Marketing world starts...!

Started a new phase in my life...finally out of the software world...!

New job....with new status of married and employed!

The new phase starts in retail/marketing profile in a retail apparel manufacturer!

Can you imagine from software codes to apparrel (i m staggering to spell it only..:) )? However, i think this will be interesting. I have already spent past few days in visiting various malls (as i have been doing since my MBA started..) and my roommate is already cribbing about how i keep dragging him along.

Branded Apparel from some estimate i read last time is around 9000 crore market in india, and each brand is doing a miniscule amount of it given the spate of brands in the market. And given the population advantage, young poulation, increasing incomes...(u must have read it hundred times i guess..), this market is a big opportunity. And truely so, each brand is trying to put up some presence in malls, high streets, tier II, III cities..wherever they can find a manageable rental (thats kinda rare these days...).

However, as marketing bhakt, i always wondedred how cool is FMCG to start a marketing career..but i realize now that apparel market is very tough....given the no of brands ( i heard that it was 28000 on last count in India), and the kind of least u can do in product differentiation....ppl have already tried segmentation - pricewise, genderwise, occassionwise, designbased...agewise...whats left? The kind of retail formats thru which apparel is sold are again umpteen...LFR, MBO, EBO, SIS, MOMPOP, ....And promotions? - buy 2 get 6 free, flat 50 + 20 + 5 + 3.45 + 2.657 % less (what does that mean???), a gillete on 2 trousers, .....again u start doubting am i buying the right stuff...

SO, the big question i am asking these days is that what i will do as a marketing person in apparels?? Whats left?

Lets see....how things move!

Proxy!

This post is a proxy!

The same proxy which respected participants used to practise in the pious corridorrs of an institute...

My life has changed with lots...

1. MBA Over! (Alas!)

2. Life Over....err bachelor life (u can understand...it sounds the same!)

3. New life calls...(joining in june)!

4. No Newsgroups to refresh :(

5. No more vella chai-friends to bakar with..

6. No indori poha :(

7. No MERCURI activities...

8. No Tension (???) - thats another problem

9 No workload :(

10 No late nite maggi-chai-omlette

....

...............

You can understand!

Bored!

~nits

PS - written in the spirit of blogging....however i am happily married :)

Learning from Class...

Had just finished one course called Rural Marketing in Term 6 of MBA programme. The professor was a 66 year old veteran in rural marketing..Mr. Rajan. He tought a lot of new things and most importantly key insights about rural people, rural markets in India from his vast experience of 3 decades!

He concluded the course with few things on personal front, which i believe really do matter:
1. Success of a person is not measured by the money he earns or by the status...but whether he/she played all his/her roles perfectly be it son, parent, husband, brother, employee, etc
2. Dreams = life, else you are dead! Whats the point in living a life of compromise....dreams should lead your actions!
3. Nothing is impossible. Create a balance sheet of all your assets & liabilities (which you think) and revisit them periodically in life....see that most of the liabilities have been moved to assets side.
I guess real nice learnings from life. Thankyou Sir!

~nits

Vibrant Advertising on our Campus! - Marksman

This post is for all Marksman fans!

Posted on my other blog - Who is Kotler?

~nits