Focus on high-end consumer appliances this festive season

Kochi, Aug 7 (UNI) Four door refrigerators, LCD and Plasma TVs and clothes dryers are among the high-end products being pushed by appliances majors this festive season, which gets off to a start with Onam in Kerala, later this month.

With the consumer appliances market, especially the high-end segment, growing briskly this year, companies like LG and Samsung to Whirlpool, Electrolux and Videocon are optimistic that the market will respond well to the premium products.

Thus, on offer at the very top end are 600 and 725 ltr four door refrigerators from Electrolux, priced at Rs 90,000 and Rs 99,000 respectively, a 50 inch LCD TV with 3000 watt sound output from Videocon, priced at Rs one lakh, and 100 per cent clothes dryers, imported by Whirlpool from Europe, priced at Rs 20,000.

Asked if there was a market for such products, Samsung India Deputy Managing Director Ravinder Zutshi and Whirlpool India, Vice-President, Marketing, Shantanu Das Gupta said the high-end segment was in fact the fastest growing among consumer durables this year.

''Thanks to rising incomes and a consumer demand for high quality and style, people are not shying away from purchasing premium products,'' said Mr Shantanu Das Gupta.

In Kochi, last week to kickstart the Onam promotions, the appliances majors said even rising interest rates had not dampened the consumer durables market, which was growing at about ten to 15 per cent this year.

In fact, high-end products such as air conditioners and microwave ovens had seen growths of around 40 per cent, Mr Zutshi said.

In consumer electronics, a spurt in the sale of flat screen and LCD TVs had resulted in the market for colour televisions growing by over 30 per cent in the first half of this year compared to ten to 12 per cent in previous years.

While the sale of flat screen TVs had grown by 71 per cent, LCDs had gone up by 558 rpt 558 per cent and Plasma TVs by 55 per cent, Mr Zutshi said.

According to Videocon Vice-President, Sales and Marketing, Shekhar Jyoti, the demand for LCD and Plasma TVs was growing at almost 300 per cent a year.

''These high-end products are expected to constitute about six per cent of the television market in the next two years,'' he said.

In fact, so confident are the appliances majors of the television market turning ''completely flat'' in the coming years, that companies such as Samsung and Electrolux have stopped manufacturing curved tube televisions and are now offering only Flat screen televisions.

The decline in the price of Flat TVs, which are now retailing for under Rs 10,000, had helped to bring these within the range of a middle class family, said Mr Zutshi.

In the white goods sector, while direct cool refrigerators still hold sway with about 70 per cent of the market, frost-free fridges were growing more rapidly. During the first half of this year, while the frost-free segment went up 46 per cent, the direct cool segment grew at only six per cent.

The festive season, which starts in Kerala with Onam, will extend to the north with Diwali, Christmas and New Year. However, the southern region, which is expected to contribute sales of almost 33 per cent for consumer durables this year, had emerged as the largest market with the northern region projected to contribute 30 per cent followed by the western and eastern regions.

UNI