'Great Indian Furniture Fest' has given us a 20% growth: Mr. Bedraj Tripathi, Godrej Interio

Home decor industry is predominantly dominated by unorganized sector and it is one industry where buyers are more sensitive to price range rather than brand value. To create a brand value in this cluttered market, it is very important to build brands around how consumers’ experience them. And in one of its kind initiative, Godrej Interio, the home decor arm of the Godrej Group has moved out from a tactical mode of communication to a pure experiential mode. Leveraging on the idiosyncratic razzle and dazzle which every festival brings in with it, Godrej Interio is celebrating the festivals in a new and reinvigorated manner. Godrej Interio stores across the country were transformed and customized for every festival starting from Durga Puja, Navratri, Diwali & Christmas, New Year & even the wedding season. Every store is decorated as per the sensibilities of the festival with staff also being dressed in the attire that is in-sync with the festival. The brand has taken a step further and has also conducted fun filled activities like Garba Dancing, Rangoli Competition, etc. within the store to promote the festive spirit and encourage customer engagement. The consumers also get assured discount on every purchase and also get a chance to win Home Furniture for Free.

The Godrej Interio brand is positive that this season they want to drive a positive emotional connect with the consumers rather than hammering the discounts to achieve their targets and thus also help them stand out of the clutter of brands who are talking pure discounts.

Talking about the campaign “The Great Indian Furniture Fest”, Mr Bedraj Tripathi, General Manager Marketing, Godrej Interio says, “The objective behind this campaign is to celebrate the festive season in a new and refreshed manner, when it comes to their ATL, BTL, TTL or even store level experience. The ATL, BTL and TTL communication aims at creating an excitement of celebrating the festivals and linking it back to the transformation of homes for the festive season, with the benefit of discounts being by-the-way and not in an upfront manner. This approach will help the brand connect with the consumer at an emotional level rather than a transactional level. Associating Godrej Interio with the ‘Great Indian Furniture Fest’ has given us a 20% growth over our normal campaigns. During festive periods, people do expect price offs which leads to higher footfalls in retain and hence, conversions. However, once you connect with people from their perspective without simply talking about discounts, we do see an increased interest for the brand. Interestingly, it’s the festival spirit in communications that drives traffic and the actual festivities at the store helps engagement at the moment of truth and hence, higher conversions.”

The campaign which helped Godrej to stand apart from other clutter of brands who are talking about pure discounts, has rather developed connect with users which is the most important element in getting users closer to the brand. Discussing further about the marketing strategies, Mr. Tripathi says, “The key platforms used to promote the campaign time is with our ATL (predominantly print), BTL (Ground level activations to build the festive feel around catchment areas of 850 outlets), TTL (Search, Social and Display) & even in-store experience (at all 850 outlets). We use a two pronged approach. One to build the brand and two to leverage engagement in a category that one indulges in once in 6 years. To bring the brand and its promise of ‘transforming lives’, we run one of the most unique and biggest brand connect programs in the history of durables industry – Upload and Transform. The whole idea here is to get people to send photographs of their homes with a brief of that they want transformed in their homes. A set of homes are selected by a jury panel (external architects and designers) and we bring their dream homes to life – free of charge. This provides an opportunity for them to experience the transformation and others to see the possibilities of transformation.Secondly, moving away from sales, we focus on engagement. We use 360 degrees communication coupled with in-store experience to drive engagement that in turn drives footfalls and purchase. We have been extremely effective in driving online searches to our physical stores and converting them to sales. This gives users an effective and preferred solution and gives Godrej Interio a unique position to get online search traffic to our stores as customers.”

Godrej Interio is also planning to invest around Rs 300 crore in the next year to enlarge its manufacturing capacity and sales network. When asked about the probability of extension of this campaign, he replies that Godrej Interio has built this as a property and will continue to leverage this as an annual property.”

Furniture industry is the largest open economy in India and around 80% is unorganized sector. Talking about the challenges encountered, Bedraj says, “80% as a figure is debatable. I would see the unorganized market at 85% and we play in the 15%, or the organized world. The challenge really is to educate people on multiple aspects of furniture. This includes from ergonomics to comfort, to materials, to sustainability and drive preferences for a healthy user and a planet. This will drive people from unorganized to organized furniture. Having said this, we see this aspect to be critical from a growth perspective. Even if 5% of the unorganized market converts to organized segment, the core players will double their revenues. That’s the opportunity.”