``Dash! aims to continuously create excitement for children through variousways and means. The Diwali in-store contest is one such effort.'' says JacobKurian, vice-president, marketing, Titan Industries Ltd. The offer is openat the World of Titan showrooms in Dehi and other select cities likeCalcutta, Bangalore, Hyderabad, and Chennai where kids can take part in thecontest.

``Dash! as a brand, captures the fun and excitement of being young. We wantto extend this mood to our retail outlets as well and give our consumers atotal `wow' experience, ''says Bhaskar Bhat, vice-president, sales andmarketing, Titan Industries Ltd.

The strategy is to create excitement within the outlet and involve/engagechildren entering the World of Titan showrooms in a very interesting manner.``The interesting format of the contest gives Titan an opportunity fordirect interaction with the Dash! customer thus aiding in endearing thebrand to kids,'' says Kurian.

The format is: kids entering the Titan outlet can pick three cards from aset of Dash Cards and if they pick the ones with painted faces, they win aset of Dash Magic Trick Cards. If they pick two painted face cards, they wina Dash! Fling Ling Wing - a boomerang; and those who pick just one luckycard get Dash! badges.

During the promotion period, the company is also offering gifts with everypurchase of Dash! like a `Goody Bag' of sticker labels and post cardsbesides ten exclusive Dash! T-shirts as prizes.

Dash! watches, launched by Titan in July, are targeted at girls and boysbetween 6-14 years and come in 28 designs. Dash! watches are priced in therange of Rs 250-Rs 395.

The brand has so far used many unconventional media options since its launch-- like tie-ups at kid hangouts and consumer launch events. For instance, itheld contests at McDonalds in Mumbai and Pizza Hut, KFC at Pune, Delhi andBangalore. Face painting was organised at these venues adding to theexcitement. ``We believe that vehicles affording such exciting directinteraction with children at their hang-outs would go a long way in keepingDash! close to kids,'' says Kurian.

Interestingly, Titan is not promoting the Dash! contest through anypromo-specific ad though the company has earmarked an ad budget of Rs 1crore for the brand. It, however, expects the contest to be driven bytraffic generated by the Dash! TV campaign -- being aired since October 12on Cartoon Network -- in addition to the heavy Diwali traffic at the Worldof Titan showrooms.

With its Diwali promotion, Dash! expects to reach out to more than 15,000children in a period of 20 days. ``We expect to involve about 500 childrenper showroom in this contest,'' says Kurian. In terms of sales, for thecurrent year Dash! is expecting to be around three lakh numbers with about amillion expected by the end of three years of operations.

Dash was launched through 110 World of Titan showrooms across the countryand other top dealers in the top eight cities. Distribution has beenextended in September to all Titan dealers across the country giving Dash anexpected reach of about 4,000 dealers.