In the cluttered Rs 2100 crore deo market once pioneered by axe now has a new leader -Fogg
Showing posts with label Axe. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Axe. Show all posts
Tuesday, 17 December 2013
Friday, 14 June 2013
Axe deo is facing the fiercest competition in its life in India with local and MNC deo brands breathing down its neck. According to certain reports that came in ET Now's Brand Equity show, the brand had lost its leadership position in the Indian market to the new entrant Fogg.
One of the reason for the trouble is that Axe's positioning has been under threat. almost all deo brands has been aping the positioning theme of Axe thereby diluting the brand's uniqueness in the Indian market. Axe was not able to do much about it and continued with its strategy of frequent launches of new variants and importing ads from its global markets.
For a change, Axe decided to go local in its promotional strategy and roped in the current Bollywood heartthrob Ranbir Kapoor to endorse the brand. The news came as a surprise since Axe never ( in my knowledge) ran a campaign using a celebrity in India.
Axe launched its new variant Axe Blast with the new celebrity endorsement . The ad is currently on air.
Watch the ad here : Axe Ranbir Ad
What was shocking is that the ad is the exact copy of an older ad ( more than 7 years) of Axe Clicker which is a variant available in markets outside India. The Axe Clicker brand featured Ben Affleck .
Watch the ad here : Axe Ben Affleck
Now if the brand Axe can afford to bring Ranbir to the fold, why did the brand chose to just copy an old theme and present it in the Indian market ?
Its so cheap a strategy to adopt in an era where information is available to everyone. And its a totally a wrong move when the competition is eating away the share. Ranbir will get eyeballs and may in the short-run help the brand to reinforce the existing awareness.The current approach is sending warning signals regarding the laziness of the marketing department in attempting to find an easy way out rather than brainstorming on developing a differentiation strategy to take on the competition.
Friday, 12 October 2012
Axe deo , the market leader in the Rs 1000 crore Indian deo market has extended itself to soaps. In the typical Unilever style of experimenting with successful brands the current guinea pig brand is Axe. The rationale is very simple a) The soap market is witnessing a growth while deo market is now full of competition
b) With Cinthol brand becoming unisex, there is a vacuum for a men's soap brand and Axe is the best fit for filling the gap.
c) The lure for incremental profits from an established brand.
Indian soap market is around Rs 6500 crore and the men's grooming market is around Rs 1500 crore ( Economic Times). The brand may be looking to become an umbrella brand endorsing multiple products across the men's grooming category. The big question is whether these extensions will make the original deo brand vulnerable ?
I think so.
I wonder why Axe is being extended when there is so much competition in the deo market. Axe is now attacked both on positioning front as well as on product attributes front. The Axe positioning is aped by most of the deo brands to the point that everything is so predictable and boring. Now HUL is further diluting the brand by its extension into a different category.
The new extension carries the same positioning as the Original Axe brand . Axe bathing bar has the tagline " Engineered for Guys ". The ad campaign follows the same theme as the Axe Deo brand.
Watch the ad here : Axe Deo
Priced at a premium of Rs 35, Axe expects the brand loyalists to be the early adopters for this brand. HUL will be leveraging on its huge distribution strength and its reach to make sure that Axe Bathing Bar is available across the markets. To be fair to this experiment, Axe globally also is extended to various categories like Body Wash, Talcum powder etc but none of the extensions has been as successful as the original product. The same will be the case in the case of Axe Soap also.
Monday, 1 October 2012
Brand : Denim
Company : Hindustan Unilever
Brand Analysis Count : 515
Company : Hindustan Unilever
Brand Analysis Count : 515
Denim is one of the oldest deodorant brands in India. Although the brand's original launch date is not known, the brand is in existence even before Axe deo's launch in 1996. The brand had a fair share in the Indian market before being eclipsed by Axe Deo.
Axe deodorant's launch was the event that triggered the near annihilation of Denim brand in India. Axe virtually captured the entire male deodorant market and Denim was left in the sidelines.
HUL felt that there was no need for two brands with almost similar brand personalities and decided to choose Axe as the major focus area.During that time, there was a brand rationalization exercise code named " Power Brand" strategy where Levers decided to prune the number of brands in its portfolio.
How ever Denim had a small but loyal customer base ( like me). There was something innate for the brand which forced HUL to retain the brand but not as a standalone brand. In 2002, Denim was merged with Axe . Denim had a reasonable presence in the men's grooming market with Talcum Powder ( 4% share) , After Shave ( 18%) and Shaving Cream (8%). The deo was retained as a Product Line Extension of Axe and other products were axed.
From then on, Denim was staying in the Indian market as a variant thus satisfying many loyal consumers who ware initially charmed by the fragrance, brand name and the character of this brand.
In early 2012, HUL began to turn its attention to Denim . Without much promotion, Denim was again relaunched as an independent brand. Denim was heavily pushed at the retailer shelves as a low priced deo and Axe endorsement was removed. When most of the deos were at Rs 130 -200 price point, Denim was retailed at Rs 100. Now the company have started promoting Denim through television campaigns.
Watch the ad here : Denim Deo ad
The brand retains the original positioning and the classic tagline " For the man who doesn't have to try too hard".
