Branded products score high on Diwali gifts

After a year of dimness due to the economic slowdown that resulted in business uncertainty, Diwali seems to have lifted the spirits of the branded products distribution industry to some extent.

“Last Diwali, the trend was more towards lesser-priced customised gifting and less towards branded products. The game changer this year is that corporates are going in for branded products,” says Phani Raj, managing director of corporate gifts and brand merchandising company, eYantra Industries.

For instance, an Indian hospital chain has placed orders with eYantra for 32,000 Cadbury festive packs, while a mobile company based out of Gurgaon released an order for 530 LCD televisions. Also, a Bangalore-based software giant released a large order for TVs, DVD players, rice cookers and mobiles numbering 1,700.

 

The distinct shift to branded products for this Diwali is because companies delayed taking decisions on gifting. Organising customised products in a short span of time is difficult and hence corporates are moving towards readily-available branded products, reasons Raj.

The overall corporate gifting market in India (both organised and unorganised) was Rs 6,000 crore last year, of which Diwali constituted Rs 2,000 crore.

eYantra, with revenues of Rs 50 crore last year, currently has 650 clients that include Microsoft, Dr Reddy’s, Wipro, Infosys, Accenture, Bharthi Cements, ACC Cements, Zuari Cements, Dell, TCS, Oracle, Max New York Life and MRF Tyres.

“With orders coming in for branded products like LCDs, microwave ovens and induction cookers, and about 70 per cent of our clientele expected to give us orders, we hope to grow by 27 per cent this Diwali,” Raj adds.

Malvan Cunha, chief executive of Elegant Novelties, which distributes branded products of companies like P&G, Cavincare, Modi Revlon and Belmonte, says companies are increasingly looking for branded products that are useful and relevant to the recipient.

Elegant received orders for close to 8,000 Cadbury festive packs and 1,000 pieces of Prestige cookers, among others, for this Diwali. “Courtesy the shift to branded products from the earlier unbranded gifts like sweet boxes and dry fruits, we anticipate a 10 per cent growth this Diwali, over last year,” Cunha adds.

However, brand-domain experts like Harish Bijoor, chief executive of Harish Bijoor Consults Inc, a private-label consulting firm that specialises in brand and business strategy, believe that obscenely-budgeted gifts will see a downtrend this Diwali.

Terming the corporate gifting market in India as a “cottage industry”, Bijoor says inflation in terms of prices has hit the sector hard. “The trend of eatables such as dry fruits and nuts and chocolates and sweets will reign high. There, however, is a bigger yen of customers to receive branded gifts, particularly when it is a gift of high-value. Further, websites of every kind offer branded items at good prices today. This is the new dimension to gifting today. Group discount sites are yet another added dimension of this year's gifting market,” he adds.

Drawing a line between the positive and negative aspects of corporate gifting, Bijoor says gifts received from vendors are being compared against one another and this causes a kind of “positive goodwill” for one year towards the one who has gifted greater value.