FIRSTPOST YOUSPEAK
Sunday, May 26th 08:25 AM IST
Gallery
Amul GALLERY.
strongNew Delhi:/strong Would an Amul boy outwit the cute girl in polka dotted dress and with a blue hair bun? Never, say her creators. The Amul girl is far cuter than an Amul boy. She has far greater appeal, says Rahul DaCunha, Managing Director and Creative Head, DaCunha Communications, the advertising agency behind the popular hoardings. We are 50 years young!!, that's what the hoarding for the Amul girl at 50 be like. [caption id=attachment_376635 align=alignleft width=380 strongNew Delhi:/strong Would an Am
The success of Amul is no accident. It was Dr Kurien's understanding of how brands work, of the importance of building brands, of the focus on quality, value for money and customer centricity as a bedrock of all that Amul did, which has made Amul the behemoth that it is. Consider these pearls of wisdom from Dr Kurien culled from speeches that he made as chairman of the Gujarat Co-operative Milk Marketing Federation over the years. For the Consumer,Amulsimply means 'Value For Money' and Quality as it should be. Our brand name touches an emotional chord with her:Amulmeans a range of superior products, consumed by every age group, and a favourite in every part of our diverse land.Amulmakes each bite that much more special because in our humble way, we care for feelings that are truly Indian. And a few years later... [caption id=attachment_449616 align=alignleft width=380 The success of Amul is no accident.
In the thick of the retail FDI debate, General VK Singh made a statement that went by largely unnoticed. Pitching Amul model against FDI in retail, he said the former is an excellent model to empower farmers. The statement warrants a closer study of the Amul model for more reasons than one. First and foremost, it seeks to compare the co-operative model with the corporate-run, contract farming model. Amul is a network of 31 lakh dairy farmers, who are members of more than 15,000 village co-operatives. Milk producers sell their produce to village co-operatives, which is affiliated to district milk co-operative union and then in turn to the state level milk marketing federation. The model essentially helped farmers to end the strangle hold of the middlemen. [caption id=attachment_551471 align=alignleft width=380 In the thick of the retail FDI deba
Employees tend to an ice cream prodution line at the Mother Dairy factory, which manufactures the Amul brand of ice cream, at Bhatt village on the outskirts of Ahmedabad on May 30, 2012. Amul Ice Cream accounts for some 40 percent of the Indian ice cream market, with peak demand during the hot summer months. Employees tend to an ice cream prod
Employees tend to an ice cream prodution line at the Mother Dairy factory, which manufactures the Amul brand of ice cream, at Bhatt village on the outskirts of Ahmedabad on May 30, 2012. Amul Ice Cream accounts for some 40 percent of the Indian ice cream market, with peak demand during the hot summer months. Employees tend to an ice cream prod
An employee tends to an ice cream prodution line at the Mother Dairy factory, which manufactures the Amul brand of ice cream, at Bhatt village on the outskirts of Ahmedabad on May 30, 2012. Amul Ice Cream accounts for some 40 percent of the Indian ice cream market, with peak demand during the hot summer months. An employee tends to an ice cream p
Employees tend to an ice cream prodution line at the Mother Dairy factory, which manufactures the Amul brand of ice cream, at Bhatt village on the outskirts of Ahmedabad on May 30, 2012. Amul Ice Cream accounts for some 40 percent of the Indian ice cream market, with peak demand during the hot summer months. Employees tend to an ice cream prod
An ice cream prodution line is pictured at the Mother Dairy factory, which manufactures the Amul brand of ice cream, at Bhatt village on the outskirts of Ahmedabad on May 30, 2012. Amul Ice Cream accounts for some 40 percent of the Indian ice cream market, with peak demand during the hot summer months. An ice cream prodution line is pict
Employees tend to an ice cream prodution line at the Mother Dairy factory, which manufactures the Amul brand of ice cream, at Bhatt village on the outskirts of Ahmedabad on May 30, 2012. Amul Ice Cream accounts for some 40 percent of the Indian ice cream market, with peak demand during the hot summer months. Employees tend to an ice cream prod
