2012

Faculty of Management Studies, Delhi Dipanjan Das, Ravi Kumar Singh, Shekhar Chaudhary

[ Brand Positioning in the Indian Snacks Industry ]

Executive Summary
The Indian snacks market is estimated to be worth Rs 2000 crore and growing at a whopping rate of 30 percent. There are few organized players in the market and a large untapped unorganized market. Hence, it provides a glaring opportunity to grow and thrive in such an environment. Eyeing this opportunity, ITC launched Bingo in the potato chips market. With extensive research behind it and with an aggressive promotion campaign, Bingo was launched to fight head on with the established market leader Frito Lays. This study is an attempt to analyze and understand the marketing environment for the industry in general and Bingo in particular. The report is divided into three parts: we commenced with the SWOT analysis of ITC Bingo wherein we studied the internal and external factors that might affect the marketing strategy of the product. Then we move on to study the consumer behavior in the Indian snacks Industry after which we highlight the various strategies used by Frito Lays and ITCs Bingo to position their products in the minds of the consumer. The consumer buying behavior is also studied through a survey conducted on around 151 respondents. This helped us to gain an insight into the factors, which influence people to buy potato chips. The findings show that many consumers put taste as the first priority for choosing the snacks they want to buy.

Background and Motivation

Snacks are a part of Consumer Convenience/ Packaged Foods segment. A snack is a portion of food oftentimes smaller than that of a regular meal that is generally eaten between meals. Snacks come in a variety of forms including packaged and processed foods and items made from fresh ingredients at home. According to the report by the Associated Chambers of Commerce and Industry of India (ASSOCHAM), the industry would grow at a rate of 15 to 20% annually from the current level of Rs. 7500 crores till 2015. The Indian snack industry is estimated to be over 4,00,000 tons by volume. The branded segment is growing at around 25% per annum due to various reasons like Multiplex culture, snacking at home while watching TV, pubs and bars. Currently the branded segment is much smaller at Rs 2,200 crore, which is what makes it so attractive to food companies that are looking at bigger shares. In the branded snacks market, to get down to basics, Frito Lay commands a share of 45%, followed by Haldirams at 27% and ITC at 16%. The rest is divided between a handful of new entrants, wannabes and many regional players. Of the wide range of snacks available, potato chips constitute a sizeable segment of the Indian snack food industry.The potato chip market is generally an unorganized industry. Nearly all potato chip snack products are manufactured and sold locally. There is also no uniform standard for packaging, as there is in Europe, the United States and other more developed regions. Many snack foods are sold loose or packaged in poly-pouches, which may only be folded, or in some cases, stapled closed. As the Indian economy continues to grow, and production standards

improve, many snack food companies are making significant investments into plant equipment and packaging machinery. Pepsi Foods Ltd., now known as Frito-Lay India Ltd., produces India's largest snack food manufacturer brands, including Ruffles, Hostess, Cheetos and Uncle Chips. Frito Lay's story is an example of how American recipes were adjusted to satisfy local tastes. Procter & Gamble's Pringles brand of potato crisp was launched in Delhi in 1999. Pringles is also a baked potato crisp, unlike many other potato based Indian snack foods that are fried. P&G currently imports the Pringles product and therefore the product has been priced at a premium and is marketed to a micro-niche. The Bingo brand of chips was launched by ITC on 14th March 2007 with an aim to capture at least 25 percent market share of the Rs. 2000 crore branded snack market within five yrs. The launch is symbolic of ITC Foods' distinct approach of introducing innovative and differentiated products in a largely undifferentiated market place. Bingos launch was strategically timed around the World Cup. The idea was to get the consumer to take that first bite. Bingo used combination of leveraging synergies, building on consumer insights and high decibel advertising that can win the game. The company leveraged its existing distribution network and relationship established with farmers.

