The Hindu Business Line : Baskin Robbins plans strategic alliances targeting youth

ICE-CAREAM major Baskin Robbins is looking at forging strategic alliances with brands targeting the youth. The 15-year-old ice-cream brand is unleashing a fresh marketing strategy targeting the youth by associating with media and consumer brands, which are already addressing this segment.

Speaking to Business Line, Mr Pankaj Chaturvedi, CEO, Baskin Robbins, said, "We are looking at a new marketing strategy. It involves strategic tie-up with brands targeting young adults." Addressing young adults in the age group of 19-35, Baskin Robbins hopes to enter into strategic alliances with soft drink majors in the foods industry and even non-food categories such as media companies owing satellite channels targeting young audiences. "Apart from considering soft drink majors such as Coke and Pepsi, we would also be approaching satellite channels for strategic tie-ups whereby we would be supporting it on ground activities while it airs the brand as part of its programming," states Mr Chaturvedi.

Having shed its perception of being a `highly priced' premium brand in the country, Baskin Robbins is today moving away from price-related issues and instead focussing on its product offerings.

"While there was a wrong price perception in the past, we also realised that we were growing horizontally and not vertically. Just having more number of stores did not exactly lead our franchise partner to make profits. Now we have changed the matrix of our franchisees to make sure that they end up making money," claims Mr Chaturvedi. Appointing real estate consultants to map out areas where franchise operations would yield profitable results for the company, the ice-cream major has decided to change its strategy of growth merely through expansion. "Today almost 70-80 per cent of our franchises recover their money within the first six months," states Mr Chaturvedi.

Growing at rate of 30-35 per cent on a year-to-year basis, the Rs 26-crore Baskin Robbins brand has been posting profits for the past three years. However, today pricing is not an area of concern. "We do realise that people are willing to spend. Today the focus is more on pushing the product.