International Advertising Association (IAA) has bestowed Dr. R S Sodhi, MD of GCMMF with the “Business Leader of the Year” award and Jayen Mehta, Senior GM (Planning & Marketing) at GCMMF with the award of the “Marketer of the Year”. They have emerged winners in the FMCG-Food category, says a press release.
The IAA leadership awards, which honor individuals in the fields of marketing, advertising, and media every year, were presented by Maharashtra Governor Bhagat Singh Koshyari, the chief guest at the function.
IAA President, Megha Tata said “It is so rewarding to see the best in the business taking the time to be here and accepting these awards tonight. While I can describe our leaders tonight in many ways, I would just like to say that these unprecedented times call for unprecedented leadership and our leaders today definitely delivered on that.”
After receiving the award Dr. R S Sodhi thanked IAA. Sodhi presented insights into the Amul campaign saying there are four Ps.the first is a product where the customer must say it was better than his expectations. Pricing should be affordable, and farmers must get the best price. For promotion, we used umbrella branding to cut costs. Consistency in communication was the main pillar for Amul advertising and marketing strategy,” he said, mentioning creative advertising in the language of a particular place as the fourth P.
Sodhi also said that Amul is one of the first Indian brands to have recognized the importance of branding and advertising in the 1950s and started its iconic advertising campaign with the Amul Butter girl and her iconic positioning, “Utterly Butterly Delicious, Amul”. He also named “Amul – The Taste of India”, “Amul Doodh Peeta Hai India”, etc as successful campaigns. Even today, Amul spends less than 1% of its total budget in advertising, yet it is India’s most beloved brand year after year”, said the MD.
It bears a mention that in the recently held co-op conclave addressed by Union Cooperation Minister Amit Shah in Delhi on Saturday, he named Amul as a successful co-op model, from which others can learn. Amul Chairman and MD also attended the function. AMUL has a turnover of Rs 53,000 crores and is one of the biggest cooperatives owned by 36 lac farmers of Gujarat.