The Bingo Story

Research before the Launch The research started by sending a cross-functional team of eight individuals across the country to examine the snacking habits of the Indian consumers. After travelling to 14 cities and speaking to more than 1,000 people, the team came back with an insight that Indian consumers were looking for novelty and excitement in existing snacks. The team found that while vada pavs and samosas are still famous, vada pav with cheese and paneer-filled samosas, or for that matter, tomato-flavored khakra were the ones that excited the Indian consumer. Based on this information, the company decided to look at chips with innovative flavors. For the recipes, the company went to the chefs in its hotels. The chefs came up with 16 flavors with innovative twists like bindaas masti chaas, chatkila nimbu achar and tandoori paneer tikkaflavoured potato chips, chilli and tomato-flavored mad angles inspired by khakras and other snacks. The organized snacks category is subdivided into the Traditional segment (Bhujia,Chana etc) dominated by Haldiram. The second category is the Western segment (potato chips,cheese balls,puffs etc) and the Finger snacks segment which is an adaptation of traditional snacks to the

western format. The latter two categories are dominated by the Frito Lay group. ITC has launched an aggressive marketing campaign to gain entry into and capture a sizeable market share in the extremely competitive world of snack foods. Bingos success in the market is backed by ITCs strong distribution network, which allows it to stock its products in shops that previously did not sell snack food. Additionally, ITC Foods provides shopkeepers with plastic molded shelves that allow local vendors a convenient way to stock their product, and the company benefits by increased visibility for its brand. The packaging is very attractive with dominant variant color, crimp border colors and a pictorial view of the flavor. This property of flavor depiction is very informative for consumers and a layman can also associate with it. Bingo has a unique musical sound that is loved by everyone. It is one of the properties that are remembered by everyone and it is used to recall the brand by every age group.

Objectives of the study

Analysis of the potato chips segment in the Indian snacks industry Analysis of the customer penetration strategy employed by Bingo! Analysis of the effectiveness of the Bingos marketing campaign Comparative study of strategies adopted by the major players

Consumer Behavior The job of marketer is to meet and satisfy target customers requirements and desires. Knowing customer" is not a simple task. Understanding the buying behavior of the target market for the product is the essential task of the marketing plan. The job of the marketers is to think customer and to guide the company into developing offers, which are meaningful and attractive to target customers and creating solutions that deliver satisfaction to the customers, profits to customer and benefits to the stakeholders. Marketers must study the customer taste, preferences, wants, shopping and buying behavior because such study provides the clues for developing the new products, price, product changes, messages and other marketing mix elements. Consumer has various types of behavior patterns. Few of them are explained as follows;

Picking
Involves a random choice, here the buyer picks a brand from the available brands, and is indifferent to the brand he buys. Picking occurs when the consumer has Low involvement in the purchase, There is little uncertainty with untried brands

T h e r e a r e few differences between the brands

Variety Seeking
This also involves low consumer involvement, but it requires significant differences between the brands. Variety seeking can also be found when Purchases are made for more than one consumption period When the timing of purchase and the timing of consumption were different

Habitual behavior
Habit generally forms when the consumers are satisfied with the outcomes of the earlier purchases. Habitual buying is characterized by absence of information search and evaluation o alternate brands.

Extended Problem Solving

This occurs when the purchase is of importance to the buyer. This process to occurs during the purchase of complex, high priced products where brands are perceived to be different and are associated with high degree of uncertainty. Under the complex decision-making, the buyer evaluates the brands using choice criteria. Various types of choice criteria are used to evaluate the different brands.

Indian consumer buying behavior analysis

Before nineties, most of Indians were in Picking or impulsive buying behavior regarding the snack industry, as there was not many choices around. We can recall that during our childhood potato chips were considered as Fasting Food (people used to eat during the day long fast, as per Hindu tradition). After economic liberalization, multinational companies such as Pepsi Co and Coke have entered into Indian FMCG market and changed the equation. The major task to market items as potato chips is to bring Consumer from Picking to Variety seeking and then to Problem solving behavior, to change fasting Food to Fast Food.

Market Profile
Snack foods are impulse purchase products, and there is an element of indulgence associated with them. It does not figure very high on the shopping list. A consumer buys it only if it catches his eye at the outlet or is accompanied by a child who finds potato chips a fun snack. So leading players have stressed on attractive packaging and promotions targeted at children to increase consumption. As these products are general fun eat, brand loyalties are not strong and consumers look for novelty and new flavors. There is

no notable difference in consumption pattern across various age groups. One of the major issues while defining taste parameter in India is its huge geographical spread and culture diversity. Taste varies widely across the regions. For instance in south India, banana chips are extremely popular which do not find many acceptances in other parts of the country. In north, Paapri chaat is very successful whereas in Mumbai, Bata Vada /Vada Pao has been a runaway success. Snacks like Chips, Namkeens are others are generally preferred for the daily consumption whereas fun-foods like Cheese balls and Twistys are sold more in schools, Colleges, Railway Platforms and Movie Theatres .Kids generally prefer Fun-Foods whereas all age groups generally prefer Wafers and other snacks. Snacks are mostly consumed during evening time.

