Researching the Maha Kumbh Mela the religiomefestival that takes place every 12 years near Allahabad in north

h India, at which over 100 million Hindmegather has more than its fair share of challenges. (And I'm not talking here about a tragic railway footbridge collapse or the incessant rain that flooded the tent city last Iek.) Setting up a live experiment is never easy and always exciting. Our goal: to trace groundup the emergence of a market, and figure out the structures and mechanisms that will allow it to work more efficiently. Consider the numeromechoices that I faced when I had decided to study how information about demand and supply circulates, and how prices evolve in the huge market that springs up during the Kumbh Mela. My focmewas on the numeromevendors who move in overnight to cater to the millions of people who attend the Mela by selling food grains, vegetables, fruits, and other provisions. I first identified the main sources of demand. One is the approximately 500,000 pilgrims, called kalpvasis, who camp on the festival grounds for its entire duration. Another, probably the biggest, is itinerant pilgrims, who spend a day or two at the Mela. Government officials managing the event, such as bureaucrats, security personnel, and healthcare workers, constitute another source of demand. And observers like us, attending

the event to report on it or for research (and, in my case, a little bit of spirituality) also need to buy groceries. On the supply side, i had to decide which vendors to survey so i ended up with a representative sample. I asked myselves: Is the process of setting prices different for each product? I assumed it is, so I had to create a sample accordingly. Other issues quickly arose: How many of each kind should I survey? Since Im interested in vendor as networks, should I choose vendors who clustered together or ensure they Ire spatially separated? And so on. After making some assumptions, I had to pick a large number of vendors, explain how they could help me, and convince them that it would not waste their time. Tracking several other factors helped me cross-check the data's validity and interpret it correctly. For example, each commodity commanded a different price on the Mela grounds, but Allahabad's wholesale market was the main source for most of them. The variations betIen wholesale and retail prices had obviously something to teach me . One goal is to identify the factors that drive price changes, so I had to be creative. For instance, if the price of a Mela staple, such as sIet potato, shot up, was it because of a breakdown in supplies due to say rain, or

was it because of a demand surge caused by a sudden influx of pilgrims? To find out, I could artificially boost demand for a while by handing out small sums of money, or I could augment supplies by offering vendors small subsidies. If some information was hard to come by the wholesaler's location, for example -its impact on price was obviously of interest. So I highlighted where the wholesalers Ire located to a randomly chosen subset of retailers, which changed the amount of products bought and sold as Ill as prices. Building the data-set and making interventions requires the

establishment of trust betIen buyers, sellers, regulators, surveyors, and researchers. Once I've crunched the numbers, I'll not only be able to observe a market as it grows, but identify what practices helped it work best.

RETAIL STRATEGY OF HUL IN MAHA KUMBH MELA ALLAHABAD There are different strategy followed by different companies to promote there products in retail industry products like lifeboy, boroplus, everyday, etc have different strategy to make there product sell in the country. I

have analysis few retail strategy followed by companies like HUL, OOH etc. which are as follows:

Roti Reminder a hit for Lifebuoy during Kumbh

At the Kumbh, where all big marketers are vying to sell their products and boost their brands, Hindustan Unilever Limitedpromotes Lifebuoy soap through rotis in an innovative way.

The countrys largest consumer products firm, along with creative agency Ogilvy, has partnered more than 100 dhabas and hotels at the mela site to serve rotis that are stamped with Lifebuoy se haath dhoye kya? (Have you washed your hand with Lifebuoy?) The Roti Reminder gets consumers attention at the exact time when hand washing is critical, Sudhir Sitapati, general manager, skin cleansing, at HUL said. The company has made special heat stamps to make an impression of its message on rotis and hired 100 promoters to stand in 100 kitchens across the mela. The campaign started on February 1 and will run for 30 days. The company hopes to put the hand wash reminder on 2.5 million rotis.

The Mahakumbh provides a unique opportunity to communicate this message to a large, predominantly small-town and rural population, Sitapati says. In effect, this simple, clutter-breaking idea will help mereach out to a massive audience, at a fraction of the cost.

HUL's Lifebuoy on Roti at Kumbh Mela - Yuck!

Hindustan Unilevel, India's largest consumer products firm, along with Ogilvy, has partnered with more than 100 dhabas and hotels at the Kumbh mela site to serve rotis that are stamped with "Lifebuoy se haath dhoye kya?"

Economic Times reports that the company has made special heat stamps to make an impression of its message on rotis and hired 100 promoters to stand in 100 kitchens across the mela.

The campaign started on February 1 and will run for 30 days. The company hopes to put the hand wash reminder on 2.5 million rotis.

The campaign surely has grabbed a lot of eyeballs and a lot of positive word of mouth on the internet. The highly positive online sentiment depicts that netizens have appreciated and embraced this creative idea.

