New Delhi : At Timex Watches Limited it's now time to tell the story of the Timex brand. ``It's a 143-year old brand patronised by the likes of Mr Bill Gates and Mr Bill Clinton, and Mr Al Gore and Mr George Bush,'' beams the new managing director of the watch company, Mr Kapil Kapoor. The story is to aggressively reinforce Timex' image as a brand at the cutting-edge of technology and fashion. ``With the IT-and-Net revolution sweeping across the country, we reckon that consumers are now ready for our high-tech offerings,'' says Mr Kapoor.With investments of over $33 million already devoted to the Indian operations in the last nine years, Timex is rolling out a slew of initiatives to boost the brand's presence.
A new, multi-media campaign `Technology that Keeps your Ticking', handled by creative agency HTA, will be kicked off in January 2001. This will be complemented by a comprehensive Web-strategy, which will have a significant B2B component as well. The company might also institute a club-by-invitation for the country's who's who.
The company is firming up its media plan - the advertising spend for the fiscal 2000-01 has been earmarked at Rs 12 crore up from Rs 8 crore in 1999-00.
In the next four months, Timex will roll out 180 styles - it has over 600 styles at present - in the price range of Rs 995 to Rs 5,000. ``These watches would be zany, 21st century sort, targeted at the tech-savvy, consumers,'' says Mr Kapoor. ``Around two-third of all styles will be imports.''
Timex secured a turnover of around Rs 90 crore in the fiscal 1999-00. And in the first half April-September 2000 it registered a turnover of Rs 34 crore. ``We'll exploit this peak season to the fullest,'' says Mr Kapoor. ``We can meet our targets.''
The sub-Rs 1,000 watch styles account for around 70 per cent of Timex turnover. Timex believes that enormous possibilities exist to upgrade consumers to mid-priced and upscale categories. Timex will also rationalise its distribution network of 64 distributors, 300 direct dealers, and 5,000 multi-brand outlets in 1,000 towns.
``We plan to secure 25 per cent of sales from exclusive showrooms - what we used to get earlier through the Titan network of 100 showrooms,'' says Mr V D Wadhwa, country sales manager, Timex. ``We need to have around 50 Timex showrooms.'' Timex's 29 showrooms - out of which six are company-owned - account for nine per cent of overall sales now.
In all, 16 of Timex franchisees have broken even. A typical showroom measures 350-650 sqft and entails an investment of around Rs 10 lakh.
Copyright © 2000 Indian Express Newspapers (Bombay) Ltd.