying power, like USA or Vietnam get.  Despite 70 years of independence Indians fail to become globally competitive society as reflected in dismal performance in Olympics, FIFA world cup, Oscars or Nobel prize to name a few. Therefore many scholars tend to conclude that Indians in general are not ready to shoulder the leadership responsibility thus preferring the follower role.

Countries in Indian subcontinent, Sri Lanka, Pakistan, Bangladesh and India have already seen women head of states as PM & President, unlike the USA, despite the fact that women in the USA enjoy far better socio-religious freedom as compared to their pitiable plight in India. How could women rise to the top political jobs in countries that are notorious for subjugating women? It’s no brainer. All the women who occupied top political posts in Indian subcontinent came from political families who succeeded their male relations. Ms Mamta Bnnerjee, CM of west Bengal perhaps the only top political leader in Indian subcontinent who rose to top on her own merit sans any male patronage. Don’t you think Hillary Clinton would have won against Trump if she had not been seen as an ex-Presidents wife? All right thinking people must strive for an equal world, a culture where when women have same freedom to commit mistakes and still get accepted as equal as men have enjoyed for centuries. Women and men are made equal by Gods and no decent man can find an exception to the rule.

If you wonder how the above enumeration relates to rapid rise of a controversial uneducated religious bigot popular as Swamy Ramdev in the business world? Well Ramdev have entered low technology FMCG trade to sell commodities and packaged products which were already available in the market. Ramdev has used religious Hindu fundamental appeal to sell commodities and low technology semi processed items. His rise can be seen as ripple effect of rise of Hindu fundamentalism in all spheres of life in India from politics to education. Although rapid rise of Patanjali products of Ramdev looks logical in charged atmosphere of Hindutva fundamentalism in India but its future remains surrounded in mystery.

Will Ramdev be able to sustain his trade in the low tech and low margin trade of commodities with highly substitutable product categories sans differentiation if the wave of Hindu fundamentalism wanes in next 2-3 years? Serious business managers would seriously doubt the future prospects of Patanjali trade empire. Why would a customer buy Patanjali products sold by a religious Hindu fundamentalist Swamy when there are many normal Hindus are already marketing such products of equal quality? What will happen to Hindu fundamentalist appeal if India has to go to war against China or Pakistan? In my opinion a war with China is almost round the corner. Secondly I would like to draw attention to more fundamental and pervasive contraction threatening the future of Patanjali products.

Ramdev is riding a tiger in the low technology fmcg world. Ramdev a celibate won popularity as a religious man who didn’t marry because yogis consider women as distraction in achievement of higher goals of life. Unfortunately for all Hindu fundamentalist yogi and Swamys like Ramdev it’s the women who decide the fate of fmcg class of products. Will the women continue to buy products endorsed by a guy like Ramdev who considers women as distraction and refuses to give them equal status as life partner? In my opinion no self respecting educated women would by products from those who insult and disparage women. Ramdev can’t fool all the women for all the time. Let’s wait for the moment when women launch a campaign to boycott Patanjali products in their fight for dignity and equality in India. I am sure Ramdev has not hired a professional advertising agency or discussed the branding with an expert. No one can sell products/services to those who the seller don’t respects.

Journalism Ethics: Arnab, Cyril & Ravish

When I was studying journalism & mass communication at Punjabi university Patiala an editor of Dainik Tribune visited us to share his views. You would be aware that since journalism have been more of a trade or a business rather than profession therefore majority of journalist are self taught guy who prefer to toe the line than challenge the authority.  This editor from Chandigarh made a remark, which he thought was pretty innocent normal.

He said-When we (media) take government side then the readers protest and when we raise the voice of people the government dislike it. I couldn’t help myself asking him to explain such a loaded statement coming from an editor of pro-govt newspaper establishment. He looked confused to why I was asking to explain a rather routine remark. When I told him that he said could virtually imply that the democracy in India has failed.  He was stunned, began to look in the direction of the faculty as if pleading with them to make me shut up. But faculty members in Indian universities generally don’t mess with students who read more than them.

How could there be inverse relationship between aspirations & opinions of the citizens in a democracy to the government policies programs? If the government don’t want media to question them to wake them up to the views of the citizens then what is the role of media? India can’t be a North Korea clone due to size and history. When media becomes government stooge it’s the end of democracy and beginning of the end of those regimes.