But is it great? I don't think so! Imagine a soap's name appearing on the food you eat. It is if not ridiculome completely abhorrent.

From a pure marketing perspective why would you like to remind a person who is about to eat something which is kept in the toilet and completely unrelated to eating. A toothpaste advising you to rinse your mouth after eating is ok since it is somehow related to internal use and not external use.

Imagine the feelings aroused by Lifebuoy, considered a stinky soap (earlier) reaching onto our rotis. It's like the Harpic ad (cleaning toilets) being shown when you are at the dinner table watching TV.

Lifebuoy sends out 'branded' chapatis

The soap brand from Hindustan Unilever has come up with an innovative campaign at the Kumbh Mela, where it is distributing stamped chapattis to people with the message, 'Did you wash your hands before beginning your meal'. The Purna Kumbh gets lakhs of visitors and is a tempting opportunity for brand promotion. Lifebuoy, the soap brand from Hindustan Unilever, has tied up with local eateries to give out chapatis that are marked with the message, 'Did you wash hands with Lifebuoy?'

Ogilvy Action tied up with over 100 dhaba owners in the vicinity of Kumbh Mela and handed out more than 2.5 million chapattis stamped with the Lifebuoy message.

The campaign, designed by OgilvyAction India, delivers the message through the medium of chapatis, using a heating stamp to mark the words onto the chapati and serve it with the orders placed for food.

The brand has tied up with more than 100 local dhabas and restaurants.. For every order, the first chapati served carries the branded message and makes an instant connection. It has also placed the soap in the wash rooms of all these eateries. After several months of research, Ogilvy developed its own heating stamp that puts the impression on the chapati after it is completely baked. To ensure that the chapati is completely edible, there is no ink involved; the message is marked with a slight heating of the stamp. About 100 promoters have been placed in the kitchens of these eateries and stamp the message on to the chapatis. The brand plans to send out 2.5 million fresh chapatis with the message. The cost of stamping a roti works out to much less than a rupee. Vipul Salvi, national creative director, OgilvyAction, says, "Chapati forms the staple food so it was an ideal medium for meto reach people through it. Also, the brief was to make people aware of the importance of washing their hands before beginning to eat." Sudhir Sitapati, general manager, skin cleansing, Hindustan Unilever, says, "The brief to OgilvyAction was to leverage the scale of Kumbh Mela and drive awareness regarding the cause of hand washing in a clutter-breaking and relevant manner."

He adds that the key objective of the campaign was to spread awareness about the importance of hand washing with soap, especially before having food since this is a simple but effective action to help prevent transmission of germs and diseases. The campaign began on January 31 and will be on for a month.

Samir Gupte, president, OgilvyAction, says, "We are catering to all kinds of audiences in the Kumbh, be it the ones who come and go or those who stay there for the entire period of the Kumbh." To complete the loop after the message is served, the brand has placed several posters and hoardings across Allahabad to spread awareness on washing hands. FMCG brand Hindustan Unilever has a heritage of over 75 years in India. It has more than 35 brands spanning 20 distinct categories such as soaps, detergents, shampoos, skin care, toothpastes, deodorants, cosmetics, tea, coffee, packaged foods, ice cream, and water purifiers. OgilvyAction is the global brand activation network of Ogilvy & Mather. It delivers a broad range of services including experiential marketing, shopper marketing, trade marketing and promotional services. It works with several big clients and has 82 offices across 55 countries.

Summary of the strategy followed by HUL :

'Did you wash your hands with Lifebuoy?' That was the message, in Hindi, stamped on over 2.5 million chapattis at the Maha Kumbh Mela , the largest congregation of human beings on the planet. The unusual advertising medium certainly had pilgrims taking notice. The campaign enabled Unilever, the company that makes the soap, to reach a large audience in a low-cost but effective manner. Unilever has the advertising agency Ogilvy Action to thank for the brilliant advertising idea. Vipul Salvi, the 34-year-old National Creative Director of Ogilvy Action, is the one of the people behind the campaign. He says the idea needed to be big and innovative. "The obvious options were to put up stalls and play games around health and hygiene, but that would have been too gimmicky," remarks Salvi. Those ideas were rejected since the Maha Kumbh is a spiritual affair. The mandate, therefore, was to look at other ways of getting the consumer in touch with the brand. The ad agency deliberated over the campaign for close to eight months and came up with over 200 ideas before zeroing in on the roti campaign. A heat stamp was specially made to make an impression on the chapattis. The agency tied up with over 100 dhaba owners in the vicinity and handed out more than 2.5 million chapattis stamped with the Lifebuoy message. Lifebuoy achieved its aim of increasing awareness and getting people in touch with the brand. And many of the millions at the Maha Kumbh Mela ate with cleaner hands.