During the year, we invested in our brands, and expanded into new target markets with impactful campaigns and premium products. We gained market share in our core categories while stepping up innovation across our portfolio.
Tata Tea Premium continued its focus on hyper-local campaigns, launching new TVCs for Mumbai and Maharashtra, commemorating Independence Day and Republic Day with impactful 360-degree campaigns and celebrating the world’s first Holi in the Metaverse
Volume growth recorded by Tata Tea Premium in over a decade
Re-staged Tata Tea Agni into a Masterbrand with new variants added to the portfolio. Agni is the largest brand in the Tata Tea portfolio by volume, and the restage with revised communication and packaging was rolled out in 22 states throughout India. Its ‘Josh Jagaye Har Roz’ campaign brings alive true stories of strong determination and passion and features players from the Indian Women’s Hockey team
In the UK, Tetley’s new Masterbrand campaign was rolled out on national TV and social media - ‘For the love of tea, for the love of Tetley’, celebrating the nation’s love for tea, all the different ways it is enjoyed, and how Tetley has the perfect tea for every situation. From taking a flask of original Tetley to a rainy sports match, to enjoying a cup of herbal tea in bed, Tetley is for every tea lover
Tata Tea Gold launched a festive pack collection for Durga Puja with 5 specially designed packs dedicated to 5 important days of Durga Puja
Tata Sampann launched its first ever regional print campaign in Rajasthan, UP and Bihar markets. The regional marketing mix was crafted specifically for these markets, communicating a strong proposition of health and purity
Tata Salt launched a 360 degree marketing campaign intervention, against look-alike brands in Uttar Pradesh. The campaign is aimed at educating the trade and consumers and features the popular UP star, Ravi Kishan to communicate the key message
Impactful campaigns were run for Tata Coffee Grand for the Pongal festival in Tamil Nadu tying in the brand’s positioning to the sounds associated with the festival, and for Tata Coffee Quick Filter to deliver the message of 'filter coffee-like taste that is convenient to make'
Eight O’ Clock coffee launched a new campaign themed ‘Overdelivery in every cup.’ The campaign was targeted at millennials who are a key target segment for the brand. The overdelivery messaging was communicated in a fun manner focusing on taste, quality and value attributes
We are accelerating our innovation agenda to support our premiumisation goals. Some of the value-added new launches in India include Tata Tea Gold Care and Chakra Gold Care- teas infused with native herbs for wellness benefits, new variants under our premium Tata Tea 1868 brand, Tata Coffee Gold- a premium, freeze-dried coffee and new variants under the premium R&G coffee brand, Sonnets.
Tata Tea Gold Care as % of Tata Tea Gold
In the Foods business, we entered a new premium category of dry fruits under the Tata Sampann brand and launched value-added salts such as Superlite and Immuno under the Tata Salt brand.
In international markets, our super-premium brand, teapigs, is gaining momentum across channels and continues to outpace the category. Good Earth Tea is helping strengthen our presence in the premium fruit and herbal segment.
Value-added Salt
During the year, we launched new products in Tata Salt to expand the target addressable market for salt. We introduced Shuddh by Tata Salt, an iodised solar salt that gives consumers access to a high-quality, branded product at a reasonable price point. The product was tailored for the Southern Indian markets and designed to upgrade a specific segment of discerning consumers who want to spend wisely without compromising on the quality of the salt they consume.
Revenue
We also launched Tata Salt Super Lite, which comes with 30% less sodium than regular salt as an alternative to reduce sodium intake in diet. This became the second product by the brand in the premium, low-sodium category after Tata Salt Lite, which has 15% less sodium. The brand launched a 360-degree campaign featuring acclaimed actor, Supriya Pathak and addresses a common practice among health-conscious Indian households of reducing their salt intake. The campaign encourages consumers to consider changing to a healthier alternative with the tagline, ‘Namak Badalne ka Socho’.
Tata Salt Immuno offers consumers a categoryfirst unique proposition of added zinc, known for its immunity‑building properties.
In a bid to lend support to the artisan community of the country, through our brand ‘Tata Tea Premium’, we partnered with Rare Planet, a start-up that promotes the work of local Indian artisans, to unveil a ‘Desh ka kulhad’ collection. The aim of the initiative was to support the artisan community, which faced severe setback due to the pandemic.
The collection of kulhads (earthen pots) comprises of 26 distinct kulhad designs each representing different regions of India. These hand-painted kulhads were crafted with region-specific artforms such as Madhubani folk art from Bihar, Warli artform from Maharashtra, Phulkari patterns from Punjab, Patachitra from Odisha and Sanjhi Art from Uttar Pradesh. Themed around popular motifs and landmarks from each region, each kulhad celebrated a specific artform of that region. The funds collected from the sale of these kulhads were given to artisans of Okhai in supporting their livelihood.
Our ambition is to become a leading FMCG company with a focus on profitable and sustainable growth. A strong and agile Sales and Distribution (S&D) network will be a central cog to achieving the following:
In FY 20-21, we began digitalisation and transformation of our sales and distribution network, which was supported by capability building among our people to deliver on our growth aspirations. The objectives of this sales transformation were as follows:
We modernised systems and processes across urban markets by increasing our Feet on Street (Distributor Sales Representatives), deploying a state-of-the-art Distributor Management System (DMS), fully automating order capture and delivery processes through hand-held Sales Force Automation (SFA) devices and rolling out a comprehensive productivity based incentive programme. To ensure better ROI for the distributors, we went 100% paper-free and migrated to an online claim settlement process. We also began channel financing to improve working capital flow in the network.
A big thrust in infrastructure augmentation was undertaken in Rest of Urban (Rurban) and Rural markets. We expanded our distribution presence by appointing over 8,000 Rural/Semi-urban distributors across India. 100% of this network was automated with a DMS lite solution, which enabled us to measure and track secondary transactions till the last mile. Significant improvement in quality of servicing and assortment made sure that our brands are now reaching a much larger market and outlet landscape than ever before
While distribution expansion and quality augmentation agenda continued, in parallel, significant interventions were undertaken to improve our market standing with premium outlets. Samruddhi, our loyalty programme for premium and large retail outlets across key cities, is an industry-first, 100% digital, retail Loyalty programme, which includes digital KYC and enrolment, digital communication, digital merchandising review and audits and digitally enabled direct pay-out to outlets.
We strengthened our people muscle in customer-facing roles to better align and cater to the requirements of our MT customers. Joint business planning, periodic reviews and regular sync-ups ensured that our partnership with key accounts saw significant improvement. Fill rate improvement across MT accounts was taken up as a key priority with cross-functional teams comprising Sales, Supply Chain, Finance and Digital leading it.
We continued to drive strong performance in the e-commerce channel with further consolidation of leadership in the Tea category. Market standing and performance improved significantly across other categories. Investments were made to drive best-inclass industry practices in customer marketing, digitally powered brand engagement and improvement in service levels.
We reached out to institutional customers with our integrated portfolio. We continue to stay focused on driving improvement in servicing of customers, mapping and leveraging new and emerging channels and opening up new business streams for the company. Tie-ups with many strategic customers were concluded in the year.
In addition to scaling up distribution to win in traditional channels, we are building capability to win in alternate channels
Winning in alternate channels – Modern Trade and e-commerce
Through our concerted endeavours to make our sales and distribution network more robust and future-ready, we achieved the following:
New milestones in S&D transformation
Direct reach
Up 25%Distributors
Up 4XRural/semi-urban distributors
A fit-for-purpose assortment
