National Publishing Company Case Analysis

Submitted By
Harneet Singh Bahri
Roll No-140103066
Section-G

About the Product

The product is a market leader in childrens periodical segment. It is issued
fortnightly and has a market share of 45%.It caters to children with age group of 5 to
12 years but it has been seen that the product extends to the age of 14 years .The
selling of the product is done as door to door delivery .It has more than 3000 agents
and sub agents covering all parts of the state. Also periodical was sold through
different shops .These shops also carried different magazines. The price of the
product is Rs 10.
The periodical is assortment of short stories, long stories, cartoons, serialized stories,
quiz etc. Short stories cater to age groups of 12-14 years They have a moderate
approval ratings averaging 28%. Long stories are serialized in continuous as well as
standalone formats. Regular cartoons including 2-3 serialized cartoons had highest
approval ratings amongst all segments. Friendly Ghost had 80% preference shares
amongst all age.

Product Lifecycle Stage

The product is at 3rd stage of maturity .Industry is oversized and weaker competitors
have withdrawn from the market. Though it is declining Titli is still the market leader
with a market share of 47% .Hence ,it is trying to create a stable hold of the market
and hence is at maturity stage.
Implications

The sales are declining. The company should try to stop tis decline.
There is no clarity in differentiation of product. The same product I read by 212 and 13-14 years age group children.
There is a resistance by parents to age group13-14 years for reading this
magazine.
Embarrassment is felt by children in age group of 13-14 years that they are
reading Titli
The product needs to be differentiated on the basis of age.

Strategy
Short Term Plan

The company can plan to go online .It could launch its product online and
offer its subscription at Rs 5 per copy which is less than the hard copy price.
This can generate a lot of interest among children in urban areas as they are
exposed to technology.
They can reduce the number of pages by excluding topics which have
relatively low preference like quiz and read aloud stories .This will help in
reducing cost and improving the readership
They can join hands with newspaper firm to offer a discount on combo offer.
This would help them increase their sales in the short term

Long Term Strategy

The segmentation of the company should be reworked upon. The

segmentation should be on the basis of age group i.e. 2-11 and 12-14.The
company should come out with 2 magazines catering to the needs of both the
segment. The need for 2 magazines is there as Titli a magazine made for
children of age group 2-11 is also read by 12-14 and they contribute a good
amount of total viewership.
The company should try to influence the parents by adding content related to
academics and general knowledge.This would help the company to increase
the market share.

Learnings

84 pages of magazine is too large for childrens magazine

Pompatta is the name of a magazine circulated in Kerala from where this
case was taken.20 pages were reduced in the magazine which helped
reduce the size as well as the cost of the magazine
Line stretching is increasing or decreasing the product variety of an
already present product.
PLC has two variables namely sales revenue and demand .So, for deciding
which stage it is in we use these 2 variables.
In this case for deciding whether the product is in maturing stage or
declining stage we need to calculate these 2 variables and check.
PLC is generally s shaped but here it is slightly different

Number of Periodicals
35
30
25
20
15
10
5
0

Number of
Periodicals

2005 2006 2007 2008 2009

For solving a case we should have answers to 3 question

1. Should we continue with the product or not
2. Is re-segmentation needed in this case
3. Change the product specific for the age group
Here we need to segment the product and divide into 2 age groups i.e 2-11
and 13-14 years respectively .This would help us in catering to different age
categories differently. The magazine for children in age category of 13-14
years should have more of science facts and trivia as they have more
development than other age groups.