Grace in Defeat

Why do people forget that there is grace in defeat.

Right from the outset a child is taught that he/she is supposed to win, to never come second. Everything is a competition and the one who comes first is the best. In any competition, in any sphere of life, there is only one who is going to win and others are going to loose. Now, how can everyone be that ONE?

I don't remember clearly, but this was the Ad for some Winter Olympics held somewhere around 2001; I think in Italy. What the Ad basically said was that 'it is the one's adversary that makes the victory worth the effort'. If the adversary is one who is not good enough to compete against you, then what good is such a victory? The fact that the adversary has the ability to defeat and still you win is what makes the victory sweet in the first place. Then why is there any disgrace in being defeated by a worthy opponent. It is the fact that the opponent can defeat you today which will make the victory sweet tomorrow.

Recently, Australia lost a test series on home soil to South Africa. Why is the reaction to such a defeat, so negative. Probably, its because the Australians are only good at that; Sports. But still, is the fact that the opponent is worthy and can defeat them so hard to bear. This is the typical unsporting attitude that will not help any team get anywhere. Not only on the field of play but also the game called life this one fact always remains true.

Capitalism Falling on its Face?

Capitalism allows for the survival of the fittest and in most part this has been the principle that the American economy has followed. The fit survive and the unfit perish. But then why are so many companies being saved from going bankrupt. There should be left to face the music. Is this the end of capitalism?

The argument that these people offer for saving the companies that are not able to survive themselves, is that, "there would be job losses which cannot be afforded". Why is it that, these people who are so bothered about job losses, never reduce their own compensations to ensure that the jobs need not be cut. I think that increasingly the sense of ownership of a firm in the traditional sense is lost. There is no pride in ownership. A company is just a bunch of shares. Anybody can have as much as they wish to have, so long as they can pay for it. The true spirit of capitalism is lost.

I think that if a company is not doing well, they should just go ahead and cut jobs and try and bring the company back into profitability. In the event that they are not able to do this well enough, they should just shut down. Just because over the years some companies has grown into an over-sized behemoth, does not mean that they have to be saved by the government despite all their shortcomings.

Capitalism should prevail!

Design is the new Strategy

Over the past years there were a lot of experts who spent a lot of time thinking over strategy and how it impact businesses and makes them successful. They came up with many theories to explain these phenomenon. I think that these strategies are going to slowly fade away to give way to design as a the new strategy.

You don't need to do a set of things and think in a certain way to do better business, you just need to be able to come up with great design that is the thing that people really respond to. Look at the iPod as a great example. It is not the best product that is available there, but it is the best design that is available out there and it is successful.

Even if one looks at retailers, in order to be successful in the market you do not need to be the best retailer. You need to be the best designed store, which meets the requirement of the shoppers in a manner that suites them the most and you will manage to be successful. An example of this kind of a success is the Big Bazaar in India, its designed in a manner that suites the requirement of the Indian consumer so well that it is successful. It also happens to be a discounter but the main reason for its success over all other has been the way it is designed.

Not only in fields where designs are very much applicable but also as far as organizations are concerned, design plays a very important role in their success. If the design is rigid, it often breaks or gets destroyed over the course of time. The classic example of such destruction is the car companies of America. They will not get better till they change the design of their organizations and change the way they have been accustomed to think.

Design is going to play a very important role in the coming years and there is a need for organizations to prepare for this change.

Mobile Number - The New Address

About 15 years back, having a cell phone was considered a luxury and times have changed a lot since. In todays date, the first thing that you ask a person is their mobile phone number. Think how ubiquitous this device has become and how much it has managed to pervade our lives. The day is not far away when, the mobile phone will become the only means of finding a person.

In recent instances I have heard of cops being able to pin point the location of a person using the signal of the cell phone. It has also been used to track the whereabouts of nefarious elements at times. The mobile is becoming the new address. Since the user carries along with them everywhere that they go, it has become a better way of keeping track of people than an address.

The mobile phone is becoming the new address, the day is not far when it would replace all other identifications.

Driving to Bankruptcy

The car companies in US have been crying about the losses that they have been making over the past few years. All their strategies have been failing and the inevitable happens to coincide with the financial crisis that has currently engulfed the entire world. So do you think that they should be bailed out of bankruptcy.

It is not a question of jobs being lost but more a question of how much American people value their tax money. How constructively would they want it used.

The American car companies have done a horrible job as far as their strategies are concerned. They knew the situation with oil, they knew the situation with the world market. I am sure that Honda and Toyota entered the American market only after the big three. How come they are not filing for bankruptcy?

Sometime back in the 1990's Honda and Toyota realised that making large cars and gas guzzlers was not the right thing to be doing, especially keeping the oil demand and the prices in mind. They also realised that soon there would be the requirement of alternate technology. In the meantime 'The Big Three' were building larger and less efficient vehicles. They pursued the plan with a vengeance (both sides).

