DS Foods ties up with Appu Ghar, Essel World to market Pass Pass

Our Marketing Bureau in New Delhi

In a bid to increase its visibility, the Rs 35-crore natural mouth freshner brand Pass Pass owned by DS Foods, part of the DS Group, is exploring new branding initiatives with a budget of Rs 1 crore.

In its latest marketing endeavour, the brand is eyeing youth hangouts such as amusement parks, discs, pubs and other happening places. To start with, the company has got into an exclusive tie-up with Appu Ghar, a popular amusement park in the Capital and is also in talks with Essel World in Mumbai. Several similar tie-ups are in the offing.

The tie up will enable Pass Pass to brand an area of approx 560 sq feet within the amusement park. Also, Pass Pass will be associated with two major events at Appu Ghar in a year, and will organise several small shows and will have access to Amphi Theatre and other venues within the amusement park.

Apart from these, the company is also exploring in-movie placement in films despite Mukta Arts’ Yaadein bombing at the box office in which the brand Pass Pass — was among the three brands that put in Rs 3.5 crore for in-movie placement.

DS Foods, however, has no regrets over the Yaadein debacle for it is still looking for similar opportunities to place its brand in forthcoming Bollywood projects. Says Mr Aggarwal, ‘‘We were very happy with Pass Pass’ placement in Yaadein as we got enough mileage out of that.’’

The new films signed by DS foods for Pass Pass branding include a South Indian film 1,2,3 and two forthcoming Bollywood films the names of which Mr Ashok Aggarwal, vice-president, DS Foods, refused to divulge. ‘‘They are very big banners,’’ is all that Mr Aggarwal says for now.

The company had earlier this year increased the ad budget for Pass Pass from Rs 2 crore to Rs 6 crore for 2001. It has already revamped its sales strategy for deeper penetration and wider coverage of its products. Pass Pass was introduced in 1999 by the DS Group—a leader in tobacco based products with brands like Baba, Tulsi, Rajnigandha—as a more politically-correct mouth freshner brand and as an alternative to tobacco-based pan masalas which were increasingly drawing flak and regulation.

The company is projecting a sales turnover of Rs 100 crore from the brand by March 2002.