Weekly roundup
NEW MENU FOR COFFEE DAY SQUARE CAFÉS
Coffee Day Enterprises Ltd has refreshed the menu at its premium Coffee Day Square cafés and plans to introduce some of the new items in its larger network of Café Coffee Day outlets too, a top company executive said. The new menus includes molecular gastronomy to rum and tequila-flavoured non-alcoholic espresso shots, Ramchander Raman, the company’s head of food and beverages, said. “Our audience is very unforgiving. We have to keep them excited because we work on repeat clientele. We will continue to make sure food is a big focus because there is so much more that we can do there.” The new menu, introduced last week, includes freaky shakes, milkshakes, smoothies and herbal infusions, which use ingredients like pomegranate and sea buckthorn, and mandarin-flavoured non-alcoholic beer. In food, the company’s new menu is a mix of Indian and international cuisines, including Japanese and Korean ones, but with a twist.
BRAND FACTORY TO FOCUS ON SMALL TOWNS
Future Lifestyle Fashions Ltd’s discount chain Brand Factory is looking to expand its footprint, and plans to focus on smaller towns and cities in particular as part of this strategy. The retail chain, part of Kishore Biyani’s Future Group, is set to open 40 new stores to touch the 100-store mark over the next 8-10 months, said Suresh Sadhwani, business head, Brand Factory. From there on, the company will add 40-50 new stores each year until it gets to 200, he added. Brand Factory, which has been in existence for a decade, currently has 60 outlets. This means, on an average, it opened six new stores every year. The pace, which picked up to 10-15 new stores over the last year, is set to rise. Brand Factory operates in a space over which it has a clear dominance, considering individual factory outlets are the only competition in the fashion discounting market, said Ankur Bisen, senior vice-president at Technopak Advisors and another analyst who declined to be named.
MCDOWELL’S NO.1 TO DRIVE USL GROWTH
United Spirits Ltd’s (USL’s) largest brand, McDowell’s No. 1, will drive its sales growth, even as the company continues to innovate its power brands. India’s largest liquor firm, which redesigned the McDowell’s logo in December 2015, is now ramping up its marketing through its luxury soda brand and plans to reach 50 million people through its latest “No. 1 Yaari” campaign, a top executive said. Although such campaigns promote the soda portfolio, they indirectly aid liquor sales. “McDowell’s No. 1 is one of India’s biggest beverage alcohol brands and is at the helm of driving (spirits) category growth. With almost 10 million people getting into legal drinking age every year, the brand will continue driving growth backed with strategic innovations,” USL’s marketing head Amrit Thomas said. McDowell’s is a 53-million-cases per year brand, which straddles the whisky, brandy and rum categories and caters to 25 million consumers. The whisky variants excluding its Platinum variety grew 7% in volume terms in 2016-17.
FSSAI TO CHECK FOOD QUALITY IN HOSPITALS
India’s food safety regulator has turned its sights towards hospitals and other healthcare facilities to ensure they serve safe and nutritious food. The Food Safety and Standards Authority of India, which has oversight of food consumed in households, offices and even places of worship, wants public health institutions to follow safety standards prescribed by the regulator. In the first step, the FSSAI will organise a roundtable meeting of health ministers from the states. The event will be chaired by Union health and family welfare minister Jagat Prakash Nadda, FSSAI CEO Pawan Kumar Agarwal said. “Next month, we are holding this round table,” Agarwal said, adding that research by regulator has identified food served in hospitals as “potentially hazardous.”
80 YEARS ON, PARLE-G RULES BISCUIT MARKET
Nearly 80 years after it was introduced in India, Parle-G continues to dominate the country’s biscuit market, even as the industry moves toward more premium products. Parle-G, with its iconic yellow striped pack showing the ‘Parle girl’, continues to hold 20% share of the ₹25,000-crore biscuit market by value, said Mayank Shah, category head at Parle Products Pvt Ltd. It is now worth ₹5,000 crore, according to research firm Nielsen, in a market dominated by Britannia Industries Ltd that largely sells premium cream biscuits, including Treat and cookies like Good Day. The secret to Parle G’s success is sticking to its position as a glucose biscuit meant for the masses.
PICTORAL WARNINGS ON TOBACCO PRODUCTS
Efforts to cut tobacco use with 85% pictorial warnings on all tobacco products appear defeated with the Karnataka High Court on Friday striking down the Cigarette and other Tobacco Products (Packaging and Labelling) Amendment Rules, 2014.
The rules mandated 85% pictorial warnings on both sides of packages of cigarettes, bidis and all forms of chewing tobacco products.
Public health experts claim that the decision will impact India’s global image in tobacco control as efforts by the Indian government have been praised across the world.
JP Nadda, Union minister of health and family welfare was conferred the World Health Organisation (WHO) directorgeneral’s Special Recognition Award for global tobacco control in June.
“The move will result in India’s global ranking for pictorial warnings to go back to 106th ranking in the world from its current third position. Similar warnings on tobacco packs have been upheld by courts in other countries (Sri Lanka, Thailand, Australia, the UK, Canada, etc),” said Karnataka high court and Supreme Court advocate KV Dhananjay.