Here is the story of a special DIGITAL TRANSFORMATION done by a Building Material company that comes under consumer discretionary products in the Home & Construction industry. The special guest of SURFACES REPORTER's BRAND BUZZ is Aditya Gupta, CEO of Orient Bell Limited for a special interaction with Vertica Dvivedi, the Editor-in-Chief of the magazine. SURFACES REPORTER (SR) is equally transforming digitally at great speed. SR's followings have grown almost 50% in the social channels since lockdown and the website visitors have doubled.
Orient Bell Limited (OBL) has been consistently investing in getting prepared for the future. Even before COVID crept in, Orient Bell team was invested in Digital Upgragation – making them stand out digitally when compared to contemporaries who jumped the bandwagon during the times of COVID.
If there was one area where innovation and up-gradation have not seen the light of the day in the Tiles segment, it is the way the product is sold, marketed, and the long process of the purchase decision. We are told that the initiatives by Orient Bell are disrupting these significant areas with digital solutions.
So here is the story of how a Tile Brand is transforming digitally, shared by Aditya Gupta who is an Engineer and MBA from IIT Bombay and IIM Bangalore respectively with about 3 decades of experience. He is a business leader with strong operational experience in Sales and Marketing, having built & executed powerful brands in the telecom and liquor domain. He is currently the CEO of Orient Bell Limited, one of the largest manufacturers of Ceramic and Vitrified Tiles. Headquartered in New Delhi, their manufacturing plants are at three key locations: Sikandrabad in UP, Hoskote in Karnataka, and Dora in Gujarat.
Overview of the Tiles Industry
As per the Indian Council of Ceramic Tiles and Sanitaryware (ICCTAS), the industry enjoys the unique distinction of being highly indigenous with an abundance of raw materials, technical skills, infrastructural facilities despite being fairly capital intensive. A total of over 5,50,000 people are employed in the sector. Out of this, 50,000 people are directly employed and 5,00,000 are indirectly associated. The potential is huge considering the per capita consumption of ceramic tiles in India. Currently, it is at 0.50 square meters per person in comparison to over 2 square meters per person for like countries like China, Brazil, and Malaysia.
The Indian tile industry, despite an overall slowdown of the economy, continues to grow at a healthy 15% per annum. Investments in the last 5 years have aggregated over Rs. 5000 crores. The overall size of the Indian ceramic tile industry is approximately Rs 18,000 crore (FY12). The production during 2011-12 stood at approximately 600 million square meters.
The Indian tile industry is divided into the organized and unorganized sectors. The organized sector comprises approximately 14 players. The current size of the organized sector is about Rs 7,200 Crores. The unorganized sector accounts for nearly 60% of the total industry bearing testimony of the growth potential of this sector.
India ranks in the top 3 list of countries in terms of tile production in the world. With proper planning and better quality control our exports (presently insignificant) contribution can significantly increase.
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