The Hindu Business Line : Bausch & Lomb looks to make eye contact with youth

Chennai, June 27 Bausch & Lomb Eyecare Pvt Ltd, the market leader in contact lenses, has changed tack in a bid to make the product more attractive to consumers. Instead of focusing on the functional benefits, in a new marketing effort for its latest product SofLens 59, it has taken the emotional plank to get youth to connect with it.

Mr Harish Natarajan, Managing Director of the company, told Business Line research showed that those in the target group (15-24-year-olds) just didn’t feel the need to wear contact lenses. A Rs 120-crore market, the category has been growing only in the last couple of years and has not kept pace with other lifestyle categories such as apparel, mobile phones and accessories, he said.

Despite big improvements in the quality of contact lenses over the last 20 years and past advertising focusing on disposable lenses’ superior benefits, potential users still harboured the misconceptions that they were challenging to use and expensive. So the current ad campaign, which goes with the tagline “Ankhon Ki Antakshari, Khelte Raho”, focuses on using one’s eyes to express feelings, Mr Natarajan said. The company no longer thinks it necessary to “oversell the features and benefits” as has been done for many years.

Bausch & Lomb has hiked its marketing spend almost three-fold this year. It has also launched a programme called Mastermind to supplement optometrists’ skills. Research had revealed that another reason people did not take to contact lenses easily were the varying practices adopted by optometrists in prescribing and fitting contact lenses. The company is being aided by the Australia-based International Association of Contact Lens Educators and the National Institute of Sales in this effort.

It has also begun working with the top retail outlets to get the disposable lens segment moving – apparently, if people go in for hi-tech products, they tend to stay with the category.

Contrary to popular perception, a year’s supply of monthly disposable lenses cost only Rs 3,200, compared with an amount almost twice that for a pair of high-quality spectacles. Also, marketers of frames and fashion spectacles have managed to make glasses look quite cool, and that has also hindered the contact lenses category from growing, Mr Natarajan said.

India has 17 million users of vision correction aids and only 5 per cent of them uses contact lenses, said Mr Natarajan. Contact lenses are usually used with a back-up of spectacles and that is how the market is estimated, he explained, adding that in the rest of Asia, over 25 per cent of the adult population use vision correction aids and 25-30 per cent of that group of people use contact lenses.

Bausch & Lomb, which has been in India for the last 15 years, has the biggest share of the market at 70 per cent, and competes with Johnson & Johnson (Acuvue brand), Ciba Vision (a Novartis product) and some local players.

More Stories on : Strategy | Healthcare Products

Article E-Mail :: Comment :: Syndication :: Printer Friendly Page

Stories in this Section
Bausch & Lomb looks to make eye contact with youth

NDTV Imagine’s Ramayan going global

Parle ‘Musst’ contend with strong competition

Raymond buys bale of finest wool for Rs 1 cr

Brazil AIDS group opposes Gilead patent

IPR policy

Visage bullish on digital image business

Kids’ undergarments launched

Porsche Design mobile phone launched

Airtel launches 2 ISD calling packs