Procter & Gamble to roll out Pampers in India

Cincinatti-based Procter & Gamble will unveil its iconic diaper brand Pampers in India on Tuesday. More importantly it will mark a shift in P&G's distribution strategy for the brand which is already available through distributors in India.

So far, Pampers has been imported and distributed through the Chennai based Universal Corporation, but henceforth P&G will directly distribute the brand in India.

Abhay Yograj, managing director, Tecnova India, a consulting firm that has helped companies such as Perfetti and L'oreal with their entry strategy in India said "Most companies are not going through the sole distributor route anymore as distributors lack the reach and infrastructure and deliberately underperform the potential of any brand."

He added, "Most distributors need huge working capital and most of these are family owned companies with limited sales people. India is one of the few countries that has different distributors for regional pockets and not a huge national level distributor."

As a result, most companies end up relying more on their own network and sales staff to make sure that their products are available across the country. Also, the distributors are required to pay an excise duty on the products they import and re-label.

Earlier this year, Gillette too had shifted to P&G's distribution network as a result of the internal restructuring following its global take over by P&G in 2005.

P&G operates in India through two companies, P&G Hygiene and Healthcare which has brands like Whisper and Vicks and P&G Home Products and which has brands like Tide, Ariel, Pantene, Head & Shoulders and Rejoice.