Hence the companies that made the right strategic choice came out on top, whereas the ones with the wrong strategic choices have gone belly up. The amazing thing is that they are still not correcting their mistakes.

Under these circumstances, does a nation want to afford, flushing another few billion dollars on these horrible businessmen. They are only going to take all that money and light it up on fire. I understand thousands would be jobless...

Why doesn't the US start a new car company with all of that money and put the cash to good use. (I understand that the plan is to throw in $25 Billions into the hands of these three companies. Is that not enough to start a revolutionary new company?) The thousands would still find employment. They would be working for what is going to sell. They will help America grow back towards the automotive supremacy it once held.

No no... instead they will just burn it up... give it to those who don't understand strategy...

Markets are Emotional

The news over the past few days:

'Markets down on global crisis'

'Markets up on global cues'

'Crisis to last 6 months: markets down'

'Markets up on Fed Rate cuts'

The bottom-line, the stock market is an emotional animal, just as Warren Buffet puts it. It does not known what to do and where to go. It just acts on impulses provided by the outside world. There is no rhyme or reason for most of the fluctuations, they are just a result of how the "Market' is feeling. There are those who try to comment on what is going to happen at the stock market everyday, my question is does it really matter?

Markets are best when looked at from a long term basis and understood. Focusing on daily news and making your bets in the markets, is not the best thing to be doing. There is no point trying to explain everyday movement, it probably is a result of some emotions, rather than solid reasoning.

The best thing to do at such times is to concentrate on fundamental strength of the economy and the company to make decisions.

Internet and Globalization - II

The industries which sold digital content of any sort, be it software, music, movies, etc.; have all woken up to the challenges and opportunities that internet has to offer. Many of them are taking advantage of this fact and making the most of it as well. There are still other industries whose marketing efforts put them in a place where internet has been able to play a large part in their success as well as their demise.

I will take the case of Apple. Apple has a very strange way of marketing their products. They usually do not stick to a lot of TV ads, at least not in India. They are very regular at releasing updates and also make a very public show of it. They are also one of the companies that is so closed to the outside world that their product can be considered a niche product (even though it is so ubiquitous).

Apple learnt somethings about marketing the hard way when it launched iPhone in India.

About a year back when Apple released the iPhone in the US, it was an instant rage. Everyone, including the presidential candidate was talking about the iPhone. It was a phenomenon like nobody had seen before and the mobile handset companies were all shivering. Fast forward 8 months...

iPhone was launched in India. A phone that had sold more than a million pieces a month and was stocked out across US, entered India with 2 operators unlike other countries, where it was distributed by only one operator. It failed MISERABLY! Although the company would not give details, according to certain estimates only 10,000 iPhones have been sold in India 3 months after launch.

What hit them? In one word the Internet (also the piraters to a certain extent).

8 months was long enough for Apple haters to figure out every negative thing about the iPhone and publicise it sufficiently. Also, there was a lot of information available about the phone on the internet and people were immediately able to see what were the shortcomings of this phone; that was touted as the best. The internet had transferred the initial US launch hype across the world, even though the company did not put in any effort a lot of marketing happened on the net; and though the phone was not launched in India, the excitement regarding the launch was the same.

Then through the piraters and smugglers, iPhones made their way into the market. Within about 2 months of the US launch, the die-hard Apple lovers had already acquired their beloved phones through wrongful means. These were the missing phones that Apple and AT&T kept reporting. Also, the internet has made sure that the pricing is extremely transparent. Knowing that, launching iPhone at almost double the price as that of US did not make any sense, but Apple did.

All in all, the Internet alone is to be blamed for the demise of the iPhone in India. The demise occurred even before the birth. Will Apple learn its lesson?

Internet and Globalization - I

Globalization and internet has introduced a new set of problems for the marketers. No longer is it just enough to make a good product and create the right hype. It also becomes important to release the product simultaneously. In the following blogs I will look at how this has fundamentally affected the way marketers are forced to look at their markets and some mistakes that they still make.

Let us look of the paradigm shifts. In the past, the Hollywood production houses used to release the movie first in US, then in Europe and later on in Asia. This worked well for them, since they were able to use the earnings from one continent to market the movie in another.

In todays scenario, marketing does not happen in one continent alone, whether they like it not. They create the hype in America and people in India anticipate it. To make matters worse, after the introduction of the internet, they started noticing that pirated versions of the movies started becoming available soon enough in the other continents and waiting for a month before the release of the movie in the other continent meant that they lost out on a sizable chunk of box office revenues.

Matrix Reloaded was the first movie to be released on the same day world-wide. I attribute a large amount of the credit for the box office earnings that this movie had to this one fact.

