No surprises here… Rs 20,000-crore Amul is officially India's most meaningful brand

As per a recent study undertaken by Havas Media, Gujarat Cooperative Milk Marketing Federation’s (GCMMF) Rs. 20,000-crore power brand Amul has emerged as India’s Most Meaningful Brand. Other brands from India in this category include Cadbury, Google, Britannia, Life Insurance Corporation (LIC), Microsoft, Intel, HP, Parle and Samsung.
Amul is investing Rs 5,000 crore to set up about 10 additional milk processing plants in the current financial year. The plan involves setting up two plants in Delhi, three in Uttar Pradesh, one each in Kolkata and Maharashtra and the rest in Gujarat. “This capacity expansion is is line with our aim to achieve a revenue target of Rs. 50,000 crore by 2020,” RS Sodhi, Managing Director, Amul, was quoted as saying.
Amul enduring success can be attributed in large part to the GCMMF’s robustly inclusive strategy. “Our philosophy for the past 60 years have been to ensure remuneration prices for our 3.5 million members and value for money for the consumer, using the best ingredient at a fair price,” Sodhi says.
Sodhi points out that a 100 gm pack of Amul butter is still cheaper than a 100 gm bar of premium soap, which is possible only because of the brand’s philosophy of keeping in mind the farmer and consumer.
On a global level, Samsung, Google, Nestle, Bimbo, Sony, Microsoft, Nivea, Visa, IKEA and Intel have emerged as the most meaningful brands from this study.
The research reveals that Indians have the highest attachment towards Life Insurance Corporation of India (LIC), the state-owned insurance group. About 86% Indians would care if LIC disappeared tomorrow (globally most people do not care if 74% of brands disappeared the next day).
In its sixth year globally, and third year in India, the study titled Meaningful Brands, shows how our quality of life and well-being connects with brands at both the human and business level.
The research covers all aspects of people’s lives, including the impact on our collective wellbeing (the role brands play in our communities and the communities we care about), in our personal wellbeing (self-esteem, healthy lifestyles, connectivity with friends and family, making our lives easier, fitness and happiness) and marketplace factors, which relate to product performance such as quality and price.
About 75% of Indian’s believe that brands should play a role in improving our quality of life and wellbeing with the Asia Pacific average being 69% and the globally average 67%.
Approximately 67% of Indian’s feel that brands are working hard at improving consumer’s quality of life and wellbeing, compared to an Asia Pacific average of 55% and Global average of 38%.
The research also reveals that brands and consumers share best relationships in Asia Pacific across the globe. Consumers in Asia Pacific trust 83% of brands compared to just 50% globally and they would care about the disappearance of 60% of brands, trailing to just 26% globally.
However, on a global front, the research pointed that meaningful brands can increase their share of wallet by seven times and on average gain 46% more Share of Wallet than less Meaningful Brands.
These brands outperform the stock market by 133% (up from 120% in 2013), with the top 25 scorers delivering an annual return of nearly 12%. And lastly, these brands deliver marketing KPI outcomes that are twice those of lower scoring brands.
For every 10% increase in meaningfulness, a brand can increase its purchase intent by 6.6%, repurchase by 3.2% and price premiums by 10.4%, statistically demonstrating that a brand’s meaningfulness is a key driver of KPIs success.
“This is our largest India study to date in size and scope. Marketers will be encouraged to know that India once again stands out as the No.1 country, globally, where consumers have the closest relationship with brands. India is also the most ‘grateful’ country, rewarding meaningful brands, in business terms. We are seeing that in a developing economy like India, unlike the West and more developed economies, people are more trusting of brands. People here believe brands can play a meaningful role in their lives and that brands are working hard towards improving our quality of life and wellbeing. This creates tremendous opportunities for brands in India to communicate and connect with their customers, in our organic world – which is at the core of the Meaningful Brands Project,” Anita Nayyar, CEO, Havas Media India & South Asia, said about the study.
Across the globe, the research covered over 1000 brands across 12 industries and 300,000 people in 34 countries. The India leg covered 100 brands, 13,000 people and 11 sectors.