Employees tend to an ice cream prodution line at the Mother Dairy factory, which manufactures the Amul brand of ice cream, at Bhatt village on the outskirts of Ahmedabad on May 30, 2012. Amul Ice Cream accounts for some 40 percent of the Indian ice cream market, with peak demand during the hot summer months. Employees tend to an ice cream prod
An ice cream prodution line is pictured at the Mother Dairy factory, which manufactures the Amul brand of ice cream, at Bhatt village on the outskirts of Ahmedabad on May 30, 2012. Amul Ice Cream accounts for some 40 percent of the Indian ice cream market, with peak demand during the hot summer months. An ice cream prodution line is pict
Employees tend to an ice cream prodution line at the Mother Dairy factory, which manufactures the Amul brand of ice cream, at Bhatt village on the outskirts of Ahmedabad on May 30, 2012. Amul Ice Cream accounts for some 40 percent of the Indian ice cream market, with peak demand during the hot summer months. Employees tend to an ice cream prod
Employees tend to an ice cream prodution line at the Mother Dairy factory, which manufactures the Amul brand of ice cream, at Bhatt village on the outskirts of Ahmedabad on May 30, 2012. Amul Ice Cream accounts for some 40 percent of the Indian ice cream market, with peak demand during the hot summer months. Employees tend to an ice cream prod
Employees tend to an ice cream prodution line at the Mother Dairy factory, which manufactures the Amul brand of ice cream, at Bhatt village on the outskirts of Ahmedabad on May 30, 2012. Amul Ice Cream accounts for some 40 percent of the Indian ice cream market, with peak demand during the hot summer months. Employees tend to an ice cream prod
When we think of Amul, we think of milk. Yet, if you pause and think, there's so much more to Amul than just milk. Indeed, for people like me who were living (then) in a place like Kolkata or Chennai, Amul was not milk at all. It was so much more. Amul was the butter we spread on the toast every morning, Amul was the cheese we had once in a while as a special treat, and Amul was the metal container of powdered baby food you saw in the kitchen. a href=http://www.firstpost.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/09/kurien1.jpgimg class=alignleft size-full wp-image-449012 title=kurien src=http://www.firstpost.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/09/kurien1.jpg alt= width=380 height=285 //aAmul, later, became the chocolate you shared, breaking up the bar into as many pieces as there were people around. After all, Amul Chocolate was 'A gift for someone you love'. iframe src=http://www.youtube.com/embed/1LuUndZY_Ak frameborder=0 width=560 height=315/iframe Years later, Amul was an ice-cream, Amul was among the first foods you saw in a Tetrapak, Amul was cheese powder, and Amul was shrikhand. Amul, by now, was the Taste of India. object width=420 height=315 classid=clsid:d27cdb6e-ae6d-11cf-96b8-444553540000 codebase=http://download.macromedia.com/pub/shockwave/cabs/flash/swflash.cab#version=6,0,40,0param name=allowFullScreen value=true /param name=allowscriptaccess value=always /param name=src value=http://www.youtube.com/v/NKfcSMDnI7U?version=3&hl=en_US /param name=allowfullscreen value=true /embed width=420 height=315 type=application/x-shockwave-flash src=http://www.youtube.com/v/NKfcSMDnI7U?version=3&hl=en_US allowFullScreen=true allowscriptaccess=always allowfullscreen=true //object From the time you stopped breast feeding, there was at least one Amul product you consumed every day. Walk around the kitchen, open the fridge, and count the number of Amul products you have in your house. Think of when you consumed an Amul product last. For me, it was an hour ago, when I buttered a couple of slices of toast. How many multi-product marketing organisations can make a similar claim? And these achievements by a cooperative society, not a multinational, not a government funded navratna, not even an organisation owned by a big Indian industrialist. And how big was it? Huge. To give you an idea, here are some wonderful reference points (thanks to Anand Halve; all data from his book emDarwin's Brands - Adapting for success/em). Amul's turnover in 2009-10: Rs 80,054 million Nestle India (calendar year 2009: Rs. 48,008 million Britannia Industries (2009-10): Rs. 34,246 million [caption id=attachment_449013 align=alignright width=380 When we think of Amul, we think of