Recently when Pakistan government tried bullying Cyril Almeida, majority media professionals including Hamid Mir of Geo stood up with Cyril against the government. Unfortunately majority Indian media don’t have such strong spines as our friends in Pakistan. India media have earned the adage of-Crawling when indicated to bend-long ago. Therefore its pleasant surprise to see Ravish Kumar of NDTV-India cock a snook at modi sarkar in his nonchalant inimitable sober style to protest against one day ban on the channel for coverage of the Pathankot airbase attack. NDTVIndia is just another channel having no unique access to the spot or reported anything that most other channels didn’t but it is singled out for the punishment.

NDTV India has the brand positioning of mild mannered, centrist, balanced, sans theatrics channel amongst sea of noisy pseudo hindu-nationalist channels, some of them purveys mythologies than facts in the race to please Hindu fundamentalist RSS and the government run by its cadres.

Cyril Almeida belongs to minority community in Pakistan but received complete support of the majority community to save him from government high handedness. But NDTV India seems to be in modi sarkar crosshair due to its refusal to toe the RSS line showing minorities in poor light. No one is surprised at one day blackout ban on the channel. It’s shocking to see how the RSS led government could act in such predictable manner and bring more negative publicity? Many thought RSS would rope in some educated people to guide it post stunning win in 2014.

Journalism students have choice they can be Arnab Goswamy of @TimesNow  and be a voice of Hindu fundamentalist sections , a Ravish Kumar of @NDTVIndia  who stands for the idea of India. You can chose cacophony or civil debates. Let me caution that it’s easy to be an Arnab Goswamy as most people can speak loudly but very difficult to be Ravish Kumar because you can’t be him without reading lots of books regularly. Arnab Goswamys would come and go but Ravish Kumar would be discussed in mass communication classrooms for decades.

BJP- The Baggage Party !

2014 would be a watershed year for the BJP. Not for the RSS. Rival Congress may also escape unaffected by any outcome of 2014 elections too, as it has had a long tryst with India. If BJP wins 2014 national elections it may turn to hardcore Hindutva agenda and shower its proud parents with many gifts including a Grand Temple at Babri Mosque site. But if it loses the election then it may disintegrate before emerging into a new avatar.

India has definitely changed since 2009, but is it any different now than what it was in 2009? Though some vehemently would like us to believe that, but the facts need examination. According to the BJP, & opposition camp political parties, the UPA2 has failed to manage India completely. BJP want everyone to agree & approve their thesis that India is poor & faltering whereas Gujarat is rich and exponentially growing.  Well a part of body can’t be declared healthy if the heart & brains stop functioning. The heart & brains of an economy lie with the union government in Delhi.  Few strings pulled wrongly in Delhi could ruin any or all states’ economies.

BJP has to carry the load of its founding ideology, unlike Congress which has no such burden. BJP is an ideological party that exists to promote Hindutva agenda of RSS. Its core values of Hindutva simultaneously propel it forward and also obstruct its way to make an acceptable set of appeals to all sections of society in India. But the BJP hasn’t changed much over the years. BJP don’t have the freedom to micromanage & customize its core appeal at constituency level. Wise ABV knew the solution so he ruled India for a longtime by customizing the core ideology of RSS.

BJP steadfastly believe in strong leaders & leadership style. BJP behaves like a right wing masculine outfit and such behavior satisfies the emotional need of its loyal cadres. But such an appeal has limited scope only.  Some believe that passing on the baton from LK Advani to N Modi is a distinct change. But actually there is not real difference between LKA & NM, except the age gap. Ask any political marketing analyst to know that majority India feels threatened by Strong leaders & would like to avoid them.

INC, on the other hand, does not carry any burden to promote one ideology over the other. Congress is free to leverage even the Hindutva agenda, if it suits a situation in some constituencies.  Actually Congress uses many different appeals in various constituencies spread over length & breadth of India to enhance its prospects of grabbing power in each particular constituency. Congress under Sonia Gandhi is a different party than what it was under previous leaders. Moreover Sonia Gandhi cautiously avoids projecting Congress as a dominating & strong political force, which the INC actually is.

A political party with market orientation has greater chance of success in a democracy.  Selling and product oriented parties find it difficult to adjust their ‘offer’ to the dynamic needs of the citizen voters as they have to carry the burden of ideology & fixed image. If BJP could rebrand itself like Tony Blair's rebrand of Britain's Labour Party then it can reap the benefits. 

Is Masala Journalism Bad Business?

