Media conglomerate Viacom18’s consumer business plans to leave no stone unturned to connect with youth. It appears to be graduating from inner wear and condoms to providing cafes, style spas and hostels under MTV (its youth focussed music channel).
Experiential services are expected to be the next line extension for the popular franchise .
“We are exploring unconventional products and services for the youth. The purpose is to play a role in experiential services to enhance our retail presence with properties such as cafes, hostels and style spas,” said Sandeep Dahiya, Senior VP and Business Head, Viacom18. Considering that youth face problems such as finding accommodation in big cities, providing hostels would serve as a means to build further equity for the music channel. Style spas are expected to provide services such as hair-cuts and tattoos, while cafes would serve as the usual hangout.
“We are looking at getting the right partners for such experiential services which is going to take longer than just product-licensing deals,” said Dahiya. Viacom18’s merchandising business is based on licensing its brands (for which its gets a royalty fee) to partners and then engaging in co-branding exercises to build a portfolio of consumer products based on shows and characters of its television channels.
Merchandise business
Viacom’s licensing business currently stands at Rs 300 crore which is split equally between kids and youth-oriented merchandise. With kids’ channels such as Nickelodeon, Sonic and Nickelodeon Junior, the network is also keen to expand merchandise for popular shows such as Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles this summer. “Show-centric characters help build TRPs (television ratings) for kids’ channels unlike music channels which are about brand building,” he said.
New licensing deals are also being explored for kids’ merchandise with QSRs (quick service restaurants) such as McDonald’s and Pizza Hut.
In the past, MTV has already forged licensing deals with players such as Crusoe (for innerwear), Bewitch (lingerie), Bilt (stationery), CitiBank (debit card), Mochi (footwear), JK Ansell (condoms), Airtel (sim card) and Lava (mobile phones). All its licensee partners manufacture and distribute the MTV brand as part of a co-branding exercise.
The network could also explore bigger opportunities such as theme parks. Globally, Viacom has entered the business with the Nickelodeon water park in Orlando, US. “It would be a dream for the merchandising business to enter a similar agreement in India,” added Dahiya.