Verghese Kurien On Building A Successful Brand


wealthymatters.com

The success of the Amul brand name has, no doubt, resulted in my being asked to comment on its history and the reasons for its success. I have, therefore, reflected on the long history of the brand to see if I could distill reasons why Amul is a name widely recognised and respected, not just in our cities and towns, but in our villages as well.

Probably the easy, but nonetheless wrong, answer is that Amul has been advertised well. Certainly it has helped that those responsible for keeping the Amul name in the public eye have used considerable imagination and, if I do say so, ‘The Taste of India’ is nothing short of brilliant. However, there is much more to it.

A successful consumer product is the object of thousands, even tens of thousands of transactions every day. In these transactions, the brand name serves in lieu of a contract. It is the assurance to the buyer that her specifications will be met. It is the seller’s assurance that quality is being provided at a fair price. Read more of this post

Gold Smuggling


wealthymatters.com

Here is a fact I came a cross about a week ago.If you are trying to decide which way the price of gold will move short term, remember this fact.India’s official gold purchases might be down but consumption has probably not reduced as much as many pundits are positing, despite the high prices in Rupee terms.Mumbai gold prices are about Rs 1,500 per 10 grams higher than international prices

My Apologies


I am travelling on business.I am not sure of being able to devote time to blogging for the next 2-3 weeks.My apologies to all my regular readers.I will reply to all comments ASAP and on my return, I will do a post for each of the awards I stand nominated for .

Fellow bloggers I am sorry I have not been much of a follower these past days.I promise to catch up on all the reading on my return.

Savitri Jindal’s Assets


wealthymatters.comHave you ever wondered about the assets of the really wealthy?Personally I have always been interested in knowing just where wealthy people have their money.My take is that wealthy people didn’t get that way or don’t stay that way without knowing a thing or two about keeping and growing their money safely.That is why I was interested when I came across her statement, given before the returning officer, while filing her nomination papers in 2009 for the Haryana Legislative Assembly elections.

Savitri Jindal is India’s richest woman. She is the widow of the late O.P.Jindal.In her statement given before the returning officer,Savitri Jindal states that she has moveable property worth Rs 17.75 crore and immovable property worth Rs 25.94 crore.I think it’s interesting to see how much of her money she has in a liquid form.Compare this to our asset allocation.Most of us are bound to have most of our money stuck in our houses.A house is a necessity, but it makes sense to acquire one’s fortune and then splurge on fancy houses rather than try to become wealthy by sinking money in our homes.

Savitri Jindal does not own a car.I think this lady shows us women a way out of owning a depreciating asset-claim you don’t drive.Having a car at one’s disposal is good but owning it might not be so wise wealth-wise.Keep the luxury car purchases for after you reach the stage of acquiring luxury homes. Read more of this post

RBI On Gold And Housing Prices


wealthymatters.comThe Reserve Bank of India is worried about the rapid rise in housing and gold prices, out-running the inflation rate.

 ”The two markets have not only provided effective inflation hedges, but also enabled savers to earn good real returns amidst high inflation.”

Over the last two years housing price inflation has ranged between 16 – 25% during various quarters. Gold prices have increased at an even faster rate of 14-40%.

However, with housing and gold prices running ahead of inflation, there is a need for containing risks,according to the RBI.

‘While credit to housing and commercial real estate has slowed down, a close vigil is still necessary as housing price inflation has not moderated.”Hence the Reserve Bank will continue to monitor the asset prices ahead from a macro-prudential angle.