In this day and age of internet and blogs, it does not take a lot of effort for a marketer to spread word about a product (be it movies or computer or whatever). The hype gets communicated across the globe quite quickly once the information gets onto the internet. The saying 'Word spreads like fire', has become quite literal in the internet age; in fact it spread faster and wider, than any fire ever can. This makes timing the launch and doing it simultaneously, very important. Marketers are waking up to this fact. This has also resulted in a lot of pressure being put on the financial requirements for marketing. Though there are those who manage to find synergies in this as well.

It is important to realise the reality that is internet and how it affects businesses.

Creativity and a Slowing Economy

Right now is the time that most of the companies, especially the marketing teams in most companies should be looking at innovative ways of pulling customers. They can think up totally whacky ideas and rest assured that the higher powers will second it as well, in the hope that sales would pick up.

It is often in times when the economy is slowing that one gets to be at their creative best. When the going is good, most often companies, as well as executives do not wish to take any risk. Its easy to do fine by playing safe. Most companies play it safe and some out of the box idea which might be risky will not get the same kind of support for the fear of failure.

In a failing economy, failure is imminent. Therefore, risking failure becomes a lot more easier for the top executives. The way a risk is seen is different. Maybe this will avert the inevitable. Therefore the decision to go ahead with a plan that maybe seen as a creative risk, comes much more easily.

All sort of things get done! New business verticals are launched; new ad campaigns are designed; products that have been on the shelf for years are given a go-ahead! Is it the right approach? Who cares! You get to be creative!

Levi's Square

I think there are 3 Levi's squares in India. One each in Delhi, Mumbai and Bangalore. A few days back I just happened to chance into one of the stores during a rather prolonged shopping trip with my sister. I have been to the Levi's Store often, during the time that I used to do shopper research and therefore was quite aware of the structure of the store.

Upon entering this store, the ground floor generally has the 'Red Loop' line of products, which is the higher end of the price line at Rs. 3000 and above. The second floor has the 'Sykes' line which is priced between Rs. 1500 and Rs. 3000. The top floor has the 'Levi's Red Tag', the lower end of the price line with products in the Rs 1000 range. I used to think that it was a good means of ensuring that the high priced Red Loop range got some hits.

When we went into the store to shop, my sister had a look at the Red Loop line and got rather put off and was at the verge of leaving the store. Were it not for the fact that I was aware of the lower priced range being available on the upper floors, they would have lost a customer. Is it prudent to make the shopper go through the most expensive offerings that you have before they can get to the not so expensive ones, I have my doubts.

An apparel store has only so much time to capture the attention of the shopper, when the shopper enters the store. If at first the best value is not offered, most often, shoppers would go look elsewhere. Besides, in this case their premium segment of clothing would be shopped by the high end crowd, would they not want certain degree of privacy, rather than a floor that is being used as a thoroughfare?

Nano-Technology - The Paradigm Breaker

When the internet was taking its baby steps, people would have never thought that once day having an office without internet is going to be impossible. Today, living without internet would be the equivalent of trying to do business without an office in the 1980's.

Internet has changed the way business is done and the way many think about business. It has also given ubiquitous, a new meaning altogether. In effect, the world is no longer the same, because internet has been able to pervade every aspect of our lives. In a similar manner, the next thing that is going to change the paradigms that we live in is; Nano-Technology.



The above video is but, one of the applications of nano-technology, and I am sure that you would find it very impressive. Imagine tomorrow's world, where every thing that is around you is able to communicate with you. The wall of your house is a fluid display and also an input device through which you can track each and every thing in the house. When the shoe rack can know which shoe of yours required polishing and your wardrobe knows when your clothes need to go for washing. Imagine the boundless possibilities once such technology pervades our lives just the way internet has.

Now, imagine what this does to the way we do business and industries?

If clothing can be made with nano-technology... and if the cloth could take any shape and form that I desire for it to, I would just need one set which can take the shape that suites the situation, the environment and the need. It can take its bath as I take mine. What will happen to the clothing manufacturers and retailers. This is certainly going to be the next game changer.

It is going to cause the next paradigm shift, watch out for it!

Central Park

Think of New York and one of the first things that come to mind is the central park in the center of the city. Ok, now think Bangalore ('Garden City' supposedly), most would picture M.G. Road in their minds. What is our problem with protecting heritages and glorifying them? I never seem to be able to understand...

Bangalore over the past years was known as the 'Garden City', till IT came to the city and the city became highly commercial. But does that mean that the city has to forget what it was known for. These large green belts in the city are the biggest source of oxygen and they can also serve as a great means for people to relax and spend their evenings. Although the entire city is being modernised, no efforts are being directed to ensure that, these spaces are beautified, given a better structure and brought back to their former glory. All of Bangalore hangs out at malls and pubs which by the way are closed at 11 P.M. Parks are such great places to spend time, hang out, engage in various activities and most important of all it makes the place more lively.

I think this truth applies to almost all of the cities of India. The biggest hangouts in the city need not necessarily be the a place where you need to end up shelling out cash for fun. Fun can be free as well! There are several people who can help make a difference to the situation at hand, but there is no initiative from the governments end. Also, most of these efforts are turned down and shooed away. How can this heritage be made to live on?