Consumer Profile
The Indian consumers are noted for the high degree of value orientation. Such orientation to value has labeled Indians as one of the most discerning consumers in the world. Even, luxury brands have to design a unique pricing strategy in order to get a foothold in the Indian market. Indian consumers have a high degree of family orientation. This orientation in fact, extends to the extended family and friends as well. Brands with identities that support family values tend to be popular and accepted easily in the Indian market.

Indian consumers are also associated with values of nurturing, care and affection. These values are far more dominant than values of ambition and achievement. Product which communicate feelings and emotions gel with the Indian consumers. Apart from psychology and economics, the role of history and tradition in shaping the Indian consumer behavior is quite unique. Perhaps, only in India, one sees traditional products alongside modern products. For example, hair oils and tooth powder existing with shampoos and toothpaste.

SWOT Analysis Of Bingo

The Bingo brand of chips was launched by ITC on 14th March 2007with an aim to capture at least 25 percent market share of the Rs 2000crore branded snack market within five yrs. The launch is symbolic of ITC Foods' distinct approach of introducing innovative and differentiated products in a largely undifferentiated market place. Bingos launch was strategically timed around the World Cup. The idea was to get the consumer to take that first bite

Strengths

Distribution ITC leveraged it traditional businesses to develop new brands for new segments. For example, ITC used its experience of transporting and distributing tobacco products to remote and distant parts of India to the advantage of its FMCG product as BINGO.

Experience ITC had launched other FMCG products (Ashirwad Ata, Minto,Kitchens of India ) and thus it has good experience of food market in India, which can be strength for BINGO.

Skilled Resources ITC has availability of master chefs from its hotel chains to develop new food concepts and tastes for FMCG market. ITC has utilized theses killed resources, to launch BINGO with various tastes.

Capital ITC is a diversified company trading in a number of business sectors including cigarettes, hotels, paper, agriculture, packaged foods and confectionary, branded apparel, personal care, greetings cards, Information Technology, safety matches, incense sticks and stationery. Thus ITC had enough cash flow to launch and sustain, new brand BINGO.

Weaknesses

Cash Flow ITCs original business was traded in tobacco. ITC stands for Imperial Tobacco Company of India Limited. It is interesting that a business that is now so involved in branding continues to use its original name, despite the negative connection of tobacco with poor health and premature death. To fund its cash guzzling FMCG start-up, the company is still dependent upon its tobacco revenues. Cigarettes account for 47 percent of the company's turnover, and that in itself is responsible for 80% of its profits. So there is an argument that ITC's move into FMCG (Fast Moving Consumer Goods) is being subsidized by its tobacco operations. Its Gold Flake tobacco brand is the largest FMCG brand in India - and this single brand alone

hold 70% of the tobacco market. Dependency on Tobacco brand, may harm Bingos reputation as FMCG product and has impact on cash flow.

Availability of raw material and season BINGO is dependent of agriculture products as potato, rice etc. Disturbance in supply of these raw products in time, will have bad impact on BINGO production. Organization

Attention ITC is big company with many division and product diversifications. Thus it is hard for any ITC product to hold the organization attention and commitment for long time.

International Standards Being a domestic player, ITCs Bingo is behind in understanding and adapting international standards of food processing and marketing.

Brand Loyalty Typically Indian consumer is having law brand loyalty for ready made food products.

Low Fat Awareness It is common belief that potato chips and related snacks are highc holesterol food items. Increasing health awareness may keep potential buyer away from purchase due to health consciousness.

Opportunities

Growing Industry The Indian FMCG sector is the fourth largest sector in the economy with a total market size. Quoting the study by McKinsey & Co, a report by the US Department of Agriculture stated "The market size for the food consumption category in India is expected to grow from US$ 155billion in 2005 to US$ 344 billion in 2025 at a compound annual growth rate of 4.1 per cent."

Untapped Market Growing middle class and new life style in India, has created opportunity for many FMCG products for untapped market.

Emerging India Internet and TV media has increased the awareness of different world culture and their food habits. Indian consumer is started looking for new tastes and willing to pay bit extra price for that. Expanding Mal lculture, multiplexes and other avenues create new marketing opportunities for snack industry.

Globalization Increased global trade has opened door for domestic market to international players and in same fashion triggered new opportunities for domestic players as ITC for international consumer.

