Case Analysis of

“Saffola Cooking Oil – The repositioning Journey”

Group 2:
Mohammed Sameer………..PGP04052
Nandha Gopal ……………PGP04056
Shobit Nagori……………..PGP04079
Vineet Kumar Oswal……..PGP04093
Vivek Diwakar……………...PGP04096
Consumption Pattern and Marketing of
Cooking oil in India
• Before 1960s, oil was a commodity product. It was sold by local shops
on weight basis to customers.
• Customers bring their own vessel and fill oil according to their needs
• In India, cooking oil is used in large quantities in households due to
the masala rich dishes
• Customers were not concerned much about ill-health effects of such
heavy oils
• In 1960s, Saffola was the first brand which tried to brand the cooking
oil category
Consumption Pattern and Marketing of
Cooking oil in India
• It created awareness about the light oil (higher PuFA) and its effect on
controlling heart diseases
• It was able to successfully create a niche market of heart disease
related people for itself
• Similar brands like Sundrop, Gold Winner too followed a similar
marketing strategy of highlighting health benefits of light oils and
health dangers of normal commodity oil
• The marketing of cooking oil in India was purely focussed on fear
appeal of ill health and emotional appeal to housewives for taking
care of her family members
Impact of external and internal influences on
the consumption of cooking oil.
• Both the internal influencers & external influencers play a major role in affecting the consumption of cooking
oil.
• The external influences like:
• Recommendation from friends and family
• Availability of local cheaper substitute
• Advertisements efforts by companies
• Doctor’s recommendation
• helps in increasing/decreasing the consumption of packaged cooking oil in general.

• Whereas the internal influencers like:

• Motivation towards healthy lifestyle
• Health issues
• Cultural values
• Taste preferences
they majorly impact the consumption of cooking oils which contain healthy components.
Saffola Advertising Campaigns
• “Hospital” ad of 1991
• It was targeted to wives of heart related patients and was positioned as a life
insurance for heart problems.
• It intended to change the customer behaviour through fear appeal
• “Sehet se jeena hai” ad of 2001
• The ad’s targeting wasn’t specific as it focuses on members all age group in a joint
family. The positioning was of “heart of healthy family”
• The confusion in targeting failed to affect the desired consumer
• “Kal se” ad of 2004
• The ad was targeted to young and middle aged people who show dual attitude of
wanting to lead a healthy life and yet do no take efforts towards it
• The ad appealed to the wives to take control of the variables on their hands, where
oil was portrayed as the first step to a healthy lifestyle