Luxury Trains

India has been known for the luxury, that its kings and rulers have lived in. All of them left behind signs of their luxury, in the form of palaces, forts and even clothes in some cases. Many of these properties today are being managed by some of the top hotels in the world. There are so many luxury destinations in India. 2 of Oberoi group's hotels figure in the top 10 hotels in the world (both in India).

Barring Rajasthan, no other state of India has really seen the potential that this form of tourism brings to the state; or have made attempts to capitalise on the same. Rajasthan introduced the 'Palace on Wheels' which is amongst the most talked about railway experiences in the world. They created this experience through the understanding of the heritage and the inherent need for people to connect with that heritage of the place. The government of Maharshtra and Karnataka recently launched their versions of their own, and I guess in due course of time, if there is proper effort that has been put into creating a connection with the history and heritage of the place, these trains will also be successful.

There is such great potential that exists in the Indian Railways and so many opportunities going begging and it never fails to surprise me. I think that every state in this country should have a luxury train that brings out the best of that state. They say a lifetime is not enough to see France; in that case several lifetimes would not be enough to see India. India with its vastness and its beauty has so much to offer to the tourists who visit the place.

The Indian Railways is excellently positioned to cater well to there tourists and to give them the very best that India has to offer. The airplane does not do justice to all that is India and all that can be seen in India. I feel that the time has come when the Indian Railways and the states, start taking themselves more seriously and do something about creating remarkable experiences. Stop investing in useless ads and start putting together mind-blowing experiences for the people who visit the land, so that they can go back and talk about these wonderful trips that they had. Word of mouth is the strongest form of marketing!

Have you ever seen an Ad promoting tourism in Switzerland?

Less Business Brings The Best Out Of People

The dearth of any particular thing, results in the increase of its value. Simple logic of demand and supply. It is interesting to note though, that the same logic applies so strongly to the behaviour of people and the way business is carried out.

On one of my recent visits to a small town in the north of India, I came across a branded pizza joint that I was familiar with. I was pleasantly surprise when I entered the store, to find that the service was head and shoulders above what I was used to getting in Bangalore. The waiters were very polite, showed us to the table, waited on us, offered suggestions (knowledge about the preparations; now that is one thing that I expected to be higher amongst their urban counterparts), asked for preferences in taste and then served our order. It was as if I had landed up in a gourmet restaurant, but just did not know. Often when I visit the same store in the city, I get waiters who are edgy, impatient and at times even rude if you are somewhat confused.

Is it the lack of business in the smaller towns that brings out the best in the people who serve you? Or is it just the large supply of people in and urban store as against a rural store; that the value of a customer falls? I don't really know why this happens, though I would love to know why.

India Railways Has A Better Value Proposition Than EURAIL

In the opening scene of the movie 'Bachna Ae Haseeno', Ranbir Kapoor has a dialogue, which is insightful and at the same time hard hitting; he says 'I am tired of travelling by train across Switzerland, all you see is Cows and Grass'.

Are the Swiss not pure genius to have marketed green grass and black and white cows to the world so effectively that, every years thousands of people go flocking to Europe, to take a journey on the Eurail?

Recently, while taking a trip on our very own 'India Railways' from Bangalore to Jodhpur, I realised that India has such a huge variety of landscapes, sights and sounds to offer to a tourist. Every 300 Kms or so, the geography changes, the way the houses are built changes, the type of food served within the train changes... There is just so much happening outside that you can look at. There is just so much that one can take in through the course of a journey; it's like visiting several different countries, within this one, highly diverse country called India.

Is this more fun or is this more fun?

I fail to understand why this aspect never comes up in any of the 'Incredible India' ads. The value proposition that India Railways has on offer for tourists is much greater than, what any railway network has to offer in the world. There is opportunity that is crying to be exploited. There is just so much that one can do with this asset that we possess.

We have the longest, most vast railway network any country has and it works flawlessly, most of the time; except when we ourselves like to highlight the negatives and sit and cry about it. There is such raw potential that is waiting to be unleashed. Somebody has to come forward to unleash it. I would love to be the one.

Retail at the Airport

When a visitor at an airport wishes to shop, what would he/she look for? I guess the retailers at the Bangalore International Airport never thought about that when they were setting up their stores. I find a lot of the merchandise that has been put on display at these stores are surely not the kind that an airport shopper would pick-up. Let us see why...

An airport shoppers is one who wants to pick up something that he/she:
1) Is going to utilizing over the course of the journey
2) Is going to present to someone as a gift
3) Is going to carry as a souvenir that is extraordinary or typical of the place which can be taken back. At least that is what I look to shop in an Airport.