“When ice freezes, all the excrement rises to the surface. And so, when the dialectic was frozen, all the sacred excrement of the dialectic came to the surface. When the future is deep-frozen – and, indeed, even the present – we shall see all the excrement come up from the past.” (Baudrillard 1994, p.26)

2012 is sliding into history in the land of Curry Munchers, India. Although the year has been pretty ordinary from economic, political & social angles but it has brought to forefront a sort of journalism which had been confined to sectarian-vernacular ghettoes of the media. I call it Masala [Spices] journalism in TV news-media. Most characteristic feature of masala- journalism style is preeminence of the style over substance. It does not matter how insignificant is the event the anchor would make it point to adulterate the facts with overdose of shrill high pitch voice, background sound effects & graphics of the screen to grab your attention.  Channels honchos believe that since majority of Indian watch Bollywood movies full of unrealism so they would seamlessly connect with shouting screaming anchors.

Mothers do give attention to crying babies but if a baby keeps crying for hours better take it to a doctor. The Masala journalism is not an isolated phenomenon but a prevalent malady afflicting the entire TV News-media in India in 2012. The English language print media for almost fifty years maintained a distinction between national & vernacular press. That boundary has been obliterated now with rise of Hindi journalism. In 80s the largest selling vernacular newspaper was non-Hindi Malaya Manorama which has been replaced by a Cow-belt Hindi language paper. 

So the growth in Cow-belt lead to spilling over of low cost journos into English media. Traditionally media in India was notorious for paying very low wages & field correspondents were supposed to hawk advertising for the publication. This invasion of English language media by Hindi trained journos brought in new way of thought & expression into the profession. Unfortunately the Cow-Belt has remained most underdeveloped part of India with large number of districts caught up in insurgency. Social conditions shape the personality of people. So these new journos adopted an attacking slandering style of interviewing people in public in the way police interrogates criminals in privacy of police stations in India. These Masala journos will keep asking you same question repeatedly & at the same time telling you that you are wrong to hold your view.  The Masala journos pretends to be educated than IAS, Senior Execs, professors & the other educated elite.

Arnab Goswami of Times Group once threatened the principal of India’s premier college St. Stephens Delhi on public television demanding that the principal must give class attendance to a student who had not attended the college. The compliant political class pressured the VC Delhi University to pass the order making an exception in the case. The principal must have lost his motivation to maintain the tradition of excellence in his institute. Masala Goswami subverted the Taj Mahal of education in India & successive generations would pay the price of his stupidity.

There is general agreement in the media czars in India that electronic media is suited for sensationalism to get viewership. So they have let loose the marauding semi-literate armies on TV screens beaming right into homes with kids watching slogans of “Hang them, Castrate the bastards” & other puerile carefully selected jargon.  All this is done to get the attention of the viewer. These blocks think that minuscule viewership of BBC & CNN in India is because they haven’t matched the profile of consumer with the offer service. So it’s profitable to offer highly spiced curries to titillate the masses.

The media managers are rare in India because the owners want complete & total control. There is an established tradition in India to hire managers for growth phase of the business. Once the business has scaled up to an economic level the managers are often ejected & replaced by a lackey or family. This in media has led to a unique challenge that editors have come back into power in a capital intensive business. The editor wants advertising revenue to grow, so a critical level of viewership would be required to gain attention of media planers. Therefore instead of creating a business strategy they get distracted by a content oriented move to lure the masses. Here they spill the curry !  The business cycle for a hindi movie has to be shorter than a 24x7 New-media.

The media czars have fallen into trap of Editorial led strategy for a capital intensive News-Media business.”The Hindu’ commands a brand value much greater & beyond the covered markets. Masala journalism can increase the TRP but it will completely distract & destroy the attention of viewers from advertising.  Why would some business advertise on a channel where the audience is always emotionally charged?  There would very poor recall scores for the advertising message presented to an emotionally charged audience.  Masala journalism is not only bad business its poor journalism also.  Media must soothe the nerves of low-income country like India instead of rabble rousing. Look at the Hindi movies, light action based comedies do more business than others. People want some peace in their life and want to eat homemade food than spicy stuff available at the street corner. 

India Welcomes Walmart Tesco Carrefour : FDI in Multi-brand Retail

Finally on September 20, 2012 Government of India allowed Foreign Direct Investment in multi-brand retail in India. It’s possible now for global retail majors like Wal-Mart, Tesco & Carrefour to enter the market which has 300-400 millions strong middle class. Without going into political economy aspect of the move let’s look at the management & marketing side of the multi-brand retail in India. Retail & aviation has many similarities in India particularly. Retail majors need to learn lessons from India’s aviation industry as both cater to same customer base.

