Sachet Success

A Sachet (pronounced Sa-Shay) was a small packet of perfumed powder the French used to place in drawers to make clothes smell nice. It also refers to “a small sealed usually plastic envelope containing a small portion of a substance such as shampoo” says the Collins dictionary. In India the term has become synonymous with shampoos. These sachets contain upto 10-20ml of shampoo that can be a convenient and affordable option for people even at the Bottom of the Pyramid (BOP). The cola giants had Rs5 bottles of Coke and Pepsi primarily targeted at this range. Other consumer good companies – think FritoLay’s packs of potato chips – have launched products in the magical five rupee zone. From shampoo to colas to cell phones, the sachet marketing option is attractive to an increasing number of consumers. The British Economist EF Schumacher blasted away at the traditional thinking of bigger is better in his work “Small Is Beautiful: Economics As If People Mattered” as long back as 1973. His idea was that for developing economies mass production needs to be replaced with “production by the masses”.CavinKare made its shampoo (brandname Chik) available in a one rupee sachet since 1989. Ten years later they tried to dig deeper into the rural market by introducing a 4ml shampoo sachet for half a rupee. On 14 Decmber 1983 when Maruti Suzuki invited the Prime Minister Indira Gandhi to launch the first ten 800cc cars, the middle class of India soon made it their darling. It was small (as compared to the tank like Ambassador or the box like Fiat and perhaps a Standard Gazelle) and sleek. The sachet version of a car.The Trendwatching site puts it as a question, “If roughly two-thirds of the world’s population makes USD 1,500 or less per year, why try to sell them expensive, bulky goods and services originally designed for consumers who easily make twenty times as much in North America, Western Europe or Japan?”. The answer is micro-selling especially in the markets like India, China, Philippines, Mexico and Brazil.Sachet is a great instance of micro selling.

It taps into the Indian shoppers psyche. In rural India, the daily wage earners buy everything from cooking oil to vegetables and rice that lasts for a day. This is driven not just by the cash in hand but also due to limited storage space and lack of refrigeration. The sachet size purchases address this gap. When they migrate to urban areas, they continue to buy single serves until they reach the magical threshold of prosperity when they can buy beyond what they will consume in a single serve. Hence in India small sizes of packages always have mass appeal. The challenge is to find a method by which the manufacturer can reach the deeper rural pockets economically.The Nano is the world’s cheapest car. It gives the people at the bottom of the pyramid the opportunity to dream of possessing a car. The car has already begun to form a part of the dowry demands as well – a sure sign of its desireability. In Gujarat where the car is being made the word Nano नानो or नन्हो literally means small – just the nano technology is supposed to be. Autos are going micro. Driving the big fat fuel guzzling behemoth is no longer going to get you envious stares. It is not just Shampoos… and it is not just in IndiaMusic has gone Nano with the iPod. It is small and compact and creates a sachet version of the grandiose music system that you have at home. The convenience of having your entire collection of music and videos available for you on the go. Some people also tuck in their personal documents in the Nano and treat it as their storage device as well.The digital cameras have made a sachet version of the bulky cameras that you had to lug around as you huffed and puffed your way up the misty mountain. Loans have gone micro. Microfinancing provides loans to the low income, self employed and often those that are ignored by the established banks. The cost of processing loans shoot up dramatically for large banks. That limits the extent to which they can dip into the potentially large segment of consumers who have traditionally been beyond. Cloud computing is making a pay as you use model of software as well. This is going to be the sachet version of software that will drop the use of pirated software in value conscious markets.With Tweeter, even blogging has gone micro and mainstream. Send your thoughts (called Tweets) but restrict them to 140 characters. In an increasingly time challenged world, people have learnt to contain whatever they have to say to fewer characters. So when 40,000 followers track Oprah on Tweeter, marketeers are already wondering how to tap into this market. This does not take away from the millions of fans of Oprah on TV or the thousands who read her magazines, this is a new set of people to reach out using the web2.0Anything micro involves redefining the scale. From a micro-mini skirt to microfinancing it is all about getting used to a sachet sized scale. It is all about getting a flavor of the full blown version without having to pay the big bucks for it or even spend that much time or resources getting it.MicroStaffing : The next big thing in the world of staffing is going to be MicroStaffing. That will mean how to build the capabilities in the organization to go after a much smaller number of open positions but doing it in a targeted manner to get the one perfect fit for the role. No more bloated staffing engines to hire 5000 employees in 3 weeks kind of blizzard. With lesser number of vacancies to hire it will be all about finding one talented person who can make a difference.Conspicuous consumption is out – well largely. Anything Nano is up for mass adoption. Buy just what you need without locking up your capital.