PRESENTS
BOOKMARQUE VOLUME 18
Marque -The Marketing Club
HUL’S FAIR & LOVELY TO BE RENAMED GLOW & LOVELY Hindustan Unilever has replaced the word ‘Fair’ with ‘Glow’ from its iconic skin-care brand Fair & Lovely, the country’s top consumer goods firm said, amid global outrage and anti-racism protests triggered by the police killing of an African-American in the US in May.
HUL had applied for a new brand, ‘Glow & Lovely’, on June 17, 2020, according to information on the website of India’s Trade Marks Registry. HUL , however, said it applied for several trademarks since 2018 to avoid possible counterfeiting by others. ”Over the next few months, Glow & Lovely will be on the shelves, and future innovations will deliver on this new proposition,” HUL said in a statement adding that the men’s range of the brand will be called ‘Glow & Handsome’. Last week, HUL’s Chairman Sanjiv Mehta told ET that the name change had been in the works since last year and that the 1
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company had applied for a new trademark a few months ago. Also, the company said the timing of the rebranding was “purely coincidental” when asked why did HUL react to an incident in distant US to make this change and not when the civil society in India expressed outrage over the positioning of the brand.
and healthy skin last year itself, when it removed the cameo with two faces as well as the shade guides from its packaging. This saw the product’ penetration increase 280 basis points since then, with sales growth among its highest ever, the company claimed.
Several companies, both in India and abroad, have been criticised for expressing solidarity with the ‘Black Lives Matter’ movement but at the same time promoting products with their skin-lightening benefits. Nearly a fortnight ago, Johnson & Johnson, which sells Neutrogena Fine Fairness and Clear Fairness creams, said it would no longer sell a few products that are advertised as dark-spot reducers while French cosmetics company L’Oréal Group said it will remove the words whitening, lightning and fairness from all its skin-care products last week HUL’s brand, a market leader in the overall skin cream segment, had moved the positioning from fairness to glow, radiance 2
Marque -The Marketing Club
COVID-19 TO SHAVE USD 25 BILLION OFF FROM TOP 100 DOMESTIC BRANDS’ VALUE The coronavirus pandemic is likely to shave at least USD 25 billion off from the January 2020 cumulative brand value of top 100 domestic brands, says a report.
on the global and national economy, the country’s top 100 most valuable brands could lose up to 15 per cent of brand value cumulatively, a potential drop of nearly USD According to the latest report by 25 billion compared to the Brand Finance, globally, the top original valuation as of Jan500 brands could see a value ero- uary 1, 2020,” the report said. sion of USD 1 trillion from their January 2020 brand value, fol- Brand Finance has assessed lowing COVID-19 disruptions. the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic based on the ef”As the new coronavi- fect of the outbreak on enterrus pandemic wreaks havoc prise value, compared to what it was on January 1, 2020. The report further said the Tata Group has retained the title of the most valuable brand, breaking USD 20 billion brand value mark for first time this year
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and the group’s luxe hotel brand Taj is the strongest brand in the country with brand strength index score 90.5 out of 100.
diversity of the Tata Group, which employs over 720,000 across 100 countries, could mean that it emerges from the pandemic, relativeThis is despite the fact that the val- ly speaking, unscathed. ue has increased by only 2 per cent to touch the USD 20-billion-mark, Thanks to the strategic indusmaking it the only domestic try shift from oil & gas to the brand to touch this milestone. retail, media and telecoms sectors, the brand value of Reliance LIC retained its second position with Industries moved up one notch a value of USD 8.1 billion, followed to the third, following a 25 per by Reliance at third (USD 7.9 billion), cent value growth to USD 7.9 Infosys fourth (USD 7.08 billion), billion. The brand now claims SBI at fifth slot (USD6.4 billion) 34 per cent share of market revenue in the telecom sector. Others in the top 10 list include, HDFC Bank at sixth place, up one Despite the troubles plagunotch from last year, followed by ing them, banking brands did Mahindra (7th) which is down a see solid growth in the year notch from last year, IndianOil with 14 of them in the ranking (8th) gaining a whopping 15 notch- list, with a cumulative brand es, HCL at ninth slot losing one value of USD 24.9 billion, renotch from last year and Airtel was cording an average brand at the tenth slot losing eight notches. value growth of 25 per cent. Also, the Tata Group is the only domestic brand to feature in the top 100 of the Brand Finance global 500 2020 list, the agency said in a statement on Monday. . Savio D’Souza, director of Brand Finance, said the sheer size and
State Bank of India (up 8 per cent to USD 6.4 billion) and HDFC Bank (up 22 per cent to USD 5.9 billion) have retained their positions in the top 10, with the latter climbing one spot to sixth in the ranking.
