Fried and roasted snacks of every variety in packaged form will be up for question sooner than later. If you are a marketer, I do believe you need to start work on low-fat variants, more of baked snacks, and, of course, more of zero trans-fat options. And if you are a consumer, I do believe you need to watch out and read the fine print on the packages of snacks you pick up for yourself and your kids. Health is and will be a priority item for years to come. Marketers cannot shy away from this.

Marketers of these types of snack foods need to have a proactive strategy in place. It is time to wake up and not be somnolent with double-digit sales volume growth rates. It can vanish just as fast it has happened. All that is needed is a consumer movement that is potent in its viral spread.

The Indian market is a savvy market. In this market, we have a new and emerging category of dark brands. These are brands that do harm to consumers. I call them socially-ostracised categories.

In the hierarchy of socially ostracised categories, right at the top I put tobacco and all cigarettes. Next to it is liquor brands. Just under it are paan and gutkha. Under it, I put oils and trans-fat-packaged foods of every kind. Snack foods are one such. And below that I put sugars and sweetened candies. As Indian society evolves, the sensitivity of the consumer mass will push these brands into a corner. They need to adapt now to stay relevant to a future generation of sensitive consumers. Even as I write this reply, there are millions of e-mails going all around, causing for a subliminal swell of the socially ostracised categories. Take snack foods. There have been e-mails floating around on the dangers of eating a particular brand. It comes with a test: It asks you to burn a particular snack food and see how it burns and how it emanates the smell of plastic as it burns. If you actually carry out this exercise once in your home, you will not touch this snack brand again! So there goes!

When you look at the FMCG category, are there any sets of mantras to follow? This is a tough category to be in, particularly during these tough times of double-digit inflation.

- R. Balsara, New Delhi

Balsara-ji, these are tough times for sure.