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Purvita Chatterjee

Mumbai, Sept. 14 Struggling with its baby care brand Morisons ‘Baby Dreams’, the Rs 110-crore JL Morison is planning to relaunch the range. It has been in the market for almost a year.

Mr Bipin M. Vengsarkar, Executive Director, JL Morison, said: “There has been poor offtake of the baby care range and we are re-looking at this brand in our portfolio. We have managed less than a crore turnover for the brand in the past six months.”

With consumers facing difficulties in adapting to the new brand, the company also blames its mass media strategy for not being a success.

Adds Mr Vengsarkar, “In spite of there being good distribution for the brand, retailers were getting impatient to get returns and this made them switch to the more established brands. Even the mass media strategy did not work out for the brand.”

With J&J dominating the baby care category, most of the new entrants have been finding it difficult to make a success. “Even Marico’s baby care brand has not been able to make a mark in this segment and Wipro is concentrating on its diaper’s brand more than its baby care range today,” he said.

With some changes in its Baby Dreams range, JL Morison will be adopting a different channel of distribution for its products. Through direct sales route, it will adopt a new strategy by approaching doctors, especially paediatricians to promote its range.

Without changing the product formulation, the company would also put in efforts in re-packaging the Baby Dreams range with a special focus on its lotions and oils.

In terms of pricing strategy, JL Morison remains cautious and is waiting for the new entrants to enter the category. “We still don’t know whether we will change the pricing. It would depend on the new entrants who would enter the category and we will watch out for their pricing strategies. Besides, we believe even the existing brands such as Sparsh from Marico might be relaunched,” said Mr Vengsarkar.

Last year, the company launched Baby Dreams as a sub-brand of its flagship Morisons brand in the market. The products were priced at a slight premium (between Rs 4 and Rs 5) to the existing J&J offerings. JL Morison would be relaunching its Morisons Baby Dreams brand by early next year.

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