Lessons: Largest of the domestic corporate giants have burnt their fingers in organized retail in India during more than decade long period. Top three of them have reported losses. Retail in India is a fragmented unorganized business evolved alongside the social structure of communities. India has more cultural diversity than entire Europe as language, food habits, customs, religions & even Gods change every 50 kilometers in India. Hindustan Lever Limited had attempted to monopolize ice cream market in India two decades ago by buying out major brands but they could not fight with local satraps.

Basics: India has population of the size of China living on 1/3 of the area. Publicity managers of brand India have projected that what makes India attractive is presence of 300-400 million middle class consumers. Let me flag this figure right here from marketing perspective. Since Indian society is highly fragmented & culturally diverse therefore it’s a challenge to find various ‘consumers profiles’ embedded in this large population of consumers.

India buys few cars just [1/6 ] as compared to China. This figure is very significant as majority of Indian people prefer buy a house before car unlike in rest of the world.  India has no problem with congestion as all metro cities are teeming with people hence retail experience to India may not be same as routinely described in classical retail plans. On the issue of buying on credit or cash Indian consumers are no different than others but majority of Indians don’t have credit cards.

Entry Strategy: What business model Walmart would use in India is the billion dollar questions. Will they go for company owned company operate [COCO] route to begin with or take the franchise route? I believe later route may be more suitable as it would cut cost of entry & provide for safe landing for this controversial roll out. If Walmart recruits 25 major franchises in the beginning it would provide substantial leverage in domestic market to navigate the social reaction in the first phase.

POS & billing: In my opinion POS strategy would be the waterloo for Retail in India. Walmart, Tesco & Carrefour would be wise to invent a new POS strategy as no other country resembles in India in buying behavior. I would recommend that CXOs of retail giants should invest lots of their time at airport lounges & Metro railway in Delhi & Kolkata to grasp the behavior of Indians and ignore Mckinesy consumer reports. It’s impossible to succeed in retail without strategizing this final moment of truth in retail trade.

India is really a more diverse country than it appears on paper. Retail industry may have to take Indian Railway route & organize the operations that could handle the diversity of buyer needs in India. Historically Indian may have lived under centuries of foreign domination but they have succeeded at maintaining their lifestyle & culture and this must serve as guiding principle to any executives involved in this service sector. 

GOI Bans Social Media

Just half an hour ago Social Media has been banned in India. You can't access Twitter, Linkedin, Facebook but TED is still on. Today is a historical day in India when judiciary has shown the gumption to convict a Minister Dr Mayaben Kodnani for her role in massacre of 85 Muslim children & women in Naroda Patiya in Gujarat, India in 2002.Today is also a day of the SC upholds sentence of Ajmal Kasab a Pakistani terrorist involved in 26/9 attack in Mumbai. Text messages had already been under ban for the past week.

I am not sure how to react to GOI ban on social media. The govt must have its reasons for doing so as NE  India has been embroiled in communal clashes for almost a week. Indians are used to all kinds of restrictions and shortages. We take it as part of life and squeeze our-self in the continuously shrinking space for living due to over population.

Social media allows ordinary people to have a voice on issues that matter to them. It is damn empowering tool that scares the shit out of people who want to regulate information. Social media may limit an individual's  social interaction in the real space but it offers enormous opportunity for connecting virtually with global audience. So if you are the only one in your group who enjoys poetry you could go online and share your experience with the connoisseurs.

Business Innovations & Family run Enterprises

Business life cycle, like product life cycle, is getting shorter with changes in attention span of the consumers.  This actually means that a business organization must not take itself grated to last several generations as it used to be in the past.  Average life of a business organization in the twentieth century were around twenty five years that has considerably been contracted due to factors like technological obsolescence, decreasing attention span & higher consumption propensity and proliferation of competition.  The age of Life time jobs & near immortal organizations have long been gone.

Indian businesses have to innovate to survive & succeed. The scenario in emerging economies looks little deceptive as overwhelming family ownership and government protection perpetuates the notion of continuous successful presence of the family empires.  Look round and see in how many Indian business families two consecutive generations have remained in the same business? As every generation seeks to blaze its own new trail therefore it is imperative for the family to create & nurture the innovation structure & process within.

