JAY JOSHI
In the days before India opened up its economy, people did not exactly care about brands. You simply got your clothing stitched from the local tailor. At that time, trends in clothing and hairstyle were dictated by Hindi films, and the local tailor was skillful enough to deliver sartorial styles that matched the onscreen stars.
After the economy opened in 1990, India began moving towards globalisation. Multinationals from across the world set up shop here, and a new concept entered the lexicon of the Indian youth: brand consciousness. Before long, young working professionals as well as college students were using clothing and gadgets from various brands, and there was a kind of peer pressure on everyone to ‘go branded’. In the 2000s, using a particular brand was the ‘in thing’ among groups of friends, and those who did not confer to the norms were ridiculed or banished from the gang. However, that picture is slowly changing. Now, there is almost no discrimination based on whether you use a particular brand or not, but that does not mean brand consciousness has gone away.
“I did face ridicule over lack of brand awareness in college. Most of my friends used branded clothing, but I was not so brand conscious,” says Lasha D’ Mello, a digital marketing professional from Caranzalem. “I succumbed to peer pressure, and bought a branded t-shirt, but soon found that the item began wearing out after a couple of washes. At that point, I realised that it was foolish to rush into buying expensive clothing just because of peer pressure.”
Ruchi Patel from Taleigao on the other hand does not think that is the case anymore. “This has never happened to me. Neither have I seen it happening anywhere, but there is indeed a tendency among people to prefer branded things, and people who do not have these, do feel a kind of desire to buy them. There is a kind of insecurity that people feel if they do not have branded items. I personally believe that one should not look at the brand, but prefer what is useful and comfortable for oneself,” says Patel.
Hence, as said earlier, there is no ridicule if you are not using branded clothing or other items, but nevertheless, brand consciousness exists, and more people are buying branded items than ever. This is true especially in terms of mobile phones and clothing, observes Disha Mashelkar, assistant professor at Don Bosco College, Panaji.
“I have noticed that most of the students in my class use high-end phones, and wear branded clothing. However, it is interesting to know how they acquire their goodies,” observes the assistant professor. “I have seen during my college days, the sharp divide between people using branded wears and those not using them, but today that divide does not exist, because a lot of branded clothing is available at reasonable prices online. Secondly, refurbished high-end phones too are available at lower prices online. Students simply buy these refurbished gadgets. That way, you still have a high-end branded phone, and that too at a low price.”
Pranav Dixit, a businessman from Ponda who offers online branding and marketing services, disagrees. “Discrimination based on whether you use branded good never existed to start with, but brand cautiousness has indeed increased. That said, even though there is a market for refurbished goods, most prefer the novelty of new goods. Even so, now, there are many brands in the market. As a result, competition has reduced prices, and availability of goods too has increased.
Thus, customers care more about what they want than what brand they are using. This competition is changing the market rapidly. For instance, if we look at mobile phones, brand value develops overnight, and the phone that was all the rage today is replaced by another. When the market is changing so fast, the customers are brand-conscious, but not brand-loyal,” says Dixit, elaborating how the behaviour of young customers has changed over the years.
