IFB Industries - A Market Giant in Washing Machine Segment

A story on IFB’s play and how they are competing with top brands without spending much on advertisements.

Have you ever seen any television ads for IFB's washing machine, AC’s, or any other product?

No!

Of Course NO, Because they don’t do TV Ads…

Yes, In an era of advertising more and more to reach consumers and influence their buying behaviour, IFB doesn’t spend much on advertisements but still, they manage to create their brand value with a 6 million-plus high potential customers by competing not only with domestic brands but international brands too. Interestingly, IFB is one of the rare, produced in India and gives qualities of a world-class premium brand which currently occupies over 40% of the market in the front loaders washing machine segment. The figure is whooping great that you can sense the presence of this four-decade-old Indian brand in this segment. And so if you haven’t heard about IFB yet, think of them as a company to maintain dominant front loaders market share in India.

Let's have a look into their Journey

IFB Industries originally known as Indian Fine Blanks Limited is a US$ 363.3 million Indian diversified business house. Established in 1974 during Bengal's communist regime, started its journey with the cooperation of Heinrich Schmid AG based in Switzerland intending to manufacture Fine blanked tools and press tools but now has a solid presence in the consumer electronics market.

The biggest turnaround for IFB

At the time of economic liberalisation in 1991, things took off at the turn of the millennium when they decided to embark into the electrical appliances segment in a collaboration with Bosch-Siemens W. Germany. Today IFB supplies Fully-Automatic Washing Machines, Microwave ovens, and many more with factories in Goa and Bhopal, They have a strong distribution channel to market its products to every nook and corner of India. IFB group includes four companies of independent nature i.e, IFB Industries Limited, IFB Travel Systems Limited, IFB Agro Limited, IFB Automotive Private Limited. They not only produce but also export their fine blanking and other engineering-based goods to third-party, and their customers include Maruti Udyog, Ford India, Fiat India, Toyota K Motors, TVS, and many more.

IFB’s Growth Outlook

All in all, the company’s revenues have grown 10.2 fold since 2001. they’ve seen massive growth. Even profits have grown 7 times till 2018-19.

IFB financial over the years

However, they make 97% of their revenue from customers in India and the rest from the global world. IFB Industries is one of the great examples of the Make in India campaign.

From where IFB generates most of the money?

Though they operate in many divisions most of the revenue they generated is from home appliance segments, where more credit goes to Multi-Brands stores channels as they contribute volume of sales followed by IFB exclusive stores also known as IFB points.

IFB’s domination in the Indian market

IFB enjoys a leadership position in the front loading washing machine segment but also gives strong competition in other categories such as microwave ovens, clothes dryers, both are niche product segments of the Company. IFB's major competitors in the appliances segment include Samsung, Philips, LG, Godrej, and many more and IFB is giving commendable competition without advertising their brands on a high level.

How much does the IFB spend on advertisement compared to its competitors?

The Indian home appliance market is highly competitive and companies to penetrate the market share, spends much on advertisements. Here we compare IFB with some of its peers like Whirlpool India, Voltas, Godrej, and Philips, and see what we have found out?

IFB marketing strategy and reason of minimum spending on Advertisements

They focus mainly on premium segment customers and premium pricing systems. This is known as Niche marketing where the focus is made on a small and specialised group of people by aiming to satisfy their needs in terms of the price range and production quality. IFB believes that the superior quality of its products is in itself enough for its promotion. With a strong track record of high-quality product performance, IFB has developed a strong reputation as a premium brand, product superiority, and timely after-sales service which has helped it to develop a loyal consumer base.

IFB counts on word-of-mouth marketing, it's free advertising which gets triggered when  customer experience exceeds expectations and encourages others by mouth publicity. IFB's unique selling proposition is the customer’s loyalty and trust in their brands, they do face stiff competition but have still maintained its premium pricing because they are confident that customers will choose quality over prices. They also adopt multi-level marketing and promote their product by taking part in events and demo sessions to increase their brand's visibility.

Nutshell of the story

IFB is an impressive and reputed Indian brand which is the right example of  “Vocal For Local” Indian campaign to accomplish a goal of ‘Made in India’. IFB invests in technology development and product innovation to make their product quality superior over its peers. The Journey of IFB is praiseworthy and commendable as they don't invest in advertisement but considering other Indian brands, they made a strong impact on Indian consumers. IFB is yet to gain a notable market share in other segments, as they are still lacking in creating brand awareness. Nevertheless, today the company has come a long way and positioned itself as the market leader in the front loader segment, they have a high growth potential and the growth trajectory of a company speaks there's many more to achieve.