On
A Comparative Study of B2B Marketing Strategies
Of
Bisleri and Aquafina
(Industry: Packaged Drinking Water)
Submitted to
Andal Amisetti
Adjunct Professor
IMT Hyderabad
By
Rohit Goyal
Ruhi Gupta
Gaurav Surana
Ankur Sharman
Shashwat Parth Gupta
1. INTRODUCTION
The tradition of bottled water and mineral water is not very old. Even in western countries the practice of bottled drinking water started in 1950s. The trend of having mineral water gained grounds in the market. Now around 100 companies sell an estimated 424 million liters of bottled water valued at around Rs. 200 crores in the country annually.
Since ancient time people have used water from mineral springs, especially hot springs, for bathing due to its supposed therapeutic value for rheumatism, arthritis, skin diseases, and various other ailments. This started the trend of using mineral water for drinking purpose to exploit the therapeutic value of the water. This trend started gaining momentum in mid 1970s and since then large quantities of bottled water from mineral springs in France and other European The concept of bottled has been quite prevalent in western countries due to greater health consciousness and higher awareness about health and hygiene countries are exported every year.
In India, with exposure of media and international life styles, deteriorating levels of potable water, drastic increase in a number of water borne disease cases, increased in awareness about health and hygiene and other related factors led to acceptability of concept of mineral water. The market has not looked back ever since then and has grown leaps and bounds to such an extent that a number of genuine as well as fly-by -night operators have entered it to milk it.
In 1967 Bisleri set up a bottling plant for manufacturing and marketing its mineral water but failed. The brand was later sold off to Parle in 1968-69. Mineral water market had its seeding as early as 1968-69 when Parle Group