Colgate Wakes Up, Launches New Brand
Colgate Palmolive has restaged its flagship brand, Colgate Dental Cream with a new oral health care product, Colgate Double Protection. The new brand follows the original red and white colours, with a new identifying trait of overlapping two rings with the new benefit proposition, double protection.
The mint flavoured toothpaste is available in 50gms, 100gms and 200gms and is priced at Rs 10.80, Rs 20.40 and Rs 36 per tube respectively. Launched in a phased manner, Colgate Double Protection will initially be available in Mumbai and Delhi.
The changes are subtle so as not to alienate its large base of existing consumers, but are no less significant. Colgate spokespersons insist that the fresh introduction is a totally new product, similar to Colgate Calciguard and Total.
Analysts see the new launch as an obvious response to the sustained onslaught carried out by the Rs 8,743 crore Hindustan Lever in the oral care market. In the last one year, HLL has lopped off about eight percentage points from Colgate's market share in the dental segment, which has dropped to about 53 per cent. Lever's Pepsodent leads Colgate by around 10 percentage points in Bihar and is increasingly posing a big threat in Delhi.
More importantly, the sparring between the two rivals has recently moved from the marketplace to the courtroom. Recently, Lever had successfully petitioned the MRTPC, by restraining Colgate from using the phrase 'ring of confidence' (suraksha chakra) citing a precedent from an US case. Lever's contention was that the phrase was misleading. The MRTPC passed a ruling in early May this year restraining Colgate's use of the phrase.
Colgate then appealed to the Supreme Court, which has since stayed the ruling allowing it to continue the use of the 'suraksha chakra' in its advertisements.
Analysts say that the objective behind the new launch is two-pronged. One, it is a purely defensive move to shore up the brand identity of Colgate Dental Cream, in the event of a protracted legal battle. Secondly, to strengthen Colgate Dental Cream's brand proposition by giving consumers a stronger reason to buy. Says a competitor, "Colgate's apparent gameplan is to sell the product hawking it as an improved version of Colgate Dental Cream."
For the moment, Colgate hopes that its move will slow down its competitor's inroads.