Explain the role of Melas and Haats in rural distribution.

 Approximately 75% of Indian population resides in villages. Hence for many brands, rural markets are gaining importance. Most the consumer brands such as HUL, ITC, and Dabur which got saturated in urban areas are trying to spread their presence in every luke and corner of Indian villages. What are the tools these brands use to promote themselves? How are these different from the promotions in urban areas? Ever wondered a major part of rural marketing happens in haats, melas and mandis…

The above mentioned local media selling points are utilised instead of outdoor media though it is effective because of low literacy levels of rural people and differences in locations, the languages and cultural norms

Local media includes vehicles of written media – hoardings, wall paintings, leaflets or posters; mobile media – video vans, animal parades, transit media and folk media which include puppetry, theatre, music and dance and even acrobats and martial arts.

Haats: Tata Shakti utilised the opportunity provided by rural haats when it promoted it’s brand ‘Tata Shaktee Wider GC sheets’ by setting up stalls, organising games and gifting the visitors. It was a success as they could connect to more than 5 million customers on a one-to-one basis. The three unique benefits it offers are targeted customer approach, touch and feel experience and communication in local language.

Melas: For example, Fair and lovely popularised in Allahabad Kumba Mela. About 25,000 melas are organised annually. In rural India, annual melas organised with a religious or festive significance are quite popular and provide a very good platform for distribution. Rural markets come alive at these melas and people visit them to make several purchases.

According to the Indian Market Research Bureau, around 8000 such melas are held in rural India every year. Rural markets have the practice of fixing specific days in a week as Market Days when exchange of goods and services are carried out.  This is another potential low cost distribution channel available to the marketers. Haats serve a good opportunity for promotion after brand building has been done at Mela.

Also, one satellite town where people prefer to go to buy their durable commodities generally serves every region consisting of several villages. If marketing managers use these feeder towns they will easily be able to cover a large section of the rural population. Melas are organized after harvest season, so the villager has enough money, which he will be ready to spend. Demonstration at Haat is essential to convert customers at haats since their attitude is far more utilitarian than that of visitors to a fair.

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