Competition and Marketing Environment

With the help of Michael Porter the market attractiveness, can be identified

Potent entrants Supplier Power Intense Segment Rivalry Substitutes Buyer Power

In the case of Indian biscuit market, it can be easily said that the deciding factors are the threat of intense segment rivalry due to the existing competition between Britannia, Parle, ITC and other small players like Dukes etc. the other or secondary factor in our case is the buyers growing bargaining power, as the prices are competitive and margins and the choice for consumers is high due to the intense competition. In case of OREO, it is still facing huge problems with respect to the market penetration due to the existing rivalry and the other threat can be easily seen as the OREO biscuits changed its price to those magical figures of Rs.5, 10, 20 for the Indian consumer and due to competition and clearly defining the buyers power.

Market Share and other Facts

The market share and other data can be obtained from the tables in the attachments. The sandwich biscuit category for OREO is of worth Rs.1466 crore. The major player or the market leader is Parle, but in case of value, its Britannia and OREO is a premium biscuit and thereby it has no viable competition from Parle and the only competitors are Britannia and Sunfeast with Pure Magic, Treat-O and Dark Fantasy respectively. Please refer to the attachment for the data.

Competitive Strategies
As OREO is more of a premium biscuit, we will consider competitors in this segment who are actually the leaders with respect to value. The market leader being Britannia and Market challenger is Sunfeast and followers are Parle and other companies. Britannia: Britannia was already facing serious competition for its pure magic from dark fantasy and was successful in holding to it. Now the new kid in the block for this segment is Oreo which is successful globally and backed by Cadbury. Britannia tried to bring in new customers for its

product with its existing strengths in Tier -2 and rural areas. The other thing followed by it is a counter offensive defence of launching a Treat-O to compete directly with OREO that too by similar packing and labels etc. Sunfeast: Sunfeast was competing in this segment by Dark Fantasy and has been challenging the market leader and was effective. After the launch of OREO, it did not follow up any new launches or any other attacks and defences. OREO:
Oreo is focusing on the households, which are heavy consumers of cream biscuits. In other words, the brand s primary target audience are the 10 million households that contribute 70 per cent of cream and biscuit sales. While the rest 30 per cent is consumed by households which are not a heavy consumer of cream biscuits. These households are not in the focus lens of Oreo.Oreo cookies Twist, Lick and Dunk ritual also seems in sync with the Indian habit of dunking biscuits in tea and milk. Oreo is also relying on strong distribution push to make its presence felt. The brand is focusing both on modern and retail trade. Oreo is following more of a Frontal Attack by attacking its competitors directly and trying to take its slice of market share. The other attack being followed is Encirclement Attacks by actually filing a copyright infringement against Britannia with respect to Treat-O.