Brand awareness Due to innovative marking strategies and available platforms for advertisement (TV channels, news media, Commercial radio channels), Indian consumer is slowly changing, his buying behavior from seeking to problem solving. Brand awareness in FMCG marketing is increasing.

Low Fat Inclination Due to increasing health awareness, consumer is more inclined to consume, law fat food items. Marketing products under Law fat category, will increase the acceptance rate in market.

Threat

Competition with Multinational brands The obvious threat is from competition, both domestic and international. Western companies will see India as an exciting opportunity for themselves to find new market segments for their own offerings. ITC's opportunities are likely to be opportunities for other companies as well. Marketing team of ITC has stiff task to establish BINGO in highly competitive snack market, which is dominated by multinational

companies as, FritoLays. Due to high investment and international experience of snack industry, Fritolays has higher consumer visibility, brand value and market penetration.

Regional players Regional players as Balaji Wafers, poses threat to Bingos market share due to their lower prices. Regional brands have better knowledge of local taste and consumer behavior

Agriculture Dependency As other FMCG products, BINGO is also dependent on agriculture raw materials as potato, rice grains, chili etc. Irregular nature of monsoon has always make agriculture market on mercy of rain god. A bad monsoon can bring monstrous price hike in agriculture products which may have adverse impact on FMCG market.

Internal Competition ITC is a diversified company trading in a number of business sectors including cigarettes, hotels, paper, agriculture etc. Thus if a particular rproduct of ITC, fails in achieving the required market share or change in companys business strategies, may end the life of the product. There is possibility that BINGO is facing threat from other ITC products.

Prevalence of cultural taste Regional Indian snacks such as Vada-Pao, Idli Sambar, Pau Bhavi, Bhajiyaa,etc still have huge following and poses threat for Bingo.

Government Taxation Heavy tax on FMCG products will bring price hike and hurt the sales of the product.

Market Segmentation Indian market is highly segmented and divided. It is very difficult to segment country such diverse as India. Following are the high level market segment, used to define target audience of the product.

The Socialites - Socialites belong to the upper class. They prefer to shop in specialty stores, go to clubs on weekends, and spend a good amount on luxury goods. They are always looking for something different. They are the darlings of exclusive establishments. They go for high value, exclusive products. Socialites are also very brand conscious and would go only for the best known in the market. The Conservatives - The Conservatives belong to the middle class. The conservative segment is the reflection of the true Indian culture. They are traditional in their outlook, cautious in their approach towards purchases, spend more time with family than in partying and focus more on savings than spending. Slow in decision-making, they seek a lot of information before making any purchase. They look for durability and functionality but at the same time is also image conscious. They prefer high value consumer products, but often have to settle for the more affordable one. These habits in turn affect their purchasing habits where they are trying to go for the middle and upper middle level priced products. The Working Women - The working woman segment is the one, which has seen a tremendous growth in the late nineties. This segment has opened the floodgates for the Indian retailers. The working woman today has grown out of her long-standing image of being the homemaker. Today, she is rubbing shoulders with men, proving herself to be equally good, if not better. Working women have their own mind in decision to purchase the products that appeal to them. Indias Rich - Indias rich can be categorized into various categories and all have their distinct buying behavior. Rural Consumer - About three quarters of the Indian population are in the rural areas and with the growing middle class, specially in the Indian cities, the spillover effect of the growing urban middle class is also felt in the rural areas

Segmentation and Marketing Strategies

There are high visible segments of Indian society and there will be many more segments present, given the vast diversity of the country. Within above mentioned segments, there will be sub category of age groups, cultural inclination, gender aspirations etc. Each market segment requires to be addressed in specific way. The attributes, which, rich rural consumer wants from product or visual language which rural consumer understand may not pitch the urban rich in same manner. Marketer requires to design different promotional campaigns for various segments. Frito Lays What Your Program campaign was designed for urban youth, and thus advertisement locations were urban, (city Buss, college Canteen), while Kurkures tedha hei to mera hei campaign was to woo rural consumer and thus advertisement

locations and language was rustic. Its not just ad campaigns, but overall packaging should be segment specific. ITCs Bingos spicy (Masala) flavors, as RED chili, Mad Angles, etc. are mostly packed in bright colors as RED, GREEN, to symbolize spiciness of the product, while Bingos non-spicy flavor International Cream and Onion flavor, packed in sky blue color to symbolize the nature of the product.

