CONSUMER BEHAVIOUR

ASSIGNMENT #7
Advising Himalaya Herbals an underdog
brand in the Wellness Industry
Submitted By:
Akshay Chauhan DM16204
Jitendra Jain DM16219
Koushik Mandal DM16224
Mobashshir Arshad Ansari DM16230
Shubham Agarwal DM16245
Sweta Ramdas - DM16249

Date: August 9, 2015

Himalaya An Underdog Brand

Behaviour

Group 7 Consumer

The Wellness Industry - A Billion Dollar Opportunity

The wellness industry in India has evolved rapidly from its nascent unstructured
beginning in the early 90s to a comprehensive ecosystem today, including
consumers, providers, adjacent industries, facilitators and government.

The overall wellness market in India is estimated to be around INR 490 billion.
Some key market trends of this industry are as follows:

The growing wellness Industry has attracted a large number of domestic

as well as international players
Established players are looking for product portfolio diversification and
geographical expansion to foreign markets.
Companies are actively seeking private and public equity investments to
fuel growth

During the next three years, it is estimated that the Indian wellness industry will
grow at a CAGR of 20 % to reach INR 875 billion.
Wellness comprises of the following five segments:

Beauty services and cosmetic products

Fitness and cosmetic products
Nutrition
Alternate Therapy
Rejuvenation

The wellness industry in India has evolved dramatically over the last decade.
Growing urbanization, peer pressure, growing number of lifestyle diseases have
led to steady demand in such services.
Page 1 of 9

Himalaya An Underdog Brand

Behaviour

Group 7 Consumer

Key Players in the Wellness Industry:

The key players in the wellness segment can be divided into the following
segments as follows:

This report aims at analyzing Himalaya Brand that is mainly present in the
nutrition and cosmetic segment in India. Though the company has expanded
globally to various countries, in India the awareness level is comparatively low in
the beauty and wellness segment.
About Himalaya Herbals - Company Background
Himalaya's story began 82 years ago when Mr. M Manal, the founder, saw a
villager in Burma pacify a restless elephant by feeding it the root of the plant,
Rauwolfia serpentina. Fascinated by the plant's effect on elephants he had it
scientifically tested. After researching the herb, Serpina, the world's first
natural anti-hypertensive drug was launched in 1934.Gradually building its
equity in scientifically researched natural
products, Himalaya expanded its portfolio from
pharmaceuticals to personal care, well-being
and animal health, evolving into a 'head-to-heel'
herbal healthcare company. Pioneering research
by Himalaya's Research center has converted Ayurveda's herbal tradition into a
complete range of proprietary formulations dedicated to healthy living and
longevity. This legacy of researching nature forms the foundation of the
company.
By 1930, as a result of the growing influence of Western education and the trait
of critical reasoning it brought along, the traditional ideologies and belief
Page 2 of 9

Himalaya An Underdog Brand

Behaviour

Group 7 Consumer

systems were being challenged. To be consistent with this, Manal from the
beginning focused on empirical evidence and scientific data to prove the safety
and efficacy of Himalaya products. In due course of time, the mantra of quality,
safety and efficacy became the competitive differentiator for the company.
In the last decade, western companies have been spending millions of dollars to
patent medicinal plants and traditional systems. More than 2000 medicinal
plants were patented by them. The reason is they see a tremendous opportunity
of growth in the Ayurveda industry. The spreading awareness of side effects of
using chemical products is making people turn to Ayurveda and natural products.
Today, worldwide, the Himalaya brand is synonymous with safe and efficacious
herbal healthcare.
The companys product portfolio comprises of the following categories:

Face Care- Face washes, face scrubs, face masks,

treatments, toners/cleansers, fairness, eye care, lip care
Body Care- general purpose cream, body lotions and soaps
Hand and Foot care
Hair care
Baby care
Health care
Oral care

moisturizers,

Himalaya is still a baby in the FMCG segment. But, in a short time, some of the
products have become very popular. The Neem face wash is a market leader with
21% share in the cleansing category. The company has 17.9% share in the face
packs and 13.1% share in the face scrubs market. They have recently entered
the men's face wash category and also working on launching many new products
like shaving cream. Overall, their FMCG products business is growing at 40%
annually.
Himalaya has largely been seen in the natural remedies segment with players
like Lotus Herbals, Emami and Dabur, while the mainstream cosmetic market has
been dominated by larger players like Hindustan Unilever's (HUL) Fair and Lovely
and Pond's and L'oreal's Garnier. In order for the company to establish itself as a
strong contender in the skin-care or FMCG space, it has to steadily create brand
awareness among the consumers about the benefits of ayurvedic herbs that
Himalaya uses in all its products.

Page 3 of 9

Himalaya An Underdog Brand

Behaviour

Group 7 Consumer

How Himalaya fits into CBBE model?

The above figure summarizes the various dimensions of brand knowledge

architecture. Congruence of brand association is defined as the extent to which
brand association shares content and meaning with other brand association.
When we try to fit Himalaya into this CBBE model, we can see that Himalaya as a
brand has strong image as being herbal, pure and having freshness of nature as
the various types of brand associations.
The various product line extension of Himalaya carries the same associations
with them. As far as the uniqueness of brand association is concerned, no other
wellness or skin care product in India has been positioned as a natural/herbal
ingredient based product. In this regard, Himalaya enjoys uniqueness of brand
associations.
However, according to Keller, brand equity is a function of both brand image and
brand awareness. Though Himalaya has a positive brand image, when it comes
to awareness about the brand, it fairs relatively poorly compared to its
Page 4 of 9

Himalaya An Underdog Brand

Behaviour

Group 7 Consumer

competitors. So, Himalaya as a brand should focus on creating brand awareness

among consumers.
How can Himalaya increase awareness of their brand?
If an organization has a successful brand awareness it means that the products
and services of the organization have a good repute in the market and simply
acceptable (Gustafson & Chabot, 2007). The awareness of the brand plays a
significant role while purchasing a product or service and may have control on
perceived risk evaluation of consumers and their level of assurance about the
buying decision due to awareness with the brand and its uniqueness. The
importance of brand awareness in the mind of the customers can be evaluate at
various stages e.g. recognition, recall, top of mind, brand dominance (they only
call that particular brand), brand knowledge (what brand means to you) (Aaker
D., 1996). Brand awareness is very important because if there will be no brand
awareness no communication and no transaction will be occur (Percy, 1987).
Some of the consumers can make rule to purchase only those brand which are
famous in the market (Keller, 1993).
Purchase intention of the customers depends on the brand awareness and brand
loyalty of a particular brand: An intention to make a purchase of a specific
product or service in upcoming. Purchase intention of the customers consists on
problem identification, information search, evaluating the alternatives; make a
purchase, post-purchase behavior (Engel et al. J., 1995)
Himalaya can create brand awareness in the following way:

Fishbein Model: Fishbein model can be used by the company to position

their products by promoting them as herbal and natural. They can try to
change the consumer attitude towards the skin care products by making
them aware about the importance of using natural herbal products instead
of adopting inorganic harmful chemicals that are major ingredients of
almost all mainstream products like ponds, fair and lovely etc.

The Elaboration Likelihood model: The Elaboration likelihood model

aims at shaping consumer attitude through either central route or
peripheral route. Since the central route of attitude development is
persistent and strong, the company should try to adopt this strategy in
case of consumers having high cognition and involvement levels and high
motivation to use natural and herbal products.
The company has already taken several initiatives to increase consumer
involvement through various activities. As part of the record setting
activity, in Nov 2014, 286 students got a complete facial starting with a
cleansing, toning and moisturizing routine which was followed by a
Purifying Neem facial, conducted by 286 professional beauty experts from
Mumbai. The message was clearly about educating young adults on the
importance of a good skin care routine. For this promotional activity

Page 5 of 9

Himalaya An Underdog Brand

Behaviour

Group 7 Consumer

conducted by the Himalaya Drug Company, it entered the Guinness World

Record.
In May 2013, beauty expert Bridgette Jones joined hands with Himalaya to
conduct a workshop. In this workshop Bridgette Jones shared some secrets
for a glowing skin and a few quick tips for home facial. All these initiatives
are very good examples of heightening consumer involvement.

