Financial Daily from THE HINDU group of publications
Wednesday, Dec 31, 2003
Financial Daily from THE HINDU group of publications Wednesday, Dec 31, 2003 |
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Marketing
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Advertising Infant food cos to retain ad agencies despite ban on promos Ratna Bhushan
New Delhi , Dec. 30 THE blanket ban on all advertising and promotional activity for infant and weaning foods under the amendment of the Infant Milk Substitutes, Feeding Bottles and Infant Foods Act 1992, could lead to ad industry revenues taking a hit and a situation of uncertainty. At stake is at least Rs 10 crore of advertising in print media and to some extent television spends. According to TAM's AdEx data, while spends by corporates selling baby foods have grown in print media over the past few years, there has been a drastic dip in television spends since 2000. Spends in the print media, for example, have grown from Rs 90 lakh in 2000 to an estimated Rs 10.6 crore in 2003. For obvious reasons, spends on television have dipped from Rs 11.2 crore in 2000 to just an estimated Rs 20 lakh in 2003. Despite the ban, corporates are retaining ad agencies on their respective infant food brands. For example, the McCann group's heathcare division, McCann Healthcare, which has been handling the advertising and promotional activity for Nestle India's Cerelac and Lactogen brands, will continue to be associated with these brands. Mr Chintamani Rao, President, Universal McCann, told Business Line, "We remain attached to these brands. Henceforth, any communication that will be done for these brands will be under the ambit of the law. Conventional advertising for these brands, in any case, was stopped ahead of the deadline." Similar activity is expected for Farex, a Heinz brand. Advertising for the brand is handled by Rediffusion-DYR. On the other hand, according to Mr R.S. Sodhi, General Manager, Marketing, Gujarat Cooperative Milk Marketing Federation (GCMMF), the ban will not impact GCMMF's Amulspray infant food brand. "We do not promote the brand at all," he said. While declining to divulge details on the nature of the communication these brands would now adopt, ad industry sources indicated that the communication could be on surrogate lines.
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