The brand promise of nostalgia

Sharp targeting and smart marketing have made Carvaan a successful brand. But, will its retro appeal allow it to remain a lasting one?

Walk into your nearest Vijay Sales or Croma. Pick up the Rs 6,990 Carvaan, not to buy, but just to listen to it. If you are over 40 years of age, chances are you will hum along. You will, probably, wallow in some memory associated with a Mohammed Rafi, Lata Mangeshkar, Kishore Kumar or Asha Bhosle song among the 5,000 it carries. Maybe one of Ameen Sayani’s Geetmala shows, of which Carvaan packs 50 years worth, strikes a chord. 

And if you don’t buy it, chances are that a younger acquaintance or relative, impressed with the features along with all that nostalgia will gift it. 

Those roughly are the premises on which Carvaan was launched in this financial year by India’s oldest music company, the Rs 227 crore Saregama India. Since its launch Carvaan has sold a whopping 95,000 units, amounting to Rs 40 crore or about half of Saregama’s revenues in the second quarter of 2017-18. By the end of the financial year, Vikram Mehra, managing director Saregama reckons it would have sold at least half a million units. If it does, that translates to revenue of Rs 200 crore just for Carvaan. 

The brand has used only social media and PR so far for promotion. Its first ad will launch this week and the four minute, forty second commercial is a tear-jerker. Mehra reckons that gifting, a Rs 1,62,500 crore market in India, is integral to Carvaan’s brand premise and the ad is targeted at the digitally savvy young who want to indulge an elder. 

“Carvaan’s strong appeal lies in touching an emotional chord. Its charm lies in the fact that it is a retro device packed with old content in retro format,” says Samit Sinha, founder Alchemist Brand Consulting. “I know that I can’t sell music because all music is pirated. What I am selling is nostalgia. From the age of 40 onwards there is nostalgia, for the food you ate as a kid (mom’s food), for the music you heard in your youth,” says Mehra.

The story behind Carvaan

Piracy is rife in the Rs 1,200 crore Indian music market where there is little concern for copyright. And there is this constant refrain that people don’t want to pay for music. It was against this backdrop in 2015, that Saregama set out to understand how people consume music. While a project to digitise its 1.2 lakh songs was underway, a qualitative research was commissioned. GFK-Mode conducted focus groups across 23 cities in India. Mehra, who sat in on many, says that a frequent complaint was: ‘HMV (Saregama’s old name) sits on so many songs and you don’t give them to us.’ One lady in Kanpur said ‘I remember the radio would go on and I would be doing all the stuff around the house.’ “This was on Vividh Bharti, so the playlist was random and you discovered songs,” says Mehra. 

The need gap, the positioning everything was eventually derived from this research. “The primary target group is outside of four metros and is 40 plus. They are only on Facebook and WhatsApp. It is for people who want to lean back not lean forward,” says Mehra. The audience comprises people who may not be comfortable with streaming music or making playlists. 

The music player was designed in-house and the songs were handpicked from its archives spanning 1903-1990. Retail went the old route with 4,600 consumer electronics outlets being reached currently. It will go up to 10,000 by the end of the year. 

While analysts and consultants have given the brand a thumbs-up, obvious questions remain. “It is a novelty, how long will the appeal last?” asks Sinha. “It has a limited market and unlike other pieces of hardware, has no upgrade cycle,” says an analyst. 

Mehra reckons that there is a difference between nostalgia as a positioning statement and as an indicator of the potential. “The fact that you want to listen to the music you grew up with holds true for all generations,” he points out. Sinha agrees, “Owning retro stuff has nothing to do with age. I won’t be surprised if it takes off across ages.” According to Saregama’s research there are 25 million homes that are potential buyers of Carvaan, currently. 
 

Mehra lists out the brand extensions and market expansion work being done. Within three months of its launch came the Carvaan Mini, for younger people with 251 songs at Rs 2,490. Last month Carvaan launched in the US, UK and Canada markets are next on the cards. There is a Tamil version due in December with Bangla, Marathi and Punjabi too being planned. For now the possibilities for nostalgia stretch far and wide. 

Cashing in on sentiment

• Saregama has sold 95,000 units of Carvaan, its portable music player, amounting to Rs  40 crore or about half of its revenues in the second quarter of 2017-18 

• The brand has used only social media so far for promotions, the first ad will launch this week  and it plays upon the nostalgia for the golden era of Indian film music

• The campaign is aimed at the huge gifting market in India and addresses the young consumer looking to indulge a family elder or friend