Let us see what BIAL has done. The Raheja group came and booked a large space and BIAL found it convenient and gave it away for Crosswords and Shoppers Stop to be opened. A book shop is good, it works especially in the context of an airport. But a large part of the merchandise featured in the Crossword store in BIAL are coffee table books. Lets say, coffee table books are bulky, expensive, not easy to carry and most important of all a lot of weight added to the hand luggage. It does not make a for a good in-flight read, unless the person is travelling by business class (not to mention the ratio of allocation of seat for business versus economy in a plane and the profile of people booking those seats). So just because coffee table books fetch a higher margin, they place the books there and generate very little revenue from the same.

I don't understand the rationale behind having a Shopper's Stop in the airport. The merchandise on offer is not exclusive or recognized. The brand is not know outside of the country and is available everywhere in this country, why would anybody hit that shop, unless they really need to.

The stores that make up an Airport retail area should have some degree of exclusivity. They should be the sort of things that you do not find very easily around the city. Most airports across the world sell their retail space to luxury brands, since their product mix is very exclusive and the kinds that would make everyone stop and take notice, besides its easier to get them to shell out a few more bucks for the space that they take up. They also allocate space to the not so luxury but, internationally well known brands, which can again draw a crowd on the basis of their brand power. Apart from them, space needs to be allocated to things that are unique to the city. Having this part of the offering covered is very important as far as pushing the city to the world is concerned.

The airport is the first and the last brush that one has with a city. It is important that all of the aspects of the airport are taken care of really well. Poor presentation on any front will most certainly hurt the image that one builds of the city in their minds.

Indian Malls - Retail Graveyards

First of all, I must confess that I have not seen many of the malls in India and also I don't have much information about the new projects that are coming up. But in all that I have been able to see so far, most of the malls in this country have nothing than can hold the interest of the shoppers there. Most of them are a endless number of shops laid out in a cuboid.

Malls can be destinations that people visit to spend their time, having fun, spending time in a structured manner. The shortcomings of most of the malls that I have seen is that there is an unbelievable amount of stress that has been laid on selling out space to the retailers. There is a greater degree of loyalty and customer satisfaction that can be drawn out of leaving spaces empty as against giving it away to the retailers. This is a fact that very few developers understand. People coming to a place that is supposed to be a destination, where they might spent an entire day don't want to be thrust from one shop to the other when they are there. They would look for places where they can actually hang out!

There is also a huge retail mix available in the mall; mall developers do not wait to think that retail is not the only offering that people are looking forward to. Having things in a mall that allows people to amuse themselves with (with or without a revenue generating aspect to it) is very important. The mall should be very engaging and should permit the shoppers... no no; the visitors (let us not see them as just shoppers; they may or may not shop) to enjoy their time in various activities in the mall. Having a rock climbing wall, a fancy barbecue on the terrace, roller coaster, etc. are different ways of creating engagement devices for the shoppers. These are extremely important to keep a mall alive.

STORIES - People love stories and even more so they love to tell stories to other people. In such a case don't you think that every mall should have a story of its own. Giving a theme and an exciting story behind the theme is very important to excite people about a mall. It also helps secure an individuality for the mall. It is extremely important to give a character to a mall in order to have a presence for it which is everlasting.

At present developers are just constructing spaces where they put as much retail as they possibly can. These spaces are extremely impersonal and have nothing remarkable about them. These malls don't have an individuality or character that separates them from the rest. The trend that I notice at present is only going to result in the malls of today becoming the retail graveyards of tomorrow. When something bigger and better comes along the crowds will just shift to the better option and the malls being built now are going to just fade away very fast.

Resource Harvesting - India

India is a large country blessed with several resources. It has also been blessed with some amazing natural gifts such as the Himalayas and the large coastline stretching some 7500 Kms. It has several rivers that provide with water to most of the country. What all of this provides is also ample opportunity to exploit these resources for the purpose of generating energy.

India is poised at a point where double digit growth would be easily facilitated if only the energy needs of the country could be taken care of. We are energy dependent and therefore this growth is not facilitated at present. I have no doubts in my mind that the idea that I am pushing here is not one that can be easily achieved; but instead of spending crores of the people's tax money on figuring out whether to sign a treaty with a third party (again!) for securing the future energy needs, we need to look at securing it on our own.

Can't we as Indians make a decision to push the envelopes of technology to the limit develop new and more eco-friendly ways of harvesting the bounty of resources that this country is blessed with? Is renewable sources of energy not the future of energy?

The world of automobile manufacturers had said that a car with a price tag of $2500 was not possible. Tata, an Indian company made it happen. Why are there no visionaries in the field of energy who would pursue the possibility of making India energy-independent. It would be India for now, but tomorrow the world will be their playing ground.

There is a pressing need for India to push the next wave of technological breakthoughs. Companies such as Suzlon have become industry leaders in wind energy, but have not really put together proposals for wind farms, that can cater to an entire state perhaps; they continue to look abroad for business. Similarly, though there are several players in the solar energy field none at all have the vision of setting up solar fields to cater to the large population of India (Sun is available 300 days of the year is this part of the world).