Some other strategies that the company can adopt are as follows:
Use celebrity advertisements to endorse their products that will act as
peripheral cues for low involvement people
Educating consumers about how to use products effectively for better
results

Such educational advertisements enable consumers to learn more

about the brand as well as gain valuable knowledge about proper usage
of products for effective results.

Organize beauty contests as well as sponsor beauty events in order to

educate the consumers that Himalaya products are not only healthy but
enhances beauty
Use affective appeals in advertisements
Use social media as a tool to reach out to the masses. The social
media presents a completely new way and cost effective means to
communicate with the consumers, where marketers become
aggregators of customer communities. Himalaya since its inception had
never used digital platform since its inception. Recently they have
started taking social media engagement seriously and are looking to
Page 6 of 9

Himalaya An Underdog Brand

Behaviour

Group 7 Consumer

promote their brand through various social media engagements like

WohDost contest, Challenge Accepted contest etc.
Himalaya can directly tie up with various leading saloon/ spas and
promote their products. This will increase brand visibility and lead to
creating brand awareness
In order to promote easy trialability of the products like shampoo,
conditioners etc. Himalaya can launch sachet of the products. Already
leading hair care brands have their sachets flooding the market and are
a huge success

How to reinforce Himalaya Brand in the memory of consumers?

Information obtained by consumers is short lived as they get stored in the
sensory store. By frequently showing Himalaya as an Ayurvedic product, the
message can get embedded in the long term memory. In order to do this
Himalaya can undertake the following:

Prototypicality: A research conducted shows that there are two factors

which lead to people towards a particular brand in a category. Firstly,
objects that are frequently associated with the instances of the category
become the representatives of the category. Secondly, the objects which
have the attributes that are very frequent in the category become the
representatives of the category.
Prototypicality leads to faster speed of processing and lesser response
time during the purchase of the product. Himalayas can strengthen and
reduce the distance between its brand and natural, herbal product
category by emphasizing on its ayurvedic attributes.

By frequently linking Himalaya with purity, Ayurvedic herbs etc. we can create a
very strong association between the Himalaya brand and the attributes like
quality, natural, purity, herbal etc.
Television Commercials:
40% of revenue for Himalaya Herbals comes from their sales abroad. The TVC for
Himalaya Protein Shampoo which is aired internationally shows how hair is
Page 7 of 9

Himalaya An Underdog Brand

Behaviour

Group 7 Consumer

affected due to constant blow drying or styling. It highlights that Himalaya

shampoo has almonds and chick peas which help in strengthening of the hair.
The TVC for Himalaya Protein Shampoo in India shows a girl walking with long,
shiny hair. Other girls in the ad are shown wearing a shower cap and getting
envious of the superior quality of her hair. The ad shows that Himalaya has
herbal ingredients and hence it is safe to wash and shampoo your hair every day.
For Himalaya Complete Care toothpaste, the TVC which airs abroad shows that
the toothpaste has meswak, neem and pomegranate. In the Indian TVC, they
mention that the toothpaste contains anti-oxidants which are present in all items
and good for us.
As Himalayas products are herbal and use Ayurvedic ingredients, the product is
differentiated and thus they must highlight the utilitarian aspects of the product.
All the above recommendations are basically to increase the brand awareness
and shape consumer buying behavior. However changing attitude alone is not
the sufficient condition to improve sales. Himalaya needs to rapidly work upon
improving the distribution channel to cater to the masses. Any communication
strategy fails if the product doesnt become widely available.

References

http://businesswireindia.com/news/news-details/himalaya-herbals-entersguinness-book-world-records/41714
Wellness report 2012-PWC , 3rd Annual Wellness conference, Riding the
growth wave Wellness
http://www.himalayawellness.com/newsroom/index.htm

Page 8 of 9