Marketing Plan Prompt

HSBLC 2023 Marketing Plan Challenge

Focus Product: Bandhwari Women’s Project

 

PRODUCT LINES: Items made from traditional Indian fabrics into various items.

 

 

Available resources to assist with company and marketing research:

 

Background of Bandhwari Women’s Project

INCENTIVE FOUNDATION 
Incentive Foundation recognizes its duty as a responsible corporate entity to help the communities in which it works and lives. The Foundation was established in March 2005 as the philanthropic arm of Inspiration India, in order to provide a more focused structure to the ongoing Corporate Social Responsibility initiatives of the company. Although it is a registered Charitable Trust with the Government of India under section 12AA and has been granted approval under Section 80G, which gives donors a 50% tax rebate, the Foundation does not publicly solicit donations but relies mainly on the returns generated by its parent company, Inspiration India.

Incentive Foundation was formed with a vision to empower change through education, while its underlying mission is to help build a more equitable society by empowering individuals in order to bridge the socio-economic divide. The Foundation aims to achieve this by aiding communities and providing support in the areas of education and developing more initiatives that are geared towards the vulnerable sections of our society who have little or no access to any assistance. Visit: www.incentivefoundation.com 

BANDHWARI VILLAGE
Bandhwari is a backward village in the Gurgaon District of Haryana. The village is located midway on the Faridabad-Gurgaon road and is about 15 km from either city. There is no permanent transportation facility to reach the main road from the village, which itself is poorly serviced as far as public transportation is concerned. The village has one main cluster, which is surrounded by 5 smaller clusters. Bandhwari has about 700 households with a population of approximately 3500. About half the village, most of the Gujjar community, is reasonably well-off and the other half, most of the marginalized communities, is extremely disadvantaged; not an uncommon situation in many villages. In the past, agriculture was the main source of income; more recently the villagers have become involved in small temporary businesses like driving and other casual employment outside the village. This has led to fluctuating and unstable household incomes, leading to greater vulnerability and higher indebtedness.

The village has a patriarchal family system, where men control the entire economic and social functions and have all decision-making powers. The women are mostly engaged with household work and do not have any economic power with them. The adolescent and adult population constitutes more than half of the total population. Most of the youth are under-employed, with many of them working as drivers, cleaners on trucks or as agricultural labourers. There are no avenues for vocational training or employment available locally for boys and there are hardly any girls who are gainfully employed or trained in any vocational skills.

Unemployment, alcoholism, domestic conflicts, caste differences and poor health and sanitation are the major areas of concern in the village. Though some infrastructure development has taken place in the recent past, due to the village now coming under the municipal limits, the sewage drains, potable water and transportation is still poorly maintained and the village is still backward in many ways. While the current intervention is making some positive impact on health, the other social and economic aspects of the village remain unnoticed and unattended to, making the whole process of development very slow.

Private School Education 
Incentive Foundation truly believes that education is the key to breaking out of the vicious circle of poverty. With this in mind, and considering the fact that the quality of education is really lacking at the village government school, we decided to fund the education of two extremely poor girls from the marginalized community at the village at a quality private school. We worked with our Foundation Coordinator at the village to select these two deserving girls, whose families are extremely poor. Kalpana Devi and Lalita have started attending the Suraj School in Gurgaon and their entire expenses, including school fees, bus fare, uniforms, books and other requirements are all funded by Incentive Foundation. We are aware that this is a minimum 15 year commitment, but we are confident that these girls will eventually help in not just taking their families out of poverty, but will also make a promising future for themselves. If funding would allow it, we could consider giving such opportunities to many more children.

Women’s Empowerment Programme 
This has been another of our truly success stories. What started out as an initiative to give the local village women an opportunity to earn a little extra money, has actually become a positive activity in the village. We now have about 18 women, who come to the Centre by about 10.00 am, after completing their household chores. They then have a ‘community experience’ working together to make handcrafted fabric items for sale. We have hired a seamstress from the village itself to teach the women how to make ‘quality' products. We supply them with sewing machines, threads, and zips and also all the required raw materials. Pricing is very transparent and the women make money according to the effort they have put in and the number of pieces they have produced. With the objective of training the women on ‘financial inclusion’, we have got all the women to open bank accounts and we pay them only by cheque. This initiative has not just helped the women earn money which allows them to send their children to school and feed their families, but it has also taught them how to be self-reliant.

At this point of time, the activity is largely funded by the travel business of Inspiration India. The key to developing this program lies in selling the products more effectively so that there is consistent demand, fuelled by an effective Marketing Plan. The women would produce more, scale up the entire operation and then this Empowerment Program would become sustainable IBHS @ FIU Six years ago, the Business School at Florida International University (FIU) visited our Women’s Empowerment Program at Bandhwari Village on a Service-Learning trip and found alignment with the work being done by Incentive Foundation. The International Business Honor Society (IBHS) has, since then, come back every year to work with the women and help them in creating new designs and take back products for sale in the US. The association with FIU and IBHS has evolved and grown over the years. During the current Covid-19 crisis, IBHS has mobilized a sales drive for 1000 masks made by the Bandhwari women and at their regular meetings, they are always looking for ways in which they can support our ongoing efforts. Visit the IBHS website: www.ibhsfiu.org

Prompt

During the Summer of 2022, 16 BYU students traveled to India to work with Bandhwari Women’s Project. The students helped Bandhwari think about their product designs and marketing strategy to bring their products to the U.S. The company would like to sell to stores and boutiques instead of one-by-one customer sales orders online. There are a couple of reasons for this desired strategy including, there is no one in the company that can manage an online ordering system or website and shipping from India to the U.S. one by one is very cost prohibitive.

The products are unique in that each is handmade using fabrics found only in India. Some of the products are made from recycled Sarees (traditional women’s dresses in India) which adds to the uniqueness of each individual bag or item.

Prompt Questions

  1. Which products that they currently sell are attractive to high school students and why? What could make them more attractive? How would you change them? Are there other product ideas that you think they should add to attract a high-school buyer?
  2. Where would a high school student want to buy products like these if they can’t buy them directly from the company online?
  3. What would you include in the marketing narrative from the story of the company that would help to sell the products to high school students?


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