Spirit W | Men's personal care going from manual to electrical: Philips India's Anurita Chopra

While ‘grooming’ was essentially associated to women, many personal care brands have altered this mindset over the last few years. As men in India, like their global counterparts go ‘metro’, we now see men endorsing fairness cream, male-deodorants, face-washes, soaps, grooming-gadgets etc. Most of these brands insist on men having the ‘perfect look’ thus constantly innovating their product offerings.
   
Following this line is Philips India which recently launched new male grooming range with Bollywood actor Arjun Kapoor as their brand ambassador.

Adgully caught up with Anurita Chopra, Director Marketing, Personal Care, Philips India to know more about the recent initiatives at Philips India, the organisation’s company growth, plans that lay ahead and more. Anurita, in her current role heads the personal care business at Philips India.

Speaking about the target group of consumers Philips India is now is focusing on, Chopra said, “Philips India recently launched entire trimming range QT 4000, QT 4500, QT4011, products which caters to different age group of males - 14 years onwards. We have Arjun Kapoor on board as brand ambassador for our male grooming business, which offers a range of grooming gadgets for men including trimmers, shavers and stylers. It’s not that we are not focusing on female consumers but yes right now we are focused on male grooming range.”

It is understood that any product or service launch has large volumes of research that goes into the birth of that product or service. Chopra said that the findings of a recent Philips research survey revealed that 91% women dislike men with hard facial skin and get turned on by males with smooth facial skin and while 54% women find men with styled facial hair more attractive. “Keeping this trend in mind, Philips Male Grooming has introduced an array of products in its portfolio to cater to all sort of facial hair styling needs of men including the revolutionary wet and dry shaver Aquatouch and  the world’s first laser guided beard trimmer. India as a country has seen a significant shift in the way women want their men to look”, she elaborated.

Speaking of competition in the personal care sector, and Philips India’s strategies to beat the heat, Chopra said, “Philips Personal Care is the market leaders and we are the one who have and are creating the category. We are the ones who are changing the market from manual to electrical. For our consumers we have products available in different price range according to their needs like from Rs1100- Rs.4000 to interesting innovations lead trimmers like razor glided trimmers for Rs.8000. We have even superior product ranges from Rs. 16000-Rs.17000 as well”.

At this launch, speaking about the expansion plans and future extensions of product portfolio, she said, “At Philips, we are constantly involved in the making of new products and look at widening our portfolio. This year has been great for Philips India so far. We have a very small presence in metros, but we are expanding ourselves fast in tier II and III towns as well.”

As far as marketing and promotions at Philips India is concerned, Chopra stated that expanding in traditional trade, modern trade and online is the strategy as their audience lies there and thus with this they ensure to leverage themselves through these channels. Elaborating further about distribution plans, Chopra said, “Its direct reflection of where youth shops today. So we find people shopping in regular traditional trade but also modern trade and online shopping. Our strategy is to exactly gear to see these changing trends in the market and to leverage them.”

Sharing about the strength of the company, she said, “There is one big strength we have; we do a lot of consumer work so lot of portfolio’s are designed keeping consumer’s need in mind. Our male trimming products are designed keeping Indian hair needs in mind. In India electricity is a problem especially in rural India so we have products which can be charged and use even without electricity for certain duration so that you work doesn’t get stuck. And I think that’s our strength, for us everything starts from the consumers.”

She mentions that men’s grooming products are a key focus area of growth for Philips Consumer Lifestyle division in the country. Personal Care, specifically the male grooming portfolio, has been the fastest growing category for Philips in India.
 
Arunita Chopra belongs to a marketing background as she has done her MBA (Marketing) from SP Jain Institute of Management & Research, Mumbai and started her career as marketing consultant.

As a consumer marketing professional with over 12 years of category and brand management experience across leading brands like Nokia, KurKure (PepsiCo) and Bru (HUL), she has created, launched and sustained power brands through innovative campaigns that are both global as well as India-rooted. She has received multiple external & internal recognition for innovation, creative excellence and impact at forums like Cannes, AdClub, Emvies.  [By Ranjana Gupta| Twitter: @RGrightsreserve]