I do not understand when they are capable of bringing in billion dollar investment for buying others comapnies; why is it that they cannot make similar investments for setting up power plants that shall cater to the needs of this country; which will not be a bad business proposition, by the way!

It is a black day in India when we laud the shifting of dependance for energy from the middle east to US. We should be looking at ways to make ourselves energy independent. I am waiting for an Indian visionary to take the lead towards making this a reality.

Simple is Powerful

The above video is a parody on Microsoft; had they launched the iPod. I think that it epitomizes, the thing that makes Apple a more lovable company. Their presentation is very simple!

For an idea to have an impact, it is important for the idea to be simple. A simple idea can be understood by more people and can be spread easily as well, since the effort that needs to be taken to explain the same is much less.

Simplicity is the in thing...

Hospitality Industry

Over the past few years I have had the opportunity of traveling far and wide across the world. I have been fortunate enough to be able to stay at some of the well known hotels. I have stayed at the Marriott, Hyatt, Le Meridian, Taj, Leela, and others at various locations in India and abroad. I must say that once you are used to the routine it is quite boring to stay at almost all of these hotels. Except for the subtle surprises that a Marriott might offer at occasions and on other occasions when the hotels bungle up your reservation and upgrade you to an executive room (more due to a lack of a better option that choice), there is nothing unique or surprising, that one would find while staying at these hotels.

For a hotel that calls itself 5-star would you not think that they should be in a position to delight the customer with the type of experience that is put on offer. When I enter the room of a 5-star hotel, no matter what, I will find a bed laid in the centre of the room, with TV kept across the room, a desk/study and a sitting area, not to mention the restroom, which is the most mundane bit. Why has that got to be the case in every hotel?

It amazes me that barring the landscaping that runs outside of the hotel there is pretty much no attempt made to differentiate the hotel from what they offer at the rest of the places. If this was 2000BC and designing was still taking baby steps then that would be a good excuse; fortunately it is not! Why can't each hotel; based on the geography and location be bound by a theme of its own. Something that makes it unique, something that offers surprises and mystery at the same time. When I enter the room of a beach resort, why can't the room have furniture that fold into the wall so that the room can be converted into a large play area during the day for the kids to play and cosy room by night for them to sleep peacefully after an entire day of riot. Why can't there be a water flow maintained through the entire property, water passing through every room, thereby cooling the rooms, instead of the regular AC. Why can't designing be taken to a new level to make living spaces special and experience worth remembering and so remarkable that you need to tell all of your friends?

The amount of money that these hotel chains would spend on marketing; if spent on making such upgrades, will perform the function of marketing automatically. Why does nobody put in that effort to make the experience special? What is with being routine and boring? Its amazing to be unique!

I wait in hope that someday, one of these chain will decide to do something unique, remarkable and out of the box. I would love to go stay at such a place...

Let Visitors Spend More...

India has been seeing a sharp rise in tourism over the years and there have been countless acres of forest that have gone under the axe to print matter to the same effect. I may quote some of the statistics that have been mentioned with regards to this industry.

In 2006 there were as many as 4 million visitors who visited India who spent a total of $ 8.9 billion. The tourism industry has been showing a growth rate of 20%, year on year. I am surprised that they managed to spend so much, considering the fact that we are horrible at providing opportunities to spend. The tourism industry in India is touted to grow at a rate of 30% till 2010 and with the commonwealth games coming to India and the possibility of even the olympics coming to India, we really need to look at the opportunities that visitors have to spend in India.

Let us shift to Paris...

As soon as you enter the lobby of a hotel you find a huge array of pamphlets mentioning some 25 different site seeing trips that one can take to move around the city. On all of these combined one can spend a cool 1000 Euros per head. Then you decide to head out to see the city... There are a huge array of souvenir stores that offer a range of products, no no! they are not traditional craftswork which will find no use but to sit in my showcase once I return back to my country. Instead it is the mundane, day to day stuff, that one can use regularly. Imagine the number of times an American is going to go back to America and wear a 'Sherwani'. Not only are these day to day products, that one can use easily upon returning; but they also have Paris pasted prominently over it (In fact I still believe that baring the ubër fashion stores, its impossible to find a T-Shirt in Paris without Paris written on it). Good Advertising! Don't you think? Why do you think that the city gets the most number of visitors, its because all of these people carry all of this stuff back home and do free publicity for the city.

Is it so difficult for someone in India to do the same in every major city of the country. Can this country that is known for all of the hospitality that it can offer to its guests; not offer them descent avenues to spend their cash at. I think there is a desperate need for such services in this country. Here is a situation where we need to decide to push our own country to the world, and offer our best to the world.

Will someone take the lead?

Does our market react to ad campaigns?

It was just a thought that occured to me today morning, as I was looking at the Teach IndiA ad campaign that Times of India has undertaken...

