There’s some speculation that salespeople in luxury stores are being asked to become more friendly, so as not to turn away and turn off potential customers.

But I think it isn’t just them. I think as the economy slows, possibly everyone might become less abrasive and nicer to each other – less business around so you don’t want to turn off the spenders no matter how they’re dressed – “a king dressed as a beggar” is a good simile.

Actually that reminds me of a story someone told about 20 years ago about an Indian farmer walking into a car showroom and being treated patronizingly by the salesman. The salesman saw a more urbane customer walk in and handed the farmer off to a less agressive colleague, only to see 4 cars being driven off by the farmer’s sons after an all CASH payment.

Maybe the image is not evocative as Julia Roberts in “Pretty Woman”, but still a pretty powerful one, nevertheless.

Delhaize and Unilever may not yet have felt the need to visit a relationship counseler, and of course, the jury’s still out on who (if anyone) will actually win in their battle.

For now, Unilever has lost shelf-space for around 300 of its brands at Delhaize stores.

Delhaize may potentially lose some of the sales that those brands got for it, in case consumers want a specific brand rather than a private label or a substitute brand.

The consumers lose not just in terms of their choice being reduced, but perhaps also in becoming confused about the specific value / benefits of competing products when the certainty of their customary brands is removed. Remember, brand loyalty is built on the predictability of a repeated experience over a period of time. If  you remove that factor from the purchase, each purchase becomes an experiment again, until a similar predictability is found.

(For those who missed the previous post, you can read it here.)

Referencing this battle, reactions to a discussion in at least one online poll on www.retailwire.com seem to favour retailers, or equally blame both retailers and suppliers. Only about a quarter of the respondents felt that retailers were not being fair. Considering that the respondent universe comprised of professionals from retail companies, suppliers as well as service providers, this seems to be a surprising result. Or perhaps not? Perhaps brands are no longer delivering a significant value to be able to command a premium over private label?

Some of the reactions from that discussion are reproduced below with permission from Retailwire.

 

• It’s hard for me to feel for both retailers and vendors when they obviously do what’s best for themselves, regardless of the long-term impact. In this case though, I would tell Unilever to go aggressive and pull all their lines from Delhaize. Then up the marketing of these lines with a cooperative marketing program involving the other retailers. Let Delhaize try to survive with shelves full of private label products and see how long they last. (Marc Gordon, President, Fourword Marketing)

• First, you seem to be talking more about Europe than the U.S. and that’s a different animal. However, given the universality of the question, I’d say first that the best and worst of people and companies come out during hard times. The best redouble their efforts to build meaningful long-term relationships with their trading partners. Unfortunately, it seems that most are simply trying to squeeze an extra penny or two out of the other. To your specific question–No! CPG companies are only starting to rationalize their portfolios. There are still way too many products out there simply for the sake of putting their name out there–not because the product moves. Some manufacturers are starting to cut back on their lines, but I suspect much more is needed. As to developing private label, what do you expect? Retailers have been copycating for years. But I think consumers have gotten wise to the fact that just because it looks like a brand doesn’t mean it has the same quality. And to any retailer who can’t do any more than copy, shame on them! (Len Lewis, President, Lewis Communications, Inc.)

• Fast moving consumer goods companies still need to rationalize brand portfolios in many cases, as so many retailers are finding higher profits in reduced SKU counts, without losing shopper loyalty. Depending on how this shakes out with specific retailer strategies over time, this may or may not make room for more local brands and niche players in some instances. Private label is a whole different animal today than it was even four or five years ago. The top tiers are not just inferior substitutes for national brands; they are national brand equivalents (or better) and widely recognized as such by consumers who are switching, and are not likely to come back. As for retailers copycatting, that’s always been a factor. Sometimes retailer behavior is outrageous, but there are laws protecting trade dress, etc., and branded manufacturers frequently litigate, and win. (Warren Thayer, Editor, Refrigerated & Frozen Foods Retailer, BNP Media)

