Exclusive | Dalda revamped; Sagar Boke reveals the rationale

Dalda has been one of the most iconic brands of Indian kitchens. Associated with taste and purity, the brand recently revamped its cooking oil range in the Indian market with an all new look. Celebrating 75 years of existence, Dalda as a brand enjoys a vast loyal consumer base in India. It was acquired by Bunge India Private Limited from Uniliver in the year 2003.

Dalda cooking oil products come with informative packaging and will be available in three different formats – food grade plastic Pouches, Bottles, and Jars. Dalda is one of the very few brands in the country that cater to varied consumer segments ranging from urban markets to homemakers in rural India.

Adgully caught up with Sagar Boke, Head-Marketing, Dalda to know more about the step and strategies in mind for the same.

It may be recollected that some time back, Dalda attempted to re-launch its product range, but was not successful in doing so. Speaking about the rationale behind taking a similar risk all over again, Boke said, “Dalda, being one of the oldest brands in the market has been in the existence from 75 years and there are a very few brands who have such a historic background. So we always felt that the brand has the potential to grow beyond Vanaspati (as Dalda was usually associated with Vanaspati ghee). A lot of our attempts failed, so we realised the fact we need to be really active with our product itself. Though the brand has grown and evolved over the years at some 14-15% without much of marketing push, but today we thought let’s try and give a push differently.”

While their last attempt had an approach which stated that oil is really good for consumption and this time the brand custodians are betting big on the core of the brand that lies on three parameters that are: taste, purity and the heritage.

“Then we wanted to work two factors that whether these core parameters are extendable or not in terms of taste (whether the consumer will like the edible oil) and secondly whether this step will strengthen our imagery or not. After a lot of research and survey we realized that yes, it will! Hence we took this step keeping in mind the demand of the taste of our product”, he added.

So, clearly demarcating the two attempts on health and taste respectively, the brand is now focusing on the latter as it’s the ‘taste’ of the brand that, according to them has supported their existence in the market for years. To support the new range, the brand came up with a new TVC with a tag-line: ‘Mamta ki kausiti par khara utra’. He says, “Looking at the day-to-day insight of the fact that when a child finishes his ‘Dabba’ (tiffin box) is the moment that makes his / her mother happy; the entire marketing strategy is based on this insight – ‘Dabba kahli pet full’”.

The campaign is a three part series wherein the first part is just focused on the brands packaging and the new product range. Said Boke, “With an aim to change the perception of the people we have shown the shots of the delicious food being cooked in Dalda like French Fries etc which people could not really sync with the brand”. The second part is the TVC with television actor and anchor Mona Singh which again portrays a powerful story in sync with the tagline. The third part of the marketing strategy was to target the direct consumers of the brands from tier II and III cities. “We wanted to target consumers who actually buy, use and consume our brand from small cities like a housewife from Lucknow and the best medium to reach to them, we believe, is mobile. So we started with a unique initiative called: ‘Dial D’ wherein when a consumer gives a missed call to the assigned number, she gets a call back and gets a new ‘Dabba’ recipe, cooking tip etc.”, he added.

Boke also mentioned that the northern markets have been a great support for the brand; however, the company plans to mark its presence across India.

Dalda, is available in a range of edible oils - both refined and taste oils. They are available in variants of Refined Sunflower, Soyabean, Mustard Oils and Groundnut Oil.

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