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UNILEVER TO STOP US ADS ON FACEBOOK, TWITTER FOR REST OF YEAR Unilever said on Friday it will stop advertising on Facebook, Instagram and Twitter in the United States for the rest of the year, citing “divisiveness and hate speech during this polarized election period in the U.S.”
started by U.S. civil rights groups after the death of George Floyd. The effort called on Facebook, which owns Instagram, to do more to stop hate speech and misinformation.
Shares of Facebook and TwitThe consumer goods company, which ter both fell more than 7%. owns brands like Dove Soap and Lipton tea, joins a growing advertising “Continuing to advertise on these boycott against Facebook as part of platforms at this time would not add the “Stop Hate for Profit” campaign value to people and society. We will be monitoring ongoing and will revisit our current position if necessary,” Unilever said in a statement. “The Stop Hate for Profit” campaign asks businesses not to advertise on Facebook’s services
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in July. It focuses on specific recommendations for Facebook, though Twitter has also long been under pressure to clean up alleged abuses and misinformation on its platform. “We have developed policies and platform capabilities designed to protect and serve the public conversation, and as always, are committed to amplifying voices from under-represented communities and marginalized groups,” said Sarah Personette, vice president for Twitter’s Global Client Solutions. “We are respectful of our partners’ decisions and will continue to work and communicate closely with them during this time.”
s audit and investments in Artificial Intelligence that allow it to find and take action on hate speech. “We know we have more work to do, and we’ll continue to work with civil rights groups, GARM, and other experts to develop even more tools, technology and policies to continue this fight,” she said, referring to the Global Alliance for Responsible Media. Other groups in the campaign include the NAACP, Anti-Defamation League, Common Sense, Free Press and Color of Change.
More than 90 advertisers including Verizon Communications and The North Face, a unit of VF Corp, have joined the campaign, according to a list by ad activism group Sleeping Giants, a partner in the campaign Earlier this week, ice-cream maker Ben & Jerry’s, a unit of Unilever, said it would pull its Facebook and Instagram ads in the United States. In a statement, a Facebook spokeswoman pointed to its civil rights
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MARICO FULLY ACQUIRES MEN’S GROOMING STARTUP BEARDO Marico has now fully acquired Beardo, a startup company which operates into the men’s grooming market, by buying 55 per cent additional shares, a move which will help FMCG firm to extend its play into the segment. Marico has acquired the remaining 55 per cent share of Zed Lifestyle, Beardo’s parent firm, in an all-cash deal, making a step-down company.
Confirming the move, Venture Catalysts (VCats), an integrated incubator and accelerator platform, also announced a complete exit from Zed Lifestyle after the acquisition of its portfolio company Beardo by Marico.
“Sensing the tremendous potential in the segment, Marico acquired an additional 55 per cent equity share in Beardo’s parent company “The investment makes the in- Zed Lifestyle Pvt Ltd earlier this vestee company (Zed Lifestyle) a week,” said a statement from VCats. wholly-owned subsidiary of Marico Ltd and gives Marico a com- Marico had made an investment plete control over the operations in the company in March 2017, of the investee company,” said which was equivalent to 45 per Marico in a regulatory filing. cent of the issued and paid-up share capital of Zed Lifestyle.
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FUTURE RETAIL EXPLORES, EVALUATES VARIOUS OPPORTUNITIES FOR STAKE SALE Future Retail, responding to reports of talks to sell a stake in the firm to Reliance Industries Ltd (RIL), on Thursday said it continues to explore and evaluate various opportunities. Responding to the BSE over reports, the Future Group firm said no such decision has been taken by the company’s board so far.
While the Future Group said any such proposal by any company is always a subject matter of feasibility studies and the need for requisite consents, said the Future Group company in the filing.
“The company continues to explore and evaluate various opMeanwhile, RIL in a regulatory fil- portunities or associations in ing said it evaluates various op- the interest the company as and portunities on an ongoing basis. when considered appropriate, which is always a subject matter of further feasibility studies and the need for requisite consents in accordance to the applicable laws and other stakeholders,” said Future Retail. If
any
deal
is
finalised,
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it would be a breather for the Future Earlier this year, the Future Group, as promoter Kishore Biyani Group forged partnerships had defaulted on loans in March. with e-commerce major Amazon, as they sought to exVarious rating agencies like Stan- pand their reach by leverdard & Poor’s and Fitch down- aging each other’s networks. graded credit ratings of Future Retail after the default and invocation of pledged shares by lenders. Promoter and promoter group held a 40.31 per cent stake in Future Retail as of March 31, 2020, through Future Corporate Resources and Future Coupons. Future Retail operates 1,500 retail stores that cover over 16 million sq ft of retail space in 400 cities. It has large-format stores, Big Bazaar, its flagship chain, besides small store neighbourhood retail chains, EasyDay Club and Heritage Fresh. On the other hand, Reliance Retail operates a network of 11,784 stores covering 28.7 million sq ft and reported a revenue of Rs 38,211 crore in the January-March quarter. PremjiInvest owns about 6 per cent stake in Future Retail, while Amazon has around 3.6 per cent.
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