Consumer durable cos bet big on festive frenzy

After a long dry spell of purse-pinching and dampened spirits, the Indian consumer is finally in the mood to loosen his purse-strings yet again. And gearing up for this urge to spluge are consumer durables players who are leaving no stone unturned to spoil them for choice.
Betting big on the festive spirit that began on a buoyant note with Ganesh Chaturthi and will go on through Durga Puja, Dussehra and Diwali and end around New Year, consumer durables players right from LG to Samsung, Sony, Haier and even homegrown majors like Onida have lined up big-ticket budgets with an eye to rake in the moolah.
Apart from the regular freebies that companies typically throw in with purchases this time of the year, most players are trying to charge up consumer interest by unveiling new products packaged with attractive add-ons like free extended warranties, 0% finance schemes and even free tickets to exotic locales.
Korean chaebol LG alone has set aside a whopping Rs 65 crore festive season promotional budget with an eye on riding the festive fever and raking in an eye-popping Rs 3600 crore in the bargain. “Because of changing lifestyle and robust economic growth, this year will be very promising. We expect a growth of around 45% this festive season over last years festive season sales,” a bullish Amitabh Tiwari, national sales head, LG Electronics India told TOI.
Ditto for Chinese biggie Haier, which is banking bigtime on the festive season to not only revive its fortunes in the Indian market but also help it scale the Rs 1,000 crore turnover mark this year.
The company, that bore the brunt of the slow-down last year, has not just recouped lost ground in the first five months of 2010 by clocking revenues of over Rs 350 crore, it is hoping to rake in more than this in just the next three months. Haier’s revenues for 2009 stood at just Rs 350 crore.
“We expect a huge 150% growth this festive season, which may prove to be the catalyst that could catapult our estimated Rs 700 crore revenue target to over Rs 1000 crore by the time the year is up,” says Shanta Roy, head of marketing at Haier India. Conservative Sony too is pulling out the stops. It has lined up a budget of Rs 45 crore for just pitching its latest range of 3D offerings and is hoping to cash in on an explosive growth in the rapidly expanding LED/LCD market this Diwali. “Consumer sentiment is buoyant during the festive season and we plan to cash it through aggressive sales,” says Tadato Kimura, general manager (marketing), Sony India, who expects 30% of the company’s revenues to come from its 3D range by 2012. Ruchika Batra, general manager (corporate communications), Samsung India too is looking forward to a huge spurt in sales this festive season. “We expect a growth of atleast 40% in sales over last year’s festive season. The LED/LCD television segment looks the most promising,” she said.
Samsung, which has already rolled out offers in West Bengal for Durga Puja and the West for Ganesh Chaturthi, is now gearing up to unveil value added offers for Dusshera through Diwali.
Not to be left behind in the race, erstwhile market leaders like Onida, which is also celebrating its 30th year anniversary, are also raising the stakes. In a bid to cash in on the growing flat panel television sets, the company has not just rolled a new range of LED televisions this season it has allotted a whopping Rs 150 crore budget this year, of which a chunk will be used to fire up festive season demand. While the company has woven a campaign around the number 30, during the festive season it offers among other things all expenses paid trip to HongKong for 30 customers and families.
“Despite the fact that these days consumers buy consumer durables around the year, we still expect a 35-45% spike in sales thanks to the festival sentiment and the fact that the economy is back firmly on the growth track,” said K Sriram, vice-president (sales and marketing), Mirc Electronics.