MARKETING POSITIONING FOR PEPSI CO PRODUCTS

To gain the market share in Snack industry and position Frito lays food products with brand differentiation, Pepsi Co has chosen Bollywood stars such as Saif Ali Khan and Juhi Chawla to endorse their products Lays potato Chips and Kurkure, respectively.

Brand Management: Lays TAG Line: No one can eat just one

Pepsi Co has targeted rich/upper middle class urban youth, who has enough money to buy bit expensive lays potato chips. To give the vision of Lays to Indian consumer, Saif Ali Khan was selected for his boyish and boy-next-door appeal. Image of Saif Ali Khan was mostly contributed by his landmark-hit film Dil Chahta Hai , as an innocent, cute and charming youth. Pepsi Cos targeted audience, urban Youth, can easily identify themselves with Saif Ali Khan. On due course, cricketers as Mohammad Kaif and Mahendra Dhoni as well as Bollywood stars Priety Zinta and Rahul Khanna, endorsed Lays potato chips along with Saif Ali Khan.

Following are example, of year 2003, of Ad campaign, positioning Lays as youth brand:

A young man at a restaurant places his order to the waiting chef for the day's special dish-a Bar-b-que style chicken.

The enthusiastic chef places a plate of chips on his table and coaxes him to try it. He doubtfully tastes one...

...and relishes it. MVO: "Pehli baar, Lay's potato chips mein bar-b-que style chicken ka mast swaad."

He licks the plate clean and orders for a second to the chef as the super appears, 'No one can eat just once.'

The TVC opens with a Dhoni fan spotting the cricketer in an elevator.

The fan pleads Dhoni to say hi! The logical mind of Dhoni to him when his friends are scolds him, asking to stay around. Dhoni is hesitant to do away from nagging fans. so.

Dhoni ignores the rational mind and chooses to be "Dillogical" The fan acts pricey and tells by approaching the fan and Dhoni not to disturb him. saying hi!

While moving away with his friends, the fan thanks Dhoni for being sporting.

Brand Management: Kurkure TAG Line: Tedha Hei par Mera Hei Product wise Kurkure was more traditional then Lays. Pepsi Co wanted to position Kurkure as family brand. While Lays was positioned to woo Indian urban youth, Kurkure was positioned to attack upper middle class families, both in rural and urban India. Juhi Chawla as senior Bollywood actress was best suitable for the role. Women and Men of age group of 35-45, can easily identify themselves with Juhi. Juhis decent public image and cute acting style, along with her age, perfectly satisfies the criteria for Kurkure.

Following are the example of Kurkure, positioning as family brand:

Advertisement Campaign of Judwa, featuring Kareena Kapoor to counter, Bingo Effect.

Major Promotional Campaigns By Pepsi Co for Lays and Kurkure

SL. No 1 2

Brand Campaign No One can eat Just One New Lays Chaat street

Brand Name Lays Potato Chips Lay's Chaat Street

Brand Ambassador Saif Ali Khan Saif Ali Khan, Priety Zinta, Rahul Khanna Saif Ali Khan and Others Saif Ali Khan, Juhi Chawla and others Mahendra Dhoni

3 4 5

Whats the Programme Chala Change Ka Chakkar Be a little Dillogical

Lays Mint Mischief Pepsi Co Foods Lays

6 7 8 9 10 11

Be a little Dillogical Kahanai Mein Twist Chai Time Achievers Award Teda hai par mera hai No Fun Without Desipan To is Diwali Muh Kurkure Karo

Lays Indian Curry Masala Kurkure Kurkure Kurkure Kurkure Desibeats Kurkure

Saif Ali Khan and others Juhi Chawla Juhi Chawla Juhi Chawla Kareena Kapoor Juhi Chawla

MARKETING POSITIONING FOR ITCs Bingo As Pepsi Co has used Celebrity Power to position its products for particular market segment, ITC has used totally different kind of marketing strategy to launch its product Bingo. Bingo is not endorsed by any Celebrity power or high technology.

Major Strategies Adopted by ITC for Bingo

Product Assortment of flavors and eye catchy packaging. Bingo positioned itself with its Indian flavors such as Tandoori Paneer, Tikka, and Spice Paneer etc. The segmentation was mainly done on basis of the age of the people. The offerings under the Finger Snacks segment are unique and innovative

Packaging ITC has done the packaging such that the product attracts the buyer. It launched packs with different quantity keeping in mind thespecific consumer demand.