Back in August last year, the sub-prime crisis had already broken out in the United States, the indication of financial troubles were looming. There was a feeling that the emerging markets will not take the blow of this economic downturn in the US. Also, around the same time, the 'Lead India' and the 'India Poised' campaigns were up and running in India. The correlation of the positive movement of the market and the campaign being run at the same time is worth noticing.

Towards the end of the year and with the dawn of the new year, these campaigns began to wane and so did the confidence in the stock markets. Essentially nothing had changed, as far as many of the sectors are concerned but the beating down was consistent across all sectors.

I know that there was an initial feeling that de-coupling will occur which never happened and FIIs pulled out of Indian markets and all of those stories that the finance gurus offer. But were the people offering advice to these FIIs not based out of India? Are they not human? Could they not get influenced by ads?

At the end of it all, I would like to say that; there is no conclusive evidence based on which, I have framed the above argument. It is just a thought and I think there is something there...

Network Businesses - Death of Large Corporations

There was a time when big meant powerful. A time when big companies bought the smaller ones and grew in capabilities and strength.

The bigger; the better.

Companies were able to easily hold onto 50% - 60% of the market and beat the competition with their superior marketing power. Those days are soon going to be passe. The future does not belong to the big but the small companies.

These guys are nimble, can move swiftly, have the flexibility to change with the needs of the market. Small companies; with brilliant people, who in their individual capacity are capable creating value, have been coming together constantly. There are several such firms that operate across the world today. The era of large companies having a wide array of capabilities is gone and specialists who are truly remarkable at the work that they do, who work in very narrow domains of knowledge are replacing them fast. These small organizations, network with similar entities, but with varied competencies, in order to achieve huge synergies.

In the end several such groups, each consiting of just a handful of people will come together to pose a major challenge to the large firms who are bulky and cannot adapt quickly enough to the changing business environment.

Microsoft was extremely competitive when it was small, slowly and steadily it went on absorbing one small company after the other and now finds itself in a position where it is not able to compete effectively in any of the domains where it exists. Its latest launches have all failed and so have its attempts to buy others. The case is similar with Wal-Mart, Ford, and numerous other companies that are large.

In the years to come, smaller and smaller companies will come together to achieve larger and larger goals. It will be important for the now large companies, to split themselves into smaller and managable companies, which are specialists at what they do. They will have to network with not only themselves but also with other specialists firms.

This may not be the death knell for the large firms, but it surely is a warning!

What makes 'Apple' succeed

The question, 'Why Apple products are the benchmark that the industry keeps chasing?'; is one that many have tried to explain (I shall take my shot at it!). I think that there is just one thing that they do right and that is 'SEXING UP' their offering.

Now let us take the case of the iPod (since it is the most successful Apple product)...

The iPod is just a music/video player that can do a bunch of other things. Oh by the way, you cannot load music on it without iTunes and if you are on your friend's computer and the iTunes does not have all the songs that you have loaded onto your iPod already, it will pretty much delete everything on your iPod. Ok... moving on... It will not accept any video files other than mp4, so you have to convert all the videos prior to loading them onto the iPod. You also need to convert all audio files into mp3 files in order to load then onto the iPod. Oh, oh and it does not let you you take any song out of it either, just in case you wanted to transfer some songs onto your computer. All of these problems do not exist in any of the other mp3 players in the market but still they dont sell as much. So with all of these problems and shortcomings, how does a product zoom to become the hottest selling gadget in the world?

The secret behind Apple's success is rooted in the development of its products, in the same manner in which Warren Buffet invests.

According to Warren:

One must find a company that is undervalued or one where there is great potential to unlock value.
Once you have understood the company and have belief in the management, invest as much as possible in the company to ensure huge returns from the same

This is exactly the same policy that Apple pursues as far as its products are concerned. They introduced just one product called the iPod whose function was, simple and straight forward. They put all the technology and marketing effort behind that product. All their investment ran behind that one product and the concentrated effort resulted in their product being an instant success. The variants that were introduced later on were based on the needs that existed in the market and since that one single product, a brand and an aspiration for the same had been established; the variants (which were few) were easily established as well.

Even if we look at the iPhone...

They came out with just 2 models which differed primarily in terms of the storage capacity that they offered. They believed in the product that they had put together and they bundled all the features that they possibly could into that one product (making for a rich product offering) and provided all the might of their marketing to that one product, creating a huge buzz about the product despite all of its deficiencies (which they corrected in the 3G version).

The idea of diversification has been killing quite a few companies. The width of their product offering causes confusion in the minds of the consumer. Also, the offering made through their products as well as the marketing push is not focussed enough to cause the product to be a runaway success.

Does diversification always result in doom?

