Price war in Visakhapatnam
The Times of india is set to enter this city offering its newspaper for less than Rs 1 a day.
R JAGADEESWARA RAO wonders what that will do to an already crowded market.
‘Times of India for less than Re.1 a day’. This, rather alluring advertisement on huge billboards that one cannot miss in the busy centers of Visakhapatnam city, signals an imminent ‘price war’ of sorts in print media. If the past is any indication. Visakhapatnam with a population of about 20 lakh, is the second most important city after Hyderabad in Andhra Pradesh. It is also called “City of Destiny’, ‘Port City’ (it handles the second largest quantity of cargo, after Kandla (Gujarat) port in the country) and ‘Happening City’.
The leading English daily in the city is The Hindu. The other important English dailies are the Deccan Chronicle and the New India Express. The latest entrant into the city which is yet to make its present felt, is the one year old, Hyderabad-based English daily ‘Hans India’, owned by the proprietors of Kapil Chit Funds.
It was in the later nineties of the last century that the Times of India entered the southern Bangalore, heralding the hitherto unknown ‘price war’ in the print media by offering TOI for just one city rupee. Deccan Herald which was then a leading English daily in Bangalore had to respond. When TOI followed it up by launching its edition in Hyderabad, all English dailies, willy nilly had to slash cover prices. The Hindu had fixed different rates for different days so that the outgo for the subscriber is about Rs.55 a month which meant less than Rs.2 a day. It had also introduced a scheme under which one had to pay a lump sum of Rs.180 for a six month subscription. Other English dailies had also felt the heat. At that time the competition was such that subscribers of Deccan Chronicle were offered Telugu daily ‘Andhra Bhoomi, a sister publication of Deccan Chronicle, free of cost
Now the cover price of the 20-plus pages The Hindu is Rs.3.The Sunday edition is priced at Rs.5. The cover price of both Deccan Chronicle (sixteen page broad sheet and 16 page tabloid) and Hans India is Rs.3.The New Indian Express is offered at a price of Rs.2.50 a copy.
The strong point for The Hindu is the ‘loyalty’ of its readers. ‘Once a Hindu subscriber, a subscriber for life’ The Hindu sources proudly assert. Even though Visakhapatnam is a metropolitan city, people are basically traditional and they do not change their reading habits easily. ‘I have been a subscriber of The Hindu for the last 60 years’ said Mr.Raju, a nonagenarian in Sitammadhara area. Visakhapatnam is also known as the city of retired people who like to read an ‘orthodox and traditional’ English daily like The Hindu was the refrain of pro- Hindu readers.
But what about the youth or Gen-Next ?
The 16 page tabloid of Deccan Chronicle, with oodles of juicy news, is basically meant to, what some people call ‘pamper the youth’. But the management of Deccan Chronicle is beset with other problems and it remains to be seen how it will face the new challenge of ‘price war’.
According to sources, besides offering the daily for less than Re.1 a day, the personnel of TOI seem to have other schemes under their sleeves. For an initial monthly subscription of Rs.49, some sort of ‘gift’ would be offered, making the prospective subscriber feel that he would be getting the daily ‘almost free’. This the subscriber could convert into an annual subscription by paying another Rs.300 . This would make the price just under Re.1 a day.
The management of TOI had already recruited additional staff, both editorial and administrative, to man the Visakhapatnam edition and the promotional work is on. Interestingly the TOI had recruited one Mr.Sumit, in charge of The Hindu’s Metro page at present, who always tried to keep his fingers on the pulse of youth in the city, to head its Visakhapatnam bureau. The Hindu had also taken a senior person to man its bureau ( the present chief would retire in the month of October) and had put another young journalist to take care of its Metro-plus page.. These are all considered steps to meet the new situation.
Tentatively the TOI’s Visakhapatnam edition is scheduled to hit the stands on the auspicious ‘Vijaya Dasami’ (October 24) day. But it may be delayed, source said. The management had already chalked out plans to enter the ‘business and commercial capital’ of Andhra Pradesh viz Vijayawada. Even though the TOI is the largest circulated English daily in the country, other English dailies like the The Hindu (in south India, specially in Tamilnadu ) and Deccan Chronicle (in the twin cities of Hyderabad and Secunderabad ) are the leaders at present. TOI seems to have decided to ‘invade and conquer’ south India also, said a senior TV journalist in the city.
Leading Telugu dailies like Eenadu, Saakshi and Andhra Jyothi, are all priced at Rs.3 a copy, and hence the reader had to only select the language of the daily and there was nothing to lose or gain for subscribing to a particular daily news paper. It is against this background that the TOI, with strong brand image and latest technology, is entering the market in the city. The result is anybody’s guess.
Subscribe To The Newsletter