Frooti, the mango drink product from Parle Agro has emerged as the second most popular mango drink in India. It has surpassed Slice from PepsiCo almost after a decade of losing the position to it.
Frooti had a market share of 25.6 percent in the country’s mango drink category worth Rs 6,300 crore in the quarter that ended March 2016, claimed Nielson’s data citing industry insiders. In the same time period, Slice had a market share of 23.4 percent. The top position is retained by Maaza from Coca-Cola that has a share of 48 percent.
Frooti has improved its share by 180 basis points in just a year’s time. A couple of years back, Parle roped in Bollywood actor Shah Rukh Khan as its first ever celebrity brand ambassador. It focused more on the PET bottles as it is a part of its strategy that will woo people of all age groups.
Nadia Chauhan, Parle Agro’s joint managing director, claimed that the communication was designed to make sure that they strike a balance among the consumers. They wanted to maintain a balance between retaining their kid consumer base that is quite large and build a massive appeal among the adult consumers as well. This has helped them gain a greater market share.
As the adult consumers prefer PET bottles, the company could lure the larger adult base with the introduction of this packaging option.
Frooti is claimed to have grown 12 percent in terms of sales in a year even as the growth rate of the category is just 1 percent. Though Frooti that was launched in 1985 is the popular packaged mange drink in India, the cola giants captured a majority of the market over the past few years.
Three years back, Parle Agro launched Frooti in RGB (returnable glass bottles) to challenge the supremacy of Maaza that grab over half of its sales from such glass bottled packs. Now, RGB accounts for almost 48 percent of the sales of mango drink in comparison to the 34 percent sales of PET packs.