Major Indian business houses have undergone transformation in terms of their core sectors of activity. Besides new players continue to challenge the established the existing ones. The telecom revolution in Indian markets, that succeeded the information technology boom, saw the leadership baton passed to new players despite the presence of the established giants in those sectors. Similarly when the organized retail sector was opened in the last decade for domestic players to enable them build competencies to take on global players it did not yield expected results.

Majority of established domestic corporate giants could not achieve major goals that they set out for themselves in the unfolding saga of organized retail. Most have still not been able to discover a suitable model fit for Indian consumer. The answer lies in intensive study of Indian consumer profile & habits rather than force fitting the alien business models of supple chain in India. Let us wait for the approval to multibrand FDI get nod of the Indian parliament and watch how the competition plays out depending upon the strategic stance of these existing organizations. There are several indicators that point out that subsequent to multibrand FDI comes into force most existing players would take an exit option or go for strategic joint venture.

Family owned enterprises have to learn to allow innovation to walk into their enterprises from the front door rather depend upon a small carefully controlled window. Business Model Innovation should get a strategic priority for companies to last an average lifetime.  There is need for giving strategic priority to BMI on the lines of product life cycle. 

Trust is a Must: Future of Retail in India

If you examine the reasons for failure of organized retail in India many factors have been cited by various experts but no one has pointed out the most critical issue of absence of trust as the prime culprit. After all there is enough growth in economy leading to healthy demand for goods & services, some players have deepest pockets too, there is reasonably good transport backbone and India has quite a few well established fmcg majors present for long enough periods too.

We witnessed huge customer interest in buying at such outlets in the beginning & any research could reveal that customers could return to buy from organized retail if the players could get their act together. Quantity, prices, packaging, buying convenience, availability, variety and experience are few given factors that are in favor of organized retail.

Though most retail players failed due to absence of managerial competency for such operations particularly in marketing function lacked the understanding & creativity required to maintain a robust interest of customers in the stores. Across the board players focused on product images to lure the customers without strategizing the brand pull in an effective manner.

Retail is a service but the organized retail players choose to run the biz without regard to the basics of services marketing. Only if Reliance Fresh, Big Bazaar, Spencers etc could learn few lessons from professional service marketers and trained & retrained their teams on a continuous basis they can pull off the act in a powerful manner. There is lack of training, sense of belongingness & trust among the people working at the outlets. 

It’s very important for the retail players to craft a suitable training programme for their team to keep them involved in the business with a degree of pride. Without inculcation of pride among the team working at the outlets its impossible to run such an operation. We must keep in mind that we are not USA or Europe where people generally trust each other. We are a society that’s fractured by insidious mistrust that keeps people from behaving like a cohesive them. First step towards success of retail is to build a trustworthy team that in turn could inspire trust of the buyers, Till such mindset is achieved even Walmart would have to struggle in Indian market. 

Defence is better than Attack in Marketing Strategy

Most SMEs in developing countries like India do not budget for marketing and hit the road without a clearly differentiated marketing strategy. Result? They get stuck in a situation that would leave no option for them but to go for a strategic retreat in order to prepare for attack at a later day. Therefore instead marching forward on the strength of incremental gains accrued with each plan period they are forced to land up in a loop that offers no clue about direction of growth.

There are many organizations that would just produce or acquire products, then without any marketing inputs,  leave the rest to the marketing forces to liquidate the inventory whenever that happens. Such thinking is risky and very costly. Your customers are always looking for options and you competition would love to undermine your offer, therefore you can not wait for attack on your brands from different direction before you unleash your counter. Although in pure marketing context, an attack may not be the most potent defense.

Let me mention the examples from our home grown brands like 'Monte Carlo', 'Haldiram' and many more like them. None of these brands despite demand & marketing potential could go on to become a formidable force to take on the competition. On the other hand, dairy brand like Amul, Verka etc have successfully warded off powerful MNC attack on their consumers segments and mounted a devastating counter on the shining MNC players like HUL in ice cream market.

An organisation howsoever small in size must budget for marketing activities so that they remain capable of mounting a surprise attack when threatened. I personally believe, and my long experience indicates so, that a defensive strategy is always preferable over any form of attack. Many MSME organisations have lost precious market domination opportunities presented by the growing middles class consumption in India. There is huge potential for home grown brands in food, Apparel, Engineering, Education & Chemicals in India. Unfortunately we do not undertake sustained marketing campaigns.