The Denim brand has moved from an Independent brand to a Line Extension and then to an Independent brand. The brand name has moved from Denim to Axe Denim and to Denim. Where in the marketing textbook we see such a branding strategy !!! We can see these kind of funny experiments only from HUL which houses the best marketing minds of India. In a span of ten years a brand being repositioned twice and brand name changed twice !!
One thing needs to be appreciated is that even though Denim was migrated to Axe, HUL made sure that Denim's brand character is not lost by retaining the brand elements like the color. This has helped the firm to relaunch Denim as an independent brand without confusing the consumer.
Denim is now the low priced flanker brand for Axe. Denim will protect the Axe brand from the low priced local brands which is nibbling away Axe's share by imitating the positioning. Denim also stands a chance to develop volume from the loyalists and also those looking for a VFM deo brand.
As a consumer who loved the brand, I am happy that Denim had regained its individuality.Beyond price, there is some powerful brand elements like the brand name , fragrance and a character that still have potential to make this a worthwhile player in the deo category.
Wednesday, 18 August 2010
Brand : Addiction Body Spray
Company : Mankind Pharma
Brand Analysis Count : 461
It looks like that Indian marketers will make deodorant/body spray - a commodity. The plethora of the new products that is now flooding the market together with horrible brand campaigns took the charm away from this category.
The latest kid on the block is the Addiction brand from Mankind pharma. Mankind was in recent news for the high profile launch of their condom brand Manforce.
Addiction body spray joins the tribe of brands like Fuel, Denver, Wild Stone taking on the market leader Axe directly by copying its positioning. All these brands have the same positioning, same message and some horrible campaigns to spread the message.
Addiction is no better.
For a change, Addiction brand has roped in the actor Neil Nithin Mukesh as the celebrity endorser . The brand is currently running a campaign featuring the celebrity.
Watch the ad here : Addiction Deo
The campaign talks about the same stuff that of the competing brands. The hunk uses the deo, girls fall for the fragrance,chases the hunk, jealous girlfriend desperately tries to prevent other girls from seducing the hunk...
Yuck !
These ads have become disgusting.
Addiction body spray has taken the attribute of " long lasting fragrance " as the main point of differentiation. The differentiation is meaningful and not many deos have concentrated on that attribute. But " long lasting " is too basic an attribute and can be easily copied by the competitor ( if they really care to). But going by the trend , most of the deo/body spray brands rely on occasional bursts of campaigns and seldom focus on longterm brand building campaigns. What the market will witness will be more hunks and more flesh.
Addiction has taken up the tagline " Lasts long, really long " which is a clean copy of the tagline of Amaron batteries. The creatives should have thought of something better for the brand.
Addiction in their campaign has called itself as a body spray rather than a deo. Deodorant and body sprays serve the same purpose of preventing body odor and smelling good. The basic difference is that Deos are used specifically to prevent body odor hence it is applied directly to the odor producing areas like under-arms . Body Sprays are used for its fragrance . (I am not sure whether Addiction brand is a deodorant body spray or just a perfumed body spray).
I wonder whether Indian consumers need another deo brand like Addiction. Having said that , there is a space for a strong competitor for a brand like Axe. None of these challenger brands have lived up to the hype they created. If you go to any supermarket, you will see the difference. Axe lives up to its position of a market leader with strong visibility in the shelves and these competitors are bundled together and kept aside. It is doubtful that any of these deo brands have managed to create a meaningful differentiation strong enough to compete with Axe.
At the same time, Axe is witnessing an erosion of its core positioning and in future will struggle to excite the consumers with its campaigns. It is a fail-fail situation for the brands in this category.
Addiction could have created an impact if it had tried something different from the theme of seduction. Focusing on a higher aspirational attribute like success, confidence, energy, self esteem etc would have helped the brand break the clutter. Rather than taking the path less traveled, Addiction preferred the path taken by other brands - which will eventually lead this brand to grave.
Sunday, 11 January 2009
Axe is a marketing phenomenon. This brand knows how to keep excitement ticking in the market. Last year saw the controversial Axe Dark Temptation making headlines . The brand has started 2009 with yet another launch - Axe 3 deo.
This is a unique innovative product where the brand asks the consumer to use two Axe Deos to gether to make a new fragrance. So Axe 3 comes in a combi-pack of two fragrances and the consumer can make a third one by spraying the two deos together.
Watch the
ad here : Axe 3 Smart move indeed. Has anybody thought of combining two deos for a new fragrance ? ..
Axe 3 was launched in other markets in 2007 as a limited edition product.
A typical Axe 3 packs contains two deos marked 1 & 2. These cans should be sprayed together for a new fragrance.
The question is why should a consumer spend double the money for deos ? Why should he use two together and blow away double the money ?
A typical Axe 3 packs contains two deos marked 1 & 2. These cans should be sprayed together for a new fragrance.
The question is why should a consumer spend double the money for deos ? Why should he use two together and blow away double the money ?
The answer is that the brand does not expect every one to do so...
This is a product launched to keep the excitement going. That is the purpose of limited editions. All those Axe fans will try out this new product and competitors will have tough time matching this brand .
Axe has always been an unconventional brand. These seemingly outrageous innovations are in line with the brand's core positioning. And these launches gives enough reasons for Axe to advertise and that keeps the brand on top of the share of mind.
Related Brand
Axe
End Note : Neither the HUL website or the Axe Effect website carry any information about this new product launch. It is sad that a professional company like HUL did not have the common sense of regularly updating its websites.
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