• There is significant brand proliferation in FMCG. Think about cereal, ketchup, salad dressing or the myriad of other categories that have duplication on top of duplication. I led an industry-wide study that proved retailers could remove 12 – 18 percent of the actual SKUs from a given category (almost across the board) and not lose sales–in fact retailers will grow their sales (by unit volume and revenue). Consumers want true variety and differentiation – not the same thing in the same size. How many red ketchups in the 24oz bottle do you really need on the shelf? In many cases, there should be a couple of national brands and the store brands.
  The study also showed that the very large marketing dollars thrown at retailers to help promote products are in many cases not enough to cover all of the downstream costs and activities retailers engage in to accommodate duplication of brands. The inventory carrying costs alone are staggering. The FMCG companies will not want to hear this, but without fail, we found that there is too much duplication and with careful consumers, retailers should make sure they are offering the very best solutions for their customers while maximizing profits and opportunities. (Kevin Sterneckert, Research Director, Retail, AMR Research)

• How many shoppers (in the US, anyway) would drive out of their way to get Unilever soap? Probably not too many. Price, proximity and shopping habits are stronger than most CPG loyalty. Higher ticket items, like durables, and higher involvement categories like skin care, have more resilience. Retailers are understandably using the recession as a catalyst to drive sales of private label. Are they playing fair? Well, no.  Manufacturers are over a barrel, giving as much information as they can in order to stay in good standing with retailers. Further, some retailers have even used promotions that pull on national brand strength to promote private label. Publix Supermarkets ran a Buy-One-Get-One, where shoppers could buy a national brand (Thomas’s English Muffins) and get the Publix private label brand free. This drove trial – and presumably–conversion to their brand. No, they aren’t playing fair. The question for national brands is how to stay relevant and on shelf. (Liz Crawford, President, Crawford Consulting)

• Technology and collaboration should be helping to solve this problem, and it is a problem that existed before the current downturn and will continue when the recovery comes (hopefully very soon!!). If the retailer can show empirically that the new product lines do nothing to add to the profit mix, or worse do something to harm it, at the store, the supplier should yield and remove or not introduce the items. If the manufacturer can show empirically that the new product lines work to bolster the profit mix at the store level, the retailer should yield and add the items. This may be over-simplifying the situation, and there will always be exceptions, but without collaboration both retailers and suppliers are going to lose and the shopper will suffer as well. (Ron Margulis, Managing Director, RAM Communications)

• “SKU Rationalization” is a dangerous game…as the volume of sales per item does not necessarily reflect the impact to the brand as a whole. The push-pull of private label vs. branded product has been going on a long time and it’s not stopping any time soon. While it’s possible to create an apparel store built solely on private label merchandise, I don’t believe it’s possible in FMCG. All those advertising dollars have, in fact, made a difference. It’s also true that not all private label merchandise is create equal. I might be okay with generic canned food, but there are other products that have a distinct difference in quality. Q-Tips, Band-aids, some cheeses come immediately to mind. There’s a reason why book sellers carry slow movers. There’s a reason why apparel retailers buy a full compliment of colors, even if the percent contribution isn’t the same across all of them. Similarly, there’s a reason why FMCG retailers need to carry brands. It adds to their own brand credibility. (Paula Rosenblum, Managing Partner, RSR Research)

• I’ll take on whether retailers are “playing fair” by copy-catting national brands/morphing them into private labels: 8-10 years ago, I would have cried foul; these days, it’s par for the course. Yet another reason why vendors have to keep their innovation pipelines full or risk being one private label switch away from extinction. Think of your retailer knocking you off as the sincerest form of flattery (if you can bear it)! (Carol Spieckerman, President, newmarketbuilders)

• As indicated in the poll questions, there is sufficient blame on both sides. Retailers are dealing with manufacturers who force impractical line extensions through financial influence (incentives) detracting from a balanced category. Private Label is skimming the cream of category sales and threatening to take a disproportionate amount of shelf space. Private Label also can trade down category average pricing through poorly thought-out pricing schemes that do not reflect the market place. The extreme in either direction reduces the optimization of the consumer-centric effort we are all chasing. Manufacturers are the Mecca of product innovation. Private Label merely mimics. When we deviate from true innovation and the goal is to reduce the shelf space of competitors, everyone loses. The leap to Private Label is a result of cash-pinched consumers looking for a bargain. Private Label has a place in retailer strategy, but it should not be the entire strategy. Nor should the overwhelming ownership of space by a single brand. The premium or angel customers will continue to buy brands that exhibit the features and benefits of quality and consistency. Which customers do we want to develop as our base? Angel customers or bargain hunters? By lowering standards, quality and differentiation, we move into a downward spiral into Heck. Manufacturers must put forth innovation and quality as the model. Retailers need to maintain the balance in the categories that maintains a profitable mix of customers. It is about strategy and thinking beyond next week. Ask John Galt. (‘GMROI’)