Sachet Marketing for Desi ghee

You would wonder whats that thing called Sachet Marketing? Well we Indians know this very well. Indian consumers  have huge following for this packaging that has given many successful products like paan masalas, shampoos, ketchup etc. Since India is a developing economy with high savings rate therefore consumers prefer to buy in small quantities in greater frequency as we have time. Even TATA Nano could be seem to be coming from same mindset which is called sachet marketing!

Few months back i suggested to a diary company to introduce pure ghee in sachet packing, but despite their acceptance they haven't gone ahead with it. The reasons could be related to operations & commercial philosophy etc. Well all fmcg guys prefer larger packs for volume movement.

There are millions in India who wish to eat desi ghee but can't afford it. Students could carry them to hostels,  restaurants could place them on the table along with salt. Moreover diet conscious could restrict the craving to one sachet and enjoy the food, the list could goon. Imagine what telecoms has achieved by working at the bottom of the consumer of the pyramid.

Strategic alternatives for Slowdown period

The slowdown in the advanced economies of the world led by USA has had ripple effect in the global

integrated world.The US seems to be struggling to shrug off the impact of poor economic performance.This scenario directly has a bearing on the global trade hurting the economies of the countries & companies dependent upon the US market. China’s manufacturing engine has corrected  its course to serve the internal consumption but same does not hold true for Japan who has been bitten sharply by fall in exports.

Indian IT sector has been hit too as the Americans have begun talking in terms of protecting their labor market & so on. So what are the strategic choices available to Indian IT players?  Let’s understand that strategic alternatives are a product of resource base of an organization. A cash strapped company would have no wait & watch choice in these turbulent times. Lets us examine what an organization can do to tide off the crisis successfully. Before we enlist the choice lets understand that selection of alternatives depends on two major factors; the size of the company and the state of the slow down period.

Size (resourses) of the company would determine the availability of strategic choices in front of the company. Generally conventional wisdom would suggest that you must keep on the established course whatever the state of the demand is. It could hold true for already factored in & expected fluctuations in the demand curve but a skewed number must get the special attention it deserves. The market share of the company must be taken into consideration before chartering a new path.

Second important factor is the state of the slowdown itself. You need to figure out if the slow down period of economy is at the beginning phase, middle or in the ultimate stage. By any stretch of imagination the present crisis do not seem to have reached the final stage though Ben & Barack would want it to be so. US economic data & consumer confidence do not allay our worst fears. Let’s hope President Obama injects the economy a second time with much needed funds.

Therefore if your business has been hit by slowdown, you have following three choices:
1.    Focus on domestic market & lower the revenue projections

2.    Vigorously look for new international orders at lower margins

3.    Invest more in marketing and retain margins

4.    Wait for the good tide & reposition the company

Most traditional companies would go for the first alternative as this looks appealing on the face of it. Others led by dreamer CEOs would go for the second alternative. Third alternative would appeal to those organizations that have a strong need to keep the order books flowing over. And the alternative number four would suit to large corporate that have high liquidity. What’s your choice? Future is always uncertain and most things in the universe are spherical, therefore the chances of recurrence of a phenomenon are always positive. 

The blues of the 'Blue Ocean Strategy' ?

Na i certainly am not interested in writing an unauthorised review of the Blue Ocean Strategy by WC KIm & Renee. The book in fact is inspirational. Its emphasis on finding blue markets through NEW way of analysing the markets is commendable though not really a new idea. Marketing lives on the power of the new and so does life and us. Let us examine some new prodct ideas here:

1 Shirt with three pairs of Changeable collars and cuffs: Twin color shirt: Shirt is the main male dress that has stopped evolving. Why not have a shirt that comes with three pairs of matched cuffs & collars so that it could be worn three times before a wash. Great economy and style that would be.

2. Desi Ghee in Pouch/satchets: Indians eat lots of desi ghee ( Clarified butter). Ghee is bought in Kg packs then used with a measure of spoon for garnishing the curries and vegetables. Why cann't we have Desi Ghee packed in 2-5 gms satches like shampoo and ketch up? Open a satchet and pour into dal or sabji!

3. Joy stick steering in cars: Steering wheel can be replaced with a joy stick to save space in car. It would lead to better driving pleasure as the driver would be able to keep it any place close to the body and saves money. Tata Nano could try that.

4. Classroom Video notes: Indian classroom is based on teacher to group teaching method and the students are hardly encouraged to ask questions. Why not record the teacher's lectures in video format and let the class see. Questions if any can be asked through emial. This would eliminate the need for teacher to go to class and save salary for the institute.

If you need any innovation write me, easy!