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The clean tasteless white spirit, vodka (which means, ‘Dear Little Water’ in Slavic languages), is not only blending well (with virtually any beverage) to suit Indian palettes, but is scaling new peaks in terms of sales volumes.
In India, with the white spirit market growing at the rate of 25-30 per cent, vodka drinking is fast catching up in the Tier I cities. The current market size of the vodka market is estimated to be over one million cases per annum. Compared to the other categories in the Indian Made Foreign Liquor (IMFL), vodka is fast emerging as the most preferred choice amongst liquor consumers.
The next time you hit one of the happening lounge bars and pubs — say for e.g., the O Bar & Lounge at Le Meredien or Aura at the Claridges in Delhi — make sure you get a shot of a plethora of new brands and flavours of luxury and designer vodkas: Belvedere, Absolut vanilla flavour or Brown Forman’s newly launched Finlandia available in a mango variant.
Smirnoff: the market leader
Market leader Diageo India Pvt. Ltd, (formerly UDV), which owns the popular brand Smirnoff Vodka, is optimistic about the entry of luxury vodkas. Santosh Kanekar, Director Marke-
ting, Diageo India, expresses that the vodka market is growing at 35 per cent and even grabbing shares from the dark spirits. Catering to appealing price points starting at Rs 400, Smirnoff also offers luxury brands such as Ciroc and Smirnoff Penka!
Elaborating on the explosive growth in flavoured vodka segment, Kanekar says, “Flavoured vodkas are a rage and Smirnoff Twist is leading this category with natural flavours like Smirnoff Orange Twist, Citrus Twist, Raspberry. We are restricting our strategy to BTL. Effective spends are done to maintain close consumer contact and our focus is on direct contact programmes.”
The premium segment
The producers of Jack Daniel’s premium whisky, Brown-Forman, launched their luxury brand, Finlandia Vodka, in the capital recently. Priced between Rs 1,500-1,600, it will be available in three flavours: Cranberry, Lime, Classic and Mango. Amrit Kiran Singh, VP & Area Director, Brown-Forman, says, “We are targeting people, who are aware of international brands and want value for money. Currently, the lower priced brands are growing faster than the premium brands. But, the value growth will come from luxury brands that use high quality ingredients and the world’s best distilling technology.” Singh also opines that clever marketers have created the designer vodka concept to create premium imagery and justify a premium price.
To read the entire story, grab your copy of Impact Advertising and Weekly magazine issue dated May 30-June 5, 2005