In this photograph taken on May 30, 2012 employees tend to an ice cream prodution line at the Mother Dairy factory, which manufactures the Amul brand of ice cream, at Bhatt village on the outskirts of Ahmedabad. India's industrial output grew just 0.1 percent in April year-on-year, official data showed June 12, 2012, adding to concerns about the economy and raising the chances of an interest rate cut next week. In this photograph taken on May 30,
Dr Verghese Kurien, the father of the White Revolution in India and the founder of Amul passed away on Sunday at Nadiad in Gujarat after a brief period of illness. He was 90. A Padma Vibhushan awardee, Verghese Kurien was the masterbrain behind making India the largest milk producer in the world. He was also the recipient of the World Food Prize and the Magsaysay Award. Kurien was the architect of Operation Flood - the largest dairy development program in the world. He helped modernise the Anand model of cooperative dairy development. [caption id=attachment_448953 align=alignleft width=380 Dr Verghese Kurien, the father of t
GCMMF has 6,315 Amul outlets, out of which 965 were added during last fiscal. Reuters GCMMF has 6,315 Amul outlets, out o
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emIt ain't what you don't know that counts. It's what you know that ain't so - Will Rogers/em On Teachers Day, it may also be a good time to bring up things they don't teach too well. Maths, for example. The year was 1986. I was in the fourth standard. My maths teacher, Mrs Leila Abraham (popularly known as Mrs Cherian because her husband's name was Cherian Abraham) had just asked us to get an Amul or Cadbury's chocolate for the next day's class. She wanted to teach fractions through a bar of chocolate. The idea was exciting enough to motivate a few students to blackmail their parents into giving them what she had asked for. Over the next few days she taught fractions to the class by breaking the bar into half, three-fourths, one-fourths and so on. Even the dullest students picked up the concept very quickly. As my interest in the subject grew, the quality of teachers who taught me went rapidly downhill. The ordeal ended when I graduated with a BSc in Mathematics from St Xavier's College, Ranchi. The quality of teaching was so bad that before the last class in the third year started I wrote this on the blackboard: Mentally (M) Agitated (A) Teachers (T) Harassing (H) Students (S). An English professor in the college, who was also the best quiz master going around in Ranchi, had come up with this expansion for M.A.T.H.S. Prof Pankaj Chattoraj, who taught us coordinate geometry, among other things, was supposed to take the last class. He was the best of the six professors who taught us. So the joke wasn't really on him. He took it in a good spirit made a few more jokes, taught what he had to and left. I have no numbers or research to back this but I feel that Maths often ends up being taught by the worst teachers. The impact of bad teaching in mathematics is clearly seen when people have to apply it. Let me share a few examples which I have come across over the last few years. Justice Markandey Katju, in a recent column in emThe Hindu/em titled emProfessor, teach thyself,/em wrote: When I was a judge of Allahabad High Court I had a case relating to a service matter of a mathematics lecturer in a university in Uttar Pradesh. Since the teacher was present in court I asked him how much one divided by zero is equal to. He replied, Infinity. I told him that his answer was incorrect, and it was evident that he was not even fit to be a teacher in an intermediate college. I wondered how had he become a university lecturer. (In mathematics it is impermissible to divide by zero. Hence anything divided by zero is known as an indeterminate number, not infinity). Rather ironically, the teacher Katju castigated was right. Any non-zero number divided by zero is infinity. But when zero is divided you get what is known as an indeterminate. The following example should explain things a little better: Asup2/sup = Asup2 /supAsup2/sup- Asup2/sup= Asup2/sup- Asup2 /supA(A-A)= (A-A)(A+A) [A(A-A)/(A-A)] = (A+A) A=A+A A=2A 1=2 In the fourth step of the equation we are dividing (A-A) by (A-A) and that allows us to come to the fifth step, i.e. A=A+A and which finally leads to 1=2. Now it need not be said that one cannot be equal to two. When we divide zero by zero we can prove anything. Hence dividing 0 by 0 (which is what A-A is) is not allowed in mathematics. [caption id=attachment_445033 align=alignleft width=380 emIt ain't what you don't know that