• There were several reports on just-food.com last week out of the Consumer Analyst Group of New York (CAGNY) conference in Florida about what some of the bigger brands plan to do about rationalizing their portfolios. Some were particularly interesting and relevant to this discussion. As for the sub-debate about differences between the US and the ROW (rest of the world)–also very interesting and relevant especially when looked at in the context of globalization vs consumer preferences for locally produced food (a subject on which there is still much to be said as it cannot possibly be, in my view, an either or proposition). ( Bernice Hurst, Managing Director, Fine Food Network)

• For FMCG, a CPG firm must ensure they have a brand strategy to address the intended audience. Most will say they have that, but the truth is that they try to “cover the Earth” with a wide assortment to capture any and all consumers they can. In these economic times, there will tend to be even less “rationalization,” so to speak, since CPG firms will try to grab any demographic who is spending money.  Of course, regions vary in their propensity to embrace things like private label, however there are great examples across the globe of deep penetration of P/L, some of which have already been mentioned, and also Trade Joe’s in the US. P/L success has more to do with intentions of the retailer, rather than the line of products, specifically. (Ralph Jacobson, Global Consumer Products Industry Marketing Executive, IBM)

• Where’s the data? Which consumers are buying which products? Which ones are not selling so well? Where’s the demand? Both sides can play the win-lose drama as long as they like and both will lose. (Camille Schuster, President, Global Collaborations, Inc.)

• Brands are the initiators of product and package innovation.
  • Until Private Label companies or a collaboration with retailers can fund research and development and spend back big dollars back against the brand, the brands will always have customers looking for their new products.
  • Retailers cannot give up the slotting fees that brands pay for shelf space. That is why many stores get more branded skus then they probably need.
  • I am not sold that manufactures can’t execute with creative accounting, “Brand partnership stores.” Retailers work on slim margins but as more retailers self manufacture there is AN opportunity to sell to yourself.
    (‘YOURBOYS’ )

Luxury has its ups and downs. Assuming that the economy will look up at some point of time in the near or distant future, luxury brands will shine again, even if they’ve muddied themselves slightly in the puddles of discounting.

Public (and industry) memory is short, especially in fashion, where you might be as good/bad as your last collection. There are plenty of luxury brands which had once been pushed to the dustiest back shelves, that have come back into fashion in recent years. So I’m sure many of the brands will be forgiven their current trespasses.

And, as a precursor to that, someone’s going to come back very soon with the bumper sticker from the post dot-con days which read: “I want to be irrationally exuberant again!”

But on a more rational note, brands which have tried to “democratize” luxury by tinkering with the basic product quality and not paying attention to the brand values would find it harder to climb up again. Just because you want to reach a larger audience you cannot inherently reduce the promise of a brand. Especially when there is true quality available across the price spectrum today.

Who knows, we might even get back to the days when the joy of luxury was based on having truly superior products rather than just a name that a lot of people recognise.

By VISHAL KRISHNA

Businessworld

20 Feb. 2009

Lesser stock on display racks in your neighbourhood Subhiksha, and may have started going elsewhere instead. One fine day, you may have even noticed that the shop was shut. What happened was this: Chennai-based value retailer Subhiksha Trading Services, neck-deep in Rs 600 crore of debt (plus Rs 180 crore raised internally as shareholders’ funds) accumulated over the past three years, could not pay its vendors as all its earnings was going to service the debt. So, over the past six months, it temporarily shut all 1,600 of its outlets in 110 cities.

Yet, till recently, Subhiksha’s managing director and promoter, R. Subramanian, was thinking of expansion. “I will add another 2 million sq. ft by the end of the fourth quarter of 2009,” he had told BW in December 2008, a move that would have raised his store count to 2,200 for an additional Rs 1,000 crore. Today, the company is on the threshold of a closure — it has no money to run its operations, its senior staff are deserting, many of its stores have reportedly been looted, and the government may initiate an independent audit of accounts at the instance of ICICI Ventures, the second-largest shareholder with 23 per cent stake.