Price Initial pricing of ITC bingo is a direct frontal attack on Frito Layswith pricing of Rs 5, 10 and 20.

Place Widespread availability at big and small retailers across the country. ITC has adopted a Market Challenger strategy with the launch of Bingo

It has chosen a combination of flank and frontal attack against the market leader Frito Lay ITC has made a strategic alliance with Future group. The Company has distributed more than 4 lakh large racks, to display the brand at all points of sale. The racks created so much impact that even competitors like market leader Frito-Lays introduced its own version of wafer racks

Promotions Bingos launch was strategically timed around the World Cup. Within a month of the launch of the initial advertisements, 70% of the viewers could recall the brand thus capturing a share of the mind of the consumers Bingo's advertising follows the AIDA model. No Brand Ambassador Comes in unique shapes for better recognition Brand recall along with 16 flavors

Due to aggressive and well planned marketing strategy, Bingo has gained the market share of approximately 16%. Market leader PepsiCo has been forced to launch product Desi beats to counter Bingo-mania.

Brand Management for Bingo

TAG Line: Great Combination, No Confusion

Television Ad Campaign: Bingos launch was strategically timed around the World Cup to cash in on the tremendous popularity that such leisure and cocktail snacks would find among cricket lovers in the country. The idea was to get the consumer to take that first bite. Not only the flavors but also the advertising was supposed to have an Indian touch. Within a month of the launch of the initial advertisements, 70%of the viewers could recall the brand thus capturing a share of themind of the consumers. Brand recall along with 16 flavors in three SKUs helped ITC to capture 16% of market share in just 18 months. Bingo has managed to do a dent in Lays market share. Is the fact that ITC spend close to 3 years researching, finding and analyzing the Finger snack segment to come up with its own indigenous variety responsible for Bingo's success The 'insanity' in Bingo's promotion is a carefully knitted strategy that was instrumental in Bingo's instant success. Marketing Guru's call it "Disruptive Advertisement" This is one those cases where advertisement/promotion has been the biggest factor in the success of a brand. The fact that ITC has a well established distribution network has also helped it increase consumer interaction points. The advertising strategy used humor to sell

Bingo. Bingos advertising follows the AIDA model (Attention, Interest, Desire, Action). The clutterbreaking ads with their slapstick humor and irrelevant themes garnered enough eyeballs to create awareness of the product and generate an interest towards the product in the minds of consumers. The ads are simply insane & nonsensical to the point of being bizarre & utter crap. And that is why they are so funny. This resulted in high product trials. Whats interesting is the fact that Lays uses a brand ambassador approach with the celebrities having mass appeal such as Saif Ali Khan, Juhi Chawla & M S Dhoni whereas Bingo has managed to do well without one. It still doesn't have an ambassador.

On television, the company booked 10 to 15 spots per channel per day on youth channels such as MTV and Star World, mass Hindi channels like Zee and Star TV, and news channels. It also had around 20 spots on a variety of radio channels and advertised in most leading national dailies. In the top-30 cities, over 1,000 outdoor hoardings advertised the product. According to industry estimates, ITC spent close to Rs 100 crore on marketing. The adverts, which were full of humor, cheesy &nonsense jokes, and relevancy with the brand, helped in establishing the brand Bingo. The adverts were irrelevant from the product point of view, they were relevant and totally associated with the brand image (which was also present in its tagline - No confusion, only great combinations).

Following is the promotional example of Bingo, placing Comedy as central theme. With the help of all GREAT COMBINATION, NO CONFUSION campaign

ITC finally tasted success in Bingo in 2008 when it became a profitable business for the first time since its launch in 2007.

Research Methodology
We had designed a questionnaire, which was circulated on social networking site and also mailed to specific people to gather responses from a diverse sample. The questionnaire is attached in the Appendix for reference. We have 151 responses for our survey. This primary data was analyzed with the help of Microsoft Excel and plotted into various graphs. On the basis of the Graphs and the study of our primary data conclusion were made regarding the consumer behavior, and how consumers perceive the various brands in the Indian snack industry. Various websites were refereed for the secondary data, the details of which are given in the references.

Analysis From the responses to our questionnaire, we find that PepsiCo (Lays and Kurkure) is still the most preferred brand with ITC Bingo being close on its heels.

