Godrej, Paras, Wipro & Himalaya Cashing In On Swine Flu Scare

Cos eye handsome gains with sanitizers

FORdecades, personal hygiene for Indians started and ended with Lifebuoy soaps and Dettol hand wash. Not any more. With swine flu scare sweeping across the country and spreading consciousness about hygiene like never before, a bunch of consumer product makers including Godrej Consumer Products, Paras Pharmaceuticals and Wipro Consumer Care have jumped into this market with hand sanitizers. 

    Hindustan Unilever too has launched its hand sanitizer in select markets under the Lifebuoy brand alright, but it's facing competition from Himalaya Herbal Healthcare, one of the few existing players that had so long restricted its sales mostly to hospitals, and a spate of new regional brands. 
    "Lifebuoy has launched hand sanitizers in select markets," said a Hindustan Unilever spokesperson. 
    There is also speculation that Reckitt Benckiser, makers of Dettol antiseptic liquid and soaps, too will bring out its hand sanitizer soon as the category sees brisk sales despite premium pricing compared with liquid soaps. "What we have sold in the last three months is probably equivalent to what we sold in the last three years," Saket Gore, business head, consumer products, at Himalaya Herbal Healthcare, said about the company's hand sanitizer brand Pure Hands. 
    While the company has widened the distribution network for its hand sanitizer, Himalaya has not started advertising its brand, unlike most of its competition that are very aggressive in marketing their product. 
    Marketers are using different positioning from convenience (no need for water and towels) and effectiveness (safer than traditional methods) to even emotion for their respective brands. 
    Godrej Consumer Products, for example, is tapping distribution points like kirana and general stores, and even small chemist outlets for its Protekt hand sanitizer. "Concern about H1N1 influenza (swine flu) specially among schools, offices, shopping and traveling has been increasing rapidly, and it's the risk factor of the disease that's fuelling growth," said Dalip Sehgal, MD of Godrej Consumer Products. Paras Pharmaceuticals is positioning its Dermicool hand sanitizer indirectly against soaps and is mainly targeting women. It was the first in the category to advertise on television. 
    "When people are outside-the-home in shopping malls or travelling, even water can have germs. Hand sanitizers offer far better protection against germs, and we believe the category will become crowded in times to come," says S Raghunandan, MD and CEO of the company that makes Moov painkiller, Krack cream and D'Cold anti-cold lozenge and cough syrup. 
    Wipro Consumer Care entered this space about three months ago by extending its Chandrika brand to hand sanitizers. It is mainly focusing on schools to create awareness about its hand sanitizer brand. "We don't expect the category to be too large but it's the need of the hour. For parents of school going children, the HINI flu scare is an emotional issue," said Vineet Agrawal, president of Wipro's consumer care business. 
    According to a Nielsen study, sales of hand sanitizers in the United States soared 245% on reports of the H1N1 flu strain. In the UK, hand sanitizers has grown three-folds since the HINI scare broke about 10 months ago. This sudden surge in demand around the world has brought alive an almost non-existent market, where the only available hand sanitizers were expensive imported brands. 
    ratna.bhushan@timesgroup.com