Many Vietnamese
enterprises, the owners of well known brands and the manufacturers of high
grade products, have been trying to expand their business by launching the
products for popular consumers which have lower prices.

The new table
wares of Minh Long Porcelain Company called “Co Tim” with a reasonable price,
have caught the special attention from the public right after the products were
launched into the market. This is for the first time, Minh Long, a well known
brand of high grade china products, launches a product with low sale price
designed for popular consumers.

Ly Huy
Sang, Deputy General Director of Minh Long 1 Company, said that the production
cost of “Co Tim” is lower than other products, because Co Tim has simpler
design which allows to be manufactured more easily. However, the quality and
safety of the product are in no way inferior to other high grade products of
Minh Long.

“We are
trying to develop the domestic market, and we want more and more Vietnamese
people to be able to own Minh Long’s products,” he said.

The competition of famous-branded
goods with reasonable prices

It is a
growing tendency that well known brands are targeting popular customers, which
explains why not only Minh Long, but many other manufacturers have also been
trying to launch low-cost products.

Nuticooking,
for example, has recently introduced a new product – the cereal nutrition –
designed for the consumers in rural areas and workers at industrial zones. In
fact, Nutifood’s cereal nutrition products have been available on the market since
2007, but the products target office workers and consumers in urban areas. As
Nutifood decides to introduce the product in rural areas, it has renewed the
packages and changes the weights to lower the production costs to make the
products fit new targeted customers.

Viet Tien,
a well known garment brand, in 2010, launched a new line of products with brand
“Viet Long” which target workers, students and rural area youths. With the
support of the “mother” brand “Viet Tien”, “Viet Long” has become well known as
a brand for popular customers.

The wise move

Commenting
about the tendency of developing the brands of products for popular customers,
analysts say Vietnamese enterprises are making a wise step to expand business.
Famous-branded goods with reasonable prices will be the choice of many
customers, especially when they have to fasten their belt in the high inflation
period.

Tran Anh
Tuan, from The Pathfinder consultancy firm, has cited a lot of cases, where a
company has different brands targeting different groups of customers. Nokia,
for example, has Vertu band for high income clients, Toyota has Lexus. In Vietnam, Viet
Tien has Sanciaro brand as high grade brand, and has Viet Long brand for
popular customers.

Tuan said
that this is an effective method of expanding market segments with niche
brands. Though companies have to spend money to popularize new brands, they
will get more clients. Especially, the launching of new brands will satisfy
high grade clients, who do not want to change their images.

In case of
Minh Long 1, the company is using the same brand “Minh Long” for all of its
lines of products. This allows the company to save money on popularizing
products, thus allowing reducing the production costs of products. Of course,
the launching of low cost products will not satisfy some customers, because
using Minh Long’s products will not be the “privilege” of rich people any more.

However,
Sang from Minh Long said that Minh Long will not “abandon” its high grade
customers and will continue marketing new special products.

Source: SGTT