The Elusive Exclusivity

When Vijay Mallya was sitting with Prestige to chalk out what they were going to build on the plot where the erstwhile UB bottling facility stood, I am sure that there were shining plans thanks to the central location and quantum of land available. They planned to build a landmark. Something that nobody could escape knowing about; with a luxury mall, 5-star hotel, service apartments, one of the most sought after office address in Bangalore; the UB City looked all set to become one of the most awesome landmarks in the city.

Then something went wrong...

To begin with they decided to ape the architecture of buildings from New York (The Empire State and the Chrysler Building). In this day and age to pick up on the architectural design of a building that was the benchmark of the 60's and copying just the design and leaving out the grandeur of the 100 story structure was where the possibility to market a winning story was lost. The designers never thought of the fact that this structure that was going to be a landmark in the city, had to compete with international benchmarks in order to capture the imagination of the citizens as well as the visitors of the city.

Half a century after the construction of the Empire State Building, tourism alone contributes a good deal to the buildings revenues, which is a result of the marketing and the recognition that the building has got over the years. They charge an average of $20 per person for the ride to the top of the building and get over 3 million visitors per annum and growing. Now there is a lot of money being made.

Ok they made one bad decision, let us not crucify them for it...

Then some years later the place opens up for business and the road outside the building is clogged. Wait its not just the traffic that is clogging it, there is an overflowing drain as well. To add to that they number of vehicles parked across the road really makes the road and more so the structure look ordinary and is a huge compromise on security.

There is little that needs to be done to improve the situation, but either the developers are not at all concerned, or they are not able to think up of a solution for the same.

Let us say...

Mr. Vijay Mallya will certainly not lack the political leverage to ensure that the traffic flow issues, drains, etc. on that road are taken care of and it gets done the way his marketing team says it should be. Some amount of effort needs to be put in, in order to make sure that the beautification of the road and the area around lives up to the luxury that the mall promises with all its big brands. Considering the 380 crores of investment made to construct the entire UB City, it would be a miniscule additional investment, but one that will make the development live up to the promises of exclusivity and luxury that it has made.

All that needs to be done is, in steps, they need to first of all resolve the issue of the open drain that is flowing like a river across the road. Ban parking of vehicles on the road, let them use the pay parking available at the back of the building or park elsewhere. Get the entire stretch of road re-laid in a better manner (instead of dropping mounds of mud when it rains heavily). Then the look of the entire road needs to be re-done, pavements, lamp post, et al. The idea is to give an exclusive feel to the entire area. For a road that bears the name of his father, it is not a huge ask. In the end it is not about the amount of cash and work that is put into the project, but the level of details that are taken care of, no matter how trivial it may seem.

Reflecting on what I read in one of Seth Godin's books; marketing is about creating a story, one that although not authentic, leads one to believe that it is; through the meticulous adherence to details and by using exclusive elements, designed to reflect the same. It is often trivial things, that complete the story.

The Great Indian Retail Business

Since the beginning of time India has been the land of the intermediaries. There are more people in this country who make money being the intermediary in a business than those who do by adding real value to a business.

What is the whining and howling that the modern retail stores killing the Mom and Pop stores all about? In the end through several surveys and studies, it has been clearly established that even at the current pace, the modern trade is going to only be having only 10% of the pie. Despite this the howling continues... Let me tell you its not the small stores that are creating the noise, but the intermediaries, the guys with the financial might who go to the press. The issue here is that the intermediaries make money due to the scale of their operations, and they have fewer people to serve in the event that a store such as Wal-Mart becomes a part of the Indian retail landscape, which means, much less turnover for them.

I say the Wal-Marts should become the new intermediaries. They have the economies of scale. If we take the case of the Indian farmers; a large retail company can cut a long term deal with the farmers for purchase and management of their produce which they pick up at an already agreed upon price. This relieves the farmer of a lot of worries, their produce is managed the right way, they are assured a sum for their produce and it also create greater efficiencies within the system (Less wastage of stock, Better pricing due to reduction of intermediaries, etc.). These efficiencies will then be further passed down the system.

If the general trade stores were to buy their requirement from these large retailers (sort of like the cash and carry businesses but on a much larger scale). This would in effect be the entire supply chain turned upside-down. The large retailers actually supplying to the smaller ones and making the entire system more efficient and beneficial to all parties involved.

The question raised would be - Wont these large retailers become monopolies? The answer is to open up the sector, let one and all participate and let us see who comes out the winner. What is the problem if someone is better that all the rest? If someone can monopolize despite the entire world of investors and businessmen knowing the idea, then so be it.

I am sure that this is not the course that India retail is going to take, but would it not be awesome if this sort of a solution could be worked out? If general trade store could be branded under a retail major, where each retail major competed with the other. It would finally be the customer at the top.

My Blog

I have decided to dedicate this blog to the things that I feel are wrong with the way things work in this world. I feel on many occasions that there are several solutions available for the real world problems that plague us. Instead of chasing the easy solution that is available we go around doing all the wrong things, namely, sticking to erstwhile solutions that does not work in the given context.

Let us take this journey forward.