However, Subramanian has not given up. Firm in the belief that Subhiksha can still be a viable business, he is making a last-ditch effort to survive by pitching for a Rs 300-crore loan from a consortium of 13 banks, besides attempting a debt restructuring exercise. In a letter sent to BW, Subramanian says, “The infusion of Rs 300 crore would revive Subhiksha soon.” That would allow him to pay off the vendors and resume operations at a minimal level, though he might also have to shell out a significant chunk of his 59 per cent stake. Subramanian’s confidence stems from his belief that his business model is viable. “We did not raise enough equity, and we paid the price,” he says. “It was a capital structure problem rather than a business model problem.”

Analysts agree that Subhiksha’s low-cost model was sound. They blame the company’s troubles on its rapid expansion with debt capital to open 800 stores in a year. Although the same store sales were as high as Rs 12,500 per sq. ft during the first few months of 2008, the debt taken on a number of new stores and the financial crisis put paid to Subhiksha’s exuberance. The industry average for stores of 2,000 sq. ft (Subhiksha’s typical store size) to break even is Rs 5,000 per sq. ft, and analysts say that Subhiksha’s new stores never achieved break-even levels.

The desire to expand at breakneck speed is not typical of Subhiksha alone. “All retailers have read the Indian market wrong,” says Devangshu Dutta, who runs retail consultancy Third Eyesight in Delhi. “There was no prudence; (there was a mismatch) between what the real consumer demand was and the number of stores opened.” Pinakiranjan Mishra, partner of retail and consumer product practice at Ernst & Young, says, “Retailers have spread themselves too thin to benefit from scale.”

The Rs 300-crore and the restructuring may help Subhiksha revive, but only if it closes at least 40 per cent of its stores. That may keep it afloat, but would be disastrous for a company that fundamentally offers low prices and relies heavily on high volumes for better discounts from consumer companies.

(Businessworld Issue Dated 24 February-02 March 2009)

About 7 months ago a spat occurred between the leading retail company in India Future Group and branded supplier Cadbury’s, with respect to margins offered to the Future Group. (A friend described it as a Bollywood saga.) Future Group had also previously had run-ins with other suppliers including the likes of Pepsi. (The previous post is here.)

Now there’s a European film noire sequel in the making, in a battle between the Belgian retailer Delhaize and European FMCG big daddy Unilever. Delhaize has suspended purchases from Unilever as, according to Delhaize, Unilever is making “unacceptable demands” that the chain stock more Unilever brands.

Like other branded suppliers, Unilever has obviously been impacted across Europe and the US as retailers have become more sophisticated in their approach to private label and squeezed out brands that they have been able to replace with their own products.

Given further weakening of the economic scenario, it is likely that consumers would switch to cheaper private labels offered by retailers, and retailers would be tempted to give over even more shelf space to their own labels where they get higher margins than branded products – a continually losing spiral for the branded FMCG companies.

According to a consumer survey carried out by an agency in Flanders in northern Belgium, apparently 31 per cent of shoppers polled were choosing to shop at chains other than Delhaize, and another 19 per cent were not happy with Delhaize decision (but there doesn’t seem to be indication yet that they would switch). Most of the customers who said they were remaining with Delhaize are either switching to other brands or to Delhaize’s own label products.

However this brawl ends, and whether it turns out to be a win-lose or a lose-lose situation, even this survey demonstrates that the retail store has the upper hand – less than one-third of the surveyed customers displayed their hard-core brand loyalty by switching to other stores.

That is obviously a worrying sign for branded suppliers who have invested humongous sums of money and decades of effort in developing their brands. But it also raises questions about whether the consumer is really perceiving any value out of the billions in advertising and millions of man-hours spent by the FMCG companies in developing the nth variation of toothpaste or detergent.

Tough times raise tough questions, and the ones that comes to mind are these:

• In recent years FMCG companies have rationalized their brand portfolios, but have they done enough?
• Are they really clear about the value the remaining brands are delivering?
• Are the retailers really playing fair when they build up so-called partnerships with suppliers, only to take on board the product learnings and then develop own-label copycat products (sometimes down to package colouring and graphics)?

What do you think?