From the 151 responses that we received, we found out that Lays is the most preferred choice of consumers with 64% and 23% responders marking Lays as their first and second choice respectively. Kurkure remained at the second place with 23% and 44% responders marking Kurkure as their first and second preference respectively. Bingo came third with 53% of the responders marking Bingo as their third preference. Recently launched Aliva secured last place with 74% of responders marking Aliva as 4 th preference. We also asked consumers their choice of preference while purchasing the above mentioned products and asked them to divide their preferences into taste, price, availability, TV advertisements, their brand loyalty, quantity, health and design & packaging. Surprisingly, contrary to popular beliefs, taste and not price was the major driving force behind their choice. As much as 83% of the responders gave taste as their first preference whereas availability was the second most important factor with 34% and 32% of the responders marking it as their first and second choice respectively. Only 19% of the responders marked price as their first preference, 30% as their second preference.

Considering the frequency of consumption of ready to eat snacks we found that 43% of responders like to consume such products once in a while, 8% completely avoid them whereas 38% consume them on a regular basis.

67% of the responders indicated that they buy such snacks from local stores, 30% from supermarkets whereas only 3% like to buy from vending machines followed by no consumers buying them online!

Coming to the taste part, we observe that 63% of responders are open to experimenting with new tastes while the rest are satisfied with a single taste itself and would like to continue with the same.

As this is a low involvement product, the responses also indicate that most consumers buy it on an impulse basis. 52% buy on impulse, 30% buy what is easily available and only 18% actually plan ahead about what they are going to buy.

Conclusion The snack food industry is a fast growing industry especially in the Indian market, where the rural areas still act us an untapped market ready for the taking. From our survey, it is clear that although Bingo has made remarkable market share in just a few years, it still has a long way to have an equal footing with the Pepsi Co products (Lays and Kurkure). However, to enter a market that was dominated by Lays and have such a huge market share in such a short time is a bold achievement. However, Pepsi Co is not taking this down easily, it has come up with aggressive campaigns. It has launched Aliva to woo the health conscious consumer. It is coming up with new flavours on a regular basis to match the variety offered by Bingo. However, Bingo too has responded by coming up with products that have different shapes. Our survey has shown that despite growing at a fast rate, Bingo still lacks behind Lays and Kurkure. With their prices being equal, the competition has come down to taste and varieties being offered. Each candidate is trying to outsmart the other in this section, coming up with new flavours, new shapes to gain more consumers. The market is still open, and although Bingo is fast climbing in sales, only time will tell whether it can come at the same footing as Lays.

References http://www.foodnavigator-asia.com/Markets/Indian-packaged-food-industry-to-soar-Report http://www.warc.com/LatestNews/News/EmailNews.news?ID=29971 http://articles.economictimes.indiatimes.com/2012-03-25/news/31236693_1_market-share-parleproducts-snacks-segment http://www.business-standard.com/india/news/itc-foods-not-so-straight/453435/ http://pepsicoindia.co.in/ http://www.itcportal.com/itc-business/fmcg/foods/bingo.aspx http://www.afaqs.com/

Survey Used

Indian Snack Foods - A Brand Positioning Perspective

1) What is your order of preference for the following ready to eat snacks: * (1 - First Choice, 4- Last Choice) 1 Lays Kurkure Bingo Aliva 2) What are your major criteria for rating the above mentioned products * (1 - Highest 5 Lowest) 1 Price Taste TV Advertisements Loyalty Quantity Health Availability 2 3 4 5 2 3 4

1 Design and Packaging

3) How frequently do you consume dry ready to eat Snack Food * Often Once in a while Rarely Avoid it

4) Where do you prefer to buy your ready to eat dry snack food * Local Stores Supermarket Online market Vending Machine

5) Do you like to try different flavors or prefer the same flavor? * Single Different

6) Rate the above products in order in which you can relate to their TV Advertisements * (1- Most Related, 5 - Least Related) 1 Lays Kurkure Bingo Aliva 2 3 4 5

7) Do you feel the below mentioned products justify their advertisement? * (1- Most Justified, 5 - Least Justified) 1 Lays Kurkure Bingo Aliva 2 3 4 5

8) When Purchasing ready to eat dry snack food ( Lays, Kurkure, Bingo,Aliva) , what do you usually do? Plan ahead what you are about to buy Buy what is available in the store Buy impusively on seeing the packets

I am * Male Female

My Age Group is * Under 20 20-29 30-39 40-49 50 and above

Thank you for taking the survey. Your opinion is really important for us.