Q] Tell us about Society Tea’s foray into these new categories. What is your target market for the new offerings?
Well until a couple of years ago, Society Tea was only known as an Indian tea brand serving delightful cups of tea to its consumers. However, not so long ago, we ventured into two new categories – chutneys and pickles under the brand name Spice Secrets, comprising of a fantastic range, made with our grandmother’s traditional recipes. We also recently launched our dairy products, which includes skimmed milk powder, dairy whitener and desi ghee. While the dairy category targets the working professionals, moms and the chefs, the chutneys and pickles category looks at people of all age groups, excluding infants, who drool over these wonderful treats.
Q] How are you planning to market these new products, especially pickles and chutneys, which is a completely new space for the brand? Is there any campaign in pipeline for the same?
While OOH and Print were largely the go-to mediums for the major brands in this category, due to the ongoing pandemic this year, we have moved to Digital as our primary marketing medium to connect with the consumer.
Q] Which particular category has seen the highest traction during the last few months?
The pandemic compelled people to stay indoors, which witnessed an increase in online buying by the consumers. During the pandemic we saw great traction on our website and some of the frequently purchased products were our ‘One Minute Tea’, the Cleanse Green Tea, our iced tea and the Spice Secrets products.
Q] Society has a strong presence in the West, specifically in Mumbai. Do you have any expansion plans in other zones? Any plans to bolster your presence in the East market?
India is a tea drinking nation and every individual has a very personal relationship with their tea. The way the tea is consumed changes every 100 km. With this as a backdrop, we are striving to be a national brand. Which means, customising blends for each of the markets as per their requirement rather than blanketing them. While we have a stronghold in the West, we are looking at expanding into every major city across the country be it North, East or South, while staying true to our core values and taking the essence of simple home grown food products and converting them into loved brands.
Q] Going forward, what will some of the key focus areas be for you? How will you adapt your marketing strategy for the new normal?
Consumers are becoming increasingly digital in the way they shop and consume. As technologies such as smart phones and smart home devices are becoming increasingly embedded in people’s lives, brands are focussing on offering a consistent digital service across several mediums and continuously engaging with the consumers. As a brand, our marketing efforts are all inclusive. Earlier we used to lean more towards offline marketing in terms of spends, but now due to the changing times, we too have gone Digital in terms of selling our products on our own website and e-commerce platforms. The pandemic brought a major shift in the consumers buying behaviour, exposing them to digital commerce. With healthy spends on Digital in place, we intend to continue marketing the newer launches in our portfolio.
