The Hindu Business Line : Loo-crative proposition

It has a sensor so it knows when you approach and opens to welcome you. Your seat is warmed too, and there's a bidet function to round off the experience. These are just a few of the features, though, of the Rs 4.25-lakh water closet that Spanish brand Roca offers in its line of premium and superpremium sanitaryware which will soon be available in India after it formed a 50-50 joint venture with the Rs 250-crore Parryware, the sanitaryware division of Chennai-based EID Parry.

Now known as Parryware Roca, the division's Rs 60-crore factory at Perundurai in Tamil Nadu (its fourth and most modern), recently went on stream. This is the unit that will begin manufacturing the Roca brand in about six months. With its commissioning, Parryware's combined capacity stands at 4.25 million pieces per annum, and the joint venture with Roca has catapulted it into the world's top ten manufacturers of sanitaryware from the 13{+t}{+h} or 14th position, says K. E. Ranganathan, Managing Director, Parryware Roca. However, the first priority is to improve the Parryware brand with the learnings and technology that the tie-up with Roca has provided, he said. The brand has 44 per cent market share in the organised segment of the sanitaryware market and with the Roca alliance, expects its turnover to cross Rs 320 crore this year.

Of the Rs 800-crore sanitaryware market, the premium segment (closets costing upward of Rs 10,000) accounts for Rs 80 crore and the sub-premium segment (Rs 5,000 onwards) for Rs 300 crore. The budget segment contributes Rs 150 crore and the rest is accounted for by the unbranded segment. About 5-6 per cent of Parryware's business comes from the premium segment but this is growing at more than 20 per cent per year, so Parryware has big plans for Roca. It will import the products and retail them in 25 of its big showrooms all over India, where it will also set up Roca shops-in-shops. It will also franchise 20 exclusive Parryware Roca stores in eight cities by the end of next year. It will soon import Roca taps and later, tiles into India. So what's it about Roca that makes Parryware so upbeat?

Parryware hopes its marketing might and the advantage of being a Murugappa group company will combine well with Roca's manufacturing strength. India also stands a good chance of being an export hub for Roca products, says Ranganathan. Roca was set up in 1917 as a company that made cast iron radiators and moved on to bathtubs, then porcelain sanitaryware in the '30s, taps and tiles later, and now claims leadership in almost every market it's present. Its product range now includes `Everything in Bathrooms' (its tagline), from water closets to hydromassage systems, shower temples, toilets, whirlpools, sinks, taps and tiles. It has production facilities in 16 countries, employs over 15,000 people and operates in more than 100 countries, with an annual turnover of euro 1.60 billion. Apart from its own design facility, its products are also designed by designer and architectural firms such as David Chipperfield.

BATHROOMS equipped with Roca sanitaryware

The competition is equally upbeat. Ved Berry, Head (Marketing and Kitchen Division) of the Rs 178-crore Hindustan Sanitaryware and Industries Ltd (HSIL), says, "We are not going to let up at all." HSIL too is launching 14 premium products in the next three months and says it "won't necessarily have to rely on foreign names as it can rely on its own capabilities to make and source from anywhere in the world." What will happen if the foreign partner walks out of a venture later on, he questions. Berry claims that the premium segment in his company's product portfolio is growing four times faster and that the bulk of the company's profits comes from the premium segment. HSIL's market share hovers at 37-38 per cent.

Much has been said about how the status of bathrooms is undergoing a sea change: they are oases of luxury, havens of privacy, and it's not just the rich and the famous who are splurging on them to make them that way. Given that consumers are exposed to trends the world over, the age of home-owners has come down and buying power gone up, more than a lakh of rupees is easily being spent on turning a bathroom into a glamorous retreat, says Ranganathan. Recounting his experience in Kerala, he speaks of a home he visited that had two closets, one in each corner of the bathroom done up in different colour schemes. The owner explained that as he could not build another bathroom, so the least he could do was reserve a closet solely for himself as that was as personal as he could get within a budget!

Parryware Roca, therefore, has good reason to cheer as this attitude, combined with low penetration of bathroom products (33 per cent) and growing construction activity, promises it much more business.

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