Indian snack market is growing at a good rate and it is expected to reach Rs 35,000 crore by 2020. The good news is that a lot of local brands are taking the advantage of this growth and are giving tough competition to MNCs in the same industry.
The man behind Prataap Snacks
Prataap Snacks has achieved big heights in a very short period of time. A big credit of this goes to the CEO and one of the three founders, Amit Kumat. Amit completed his master degree in the US and came back to India searching for a job in 1992. After some time, he started helping his father in his clothing business which helped him to know about Indian customers. Seeing the good response of clothing business, Amit wanted to expand in other areas too. For this, he tried multiple new ideas which ended up in a loss and the family was in debt.
Early days
Amit decided to invest Rs 15 lakh in snack industry and started importing cheese balls manufactured from Lucknow, and selling them in Indore and other parts of the country. This idea clicked and Amit along with Apurva Kumat and Arvind Mehta started a snack offering named Yellow Diamond under Prataap Snacks.
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Expansion
With the launch of Chulbule in 2006-07, Yellow Diamond became a homegrown challenger to rivals such as PepsiCo and Parle and Haldirams. Seeing the success, Sequoia Capital approached them for investments in 2009 and after a long wait, the company raised $30 million investment. The company that started with only 3 workers now has over 3000 employees.
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Marketing strategies
Packaging
Most local brands in India don’t achieve big profits because either they lack taste or they ignore packaging and supply network. Pratap Snacks knew this and they came with modern packaging and quality Indian taste which is a perfect combination for Indian customers.
Adopting market trends
Yellow Diamond was quick to diversify its product portfolio and launched a variety of rings, chips, namkeen, and sweet snacks according to consumer preferences and market trends.
Market research
Prataap Snacks doesn’t do research like other companies, instead, they try to keep in touch with the market by getting feedback from the consumers they meet in daily life. Kids have always been the target audience for this company and they promote and design products to attract kids.
Value for price
Diamond has never increased the price of its products because kids usually spend Rs 5-25 to buy snacks in our country. Around 99 percent of their products are in the Rs 5 to Rs 10 range. Yellow Diamond attracted customers by giving more quantity which made people try their products.
Strong distribution network
Prataap has a very strong distribution network and its products are available in rural areas too. Sellers prefer to sell products of Diamond as they get better margins as compared to other reputed names.
