Elder Health Care to build own brands, bets big on deodorants

MUMBAI: In a shift in strategy, FMCG player, Elder Health Care, has decided to give more focus to building its own brands and has lined-up about half-a-dozen launches this year, a top company official said.

The company is also aiming for a massive jump in its turnover by FY 13 at Rs 300-crore against Rs 80-crore in FY 10, the official said.

"As part of our next 5-year road-map, we plan to build our own brands rather than go for in-licensed products. We plan to launch about 5-6 of our own products this year, beginning April," Elder Health Care's Managing Director, Anuj Saxena, told PTI here.

Following this shift in strategy, the company aims to have a 50:50 ratio between in-licensed products and own brands over the next three-five-years as against the present 90:10 in favour of in-licensed products, he said.

The company is betting big on the deodorants segment and plans to launch its own brand--Octane--in April. It already has an in-licensed deodorant called Fuel launched last year which should fetch it a Rs 10-crore revenue in FY 11.

"We plan to launch Octane in April and together with Fuel, are targeting an 8-9 per cent marketshare in deodorants. The market has been growing at around 40 per cent every year in the last three-years and our experience with Fuel should stand us in good stead in pushing Octane," Saxena said.