.jpg)
Sleep and comfort solution brand, Duroflex released its latest campaign, “Tested By Relationships,” coinciding with the wedding season. The brand’s new campaign showcases young, diverse couples pursuing comfort and connection. It highlights how Duroflex’s premium innovative sleep and comfort solutions help create the ideal environment for the couples’ comfort with ease.
The ‘Tested By Relationships’ campaign takes an unconventional modern route by showing a new generation couple, redefining relationships with a live-in relationship, who prioritise meaningful connections over societal norms and emphasize inclusivity. Sridhar Balakrishnan, Group CEO, Duroflex says. “Duroflex, as a brand and organisation, has embraced the opportunity to celebrate all forms of relationships. We are not a judgmental brand and want to ensure that we are inclusive as a brand.
"Our wedding campaign is centered on a couple in a live-in relationship. The film shows the couple preparing to attend a wedding while talking about their current relationship and their interplay with each other. It's an interplay of what's traditional, modern and what's acceptable to society. The campaign celebrates young diverse couples and their pursuit of comfort, connection and happiness irrespective of their relationship status.”
The campaign comprises one digital ad film and four short films focussed on Duroflex’s portfolio including mattresses, sleep accessories, recliners and sofas. Being a digital-first campaign, Duroflex is betting big on social media and collaborating with relevant influencers who can help in communicating the brand's message to the relevant TG effectively. In addition, the campaign is supported with on-ground in-store activation. Balakrishnan says, “It's an optimal spread. We are doing what is right for the campaign and the brand at that particular point in time. The whole idea is to become the most loved company in the sleep and comfort space.” He continues, “We will definitely see increased investment over the coming years in marketing, brand building and talent. These are the areas which we believe will take the company to the next level.”
He highlights that while Gen Zs primarily engage with the brand search for information online, purchase is both on-line and off-line. Currently, e-commerce contributes 18% of the company’s total top line. He says, “E-commerce has to be a meaningful play. It's not just a channel for sales but also a channel where the consumers engage with the brand. It will continue to be a very important part of our overall channel. However, we have to be smart about the way we play in the marketplace, how we leverage our website. We do see e-commerce playing, continuing to play a significant role in our growth journey.”
An elevated and immersive experience
A key strategy for Duroflex is to provide an elevated and immersive consumer experience is through the Duroflex Exclusive Experience Centres, where shoppers can look for sleep solutions, choose the right mattress with in-store sleep experts who help consumers make an informed decision.
Balakrishnan says, “The Duroflex Exclusive Experience Centres is doing really well. Given the way the consumer engages with the brand—online or offline—we strongly believe that we have got to have a meaningful play online and offline. We've got a good response to our Duroflex COCOs.” He continues, “One of the strategic pivots we will be looking at is expansion in retail and increase our product offerings to the consumer so that we have a meaningful play in the consumer's life. The expansion will largely start with the urban centers. We would like to saturate the urban centers because from a category standpoint the bulk of the market is in the urban centers and then look at Tier II and Tier III towns. EBOs (exclusive brand outlet) and MBO (multi-brand outlet) will continue to play a very meaningful and a large role in our growth journey in the foreseeable future.”
Taking on the competition – Duroflex & Sleepyhead
The sleep solution category has seen a significant disruption and increased competition—in the last five to 10 years—with not just the legacy players such as Kurlon and Sleepwell but also with the launch of multiple D2C players such as SleepyCat, Wakefit and The Sleep Company amongst others.
On its part, in 2018, Duroflex launched a subsidiary brand, Sleepyhead, a mattress D2C brand. Commenting on the onslaught of competition, Balakrishnan quips, “Duroflex has grown 10x in the last 10 years. We've grown well. We have leveraged Sleepyhead and also leveraged the whole e-commerce journey very well.” Another key proposition and core value that Duroflex is betting on, is innovation to fundamentally solve a consumer pain point. Balakrishnan says, “We need to constantly keep innovating to stay relevant in the consumer’s mind space and solve consumer problems”
With two brands—Duroflex and Sleepyhead—in the kitty, the company has focused on leveraging the synergies between both brands. Balakrishnan says, “Where the synergy is common is largely in the value chain because that's where the financial synergies come in. However, when it's a question of addressing the consumers, both these brands cater to completely two different set of consumers, and they are priced and marketed accordingly. Duroflex is premium whereas Sleepyhead addresses a relatively younger TG, consumers just starting off and getting into their jobs for whom economics do play a role. We're also looking at slightly funkier designs. While Duroflex is relevant for the younger TG as well, it tends to address people who are slightly older, and willing to pay a slightly higher premium.”
The company recently launched the first offline COCO store for Sleepyhead in Bangalore. The strategy for Sleepyhead is to first expand the retail footprint over the next few months in Bangalore and then look to expand across the country.
Commenting on the year gone by, he says, “Overall it's been a good year for the company. We've delivered on the objectives that we set out to deliver not only in terms of financial parameters, but also in terms of infusing new talent, bringing in new capability to ready the system to move into the next orbit of growth. Today we are in a fairly strong position to leverage on our brands, as well as the capability and talent that we've built to really leapfrog and take the company to the next level over the next three to five years.” He continues, “We are looking at a lot of innovation and a meaningful growth over the next few quarters and a larger D2C play. We hope to become the most loved brand in the sleep and comfort space in the time to come.”
.jpg)
