H&R Johnson launches Marbonite coloured tiles

Mumbai-based tiles maker H&R Johnson (India) last week launched coloured tiles under its Marbonite range.

Branded Coloured Marbonite, the offering is positioned to capture the design-centric segment of the vitrified tile market in India.

The new offering is expected to consolidate H&R Johnson's leadership in the Indian tile market as well as Marbonite's brand leadership in the vitrified segment.

"Through the Coloured Marbonite launch, we aim to provide the Indian customer with a product that is revolutionary in terms of its aesthetic value as well as product attributes. We also aim to upgrade the vitrified tile segment to a new dimension with our launch," Vijay Aggarwal, managing director, H&R Johnson (India), said.

Coloured Marbonite follows the company's investments of over Rs 100 crore in product development at its plant in Pen (Maharashtra). Coloured Marbonite is a result of a cutting-edge technology known as RollFeed.

We had to make substantial investments in this technology in terms of new machinery, product development tools, design technology amongst others," said Aggarwal.

The Coloured Marbonite range has 10 designs and colours. The range will be expanded over the next six months.

Coloured Marbonite launch will create a new segment in the vitrified tile market. Until now the vitrified tile market was segmented on the basis of the product size. The design and colour was not considered a key segment differentiator. This was basically due to the lack of original designs in the evolving market segment.

The company is also launching a marketing exercise to promote the launch. "We have earmarked a Rs 10 crore promotional budget for the launch of Coloured Marbonite. The key message is aimed at driving the product's USP of colours and designs to the target audience," said Aggarwal.

Marbonite, which was launched in 1998, enjoys a 30 per cent market share in the vitrified tiles market. During the current year, Marbonite is expected to contribute over Rs 300 crore to the company's overall turnover.

Coloured Marbonite will help the company break even on the manufacturing and marketing investments made towards the new product within a year.