KOLKATA - It's a game composed of
strange-looking creatures, from smiling monsters to
fire-breathing dragons. It's an animated cartoon set in
an imaginary land. And for the most part, it appears to
be a harmless fad that many people can't seem to
understand. Yet just as these so-called "pocket
monsters" did to parents all over the world - many of
whom are fighting a losing battle against the cartoon -
it is getting parents in India very worried.
Pokemon, one of the world's most successful game
and cartoon series and a frenzy among kids the world
over, has finally hit stores in India. Its slogan,
"gotta catch 'em all", seems to sum it up. And in a span
of about 10 months, Pokemon has managed to rock the
country's kids as schools are scurrying to ban them, and
parents are trying to find a cheaper entertainment
alternative for their children.
Listen to the
complaints of the mother of two school-going siblings
aged nine and five: "My children insist on buying a
particular brand of potato chips every day, not because
the kids are particularly fond of the junk food, but for
what they get along with them: Pokemon tazos [plastic
collectible stamps] and trading cards." Parents say that
more desperate kids have started stealing Pokemon
paraphernalia, while others have resorted to using good
old-fashioned pester power to wear their parents down
into stocking up on Pokemon goods.
Indeed, as in
other places around the world, Pokemon mania is
spreading like wildfire in India. "We never expected the
Pokemon characters to gain such popularity among Indian
kids in such a short time," said Eros Huang, managing
director of Taiwan-based Top-Insight International,
which holds the Asia license to distribute and market
Pokemon merchandise. "The year 2004 will be big for
Pokemon fans in India," he added, admitting that the
company is gearing up to swamp the country's kids with
spawned games, toys, comics and an array of other
merchandise, including a Pokemon movie later in the
year.
And according to Huang, Pokemon
merchandise is not just going to flood the shelves of
children's shops and toy stores. "Talks are on with at
least half a dozen fast-moving consumer-goods companies
that are planning to use the characters as promotional
tools along with their products," said Huang.
For those who've remained sheltered from the
Pokemon phenomenon - considered by many parents to be
"the lucky ones" - Pokemon is an acronym for "pocket
monsters" and was first created as a Nintendo Gameboy
game in 1996 by Japanese gaming enthusiast Satoshi
Tajiri in an attempt to weld two of his greatest
childhood interests: collecting insects and playing
video games. It was a concept that global toy maker
Nintendo agreed to back, despite initial misgivings. But
after the video game turned into a huge money spinner,
Nintendo toys followed along with a television series,
which brought in record-breaking viewership.
By
2000 Pokemon had generated enough frenzied enthusiasm
from children across the world to make it "a
brain-numbing issue" among parents. "It's the cause of
my child wasting a whole month's pocket money on a few
packs of trading cards and junk toys" - a complaint
often heard from parents the world over, even as many
admit that they have succumbed to the "very large
expense that is threatening to quickly drain surpluses
of money put away for other important things like
college".
Small wonder, then, that Pokemon is
now one of the most successful and hottest entertainment
properties for marketers everywhere, targeting kids and
pre-teenagers alike. Reportedly, Nintendo has sold more
than 110 million Pokemon games worldwide, spurring sales
of more than 10 billion trading cards. Five animated
feature films based on Pokemon characters have also been
made to date. The first film, Pokemon: The First
Movie, made in 1999, grossed more than US$32 million
worldwide. Globally, the property rakes in more than $30
billion in licensing revenues each year, which
incidentally is greater than the gross domestic product
(GDP) of several of the world's smaller economies such
as Zimbabwe, Uruguay and Cameroon, just to name a few.
In India too, even before Pokemon begins
penetrating deeper into the country's towns and cities,
it has become a money-spinning machine. Top-Insight
claims that revenues have already exceeded Rs1.5 billion
($34 million) since the fad reached India last May. "It
is the first time that anything has generated such
excitement, and it's going to be a major jump-start for
the licensing and merchandising industry," said Marvin
Fernandes, founder and director of CB Media Ventures,
which helps Top-Insight market Pokemon in the country.
Parents say that one of the main reasons behind
Pokemon's unexpectedly quick popularity here is these
promoters' strategy of introducing constant excitement
around the brand in the form of innovative promotions
and events. "Pokemon is constantly hitting our kids
through television and almost everything associated with
pre-teens," said an exasperated parent. "Every day
children come home with newer things to buy to get
something of Pokemon free."
Rima Gupta, chief
operating officer for Quadra, a strategic marketing
consultancy, feels that that the frenzy is only going to
intensify much more in the future. "The craze will ramp
up as product licensing will only increase, since the
biggest offline driver of merchandise is the quality of
retail presence," she said.
And, believe it or
not, some parents actually appreciate that Pokemon
exists. They claim it gives their kids a hobby and that
they can meet more people this way. It gives them
something to do so that they are never bored; they start
collections and even get a small financial benefit from
trading and selling cards, they say.
Still,
though it may be some time away, some of the franchised
marketers of Pokemon have already started worrying about
the longevity of the brand in India. According to a
well-known potato-chip marketing spokesperson, kids in
India today are far more exposed and are more prone to a
high degree of "switchability, so the property can't
last too long here".
Even then, the biggest
worry for most marketers is piracy. "Piracy itself has
become a monster in India even before the Pokemon rage
caught on," said Fernandes of CB Media Ventures,
predicting that "piracy will be far more pronounced in
India than in any other market". And aside from issues
such as basic licensing structure, royalty or minimum
guarantee payments and an acceptable product quality as
the brand is franchised out to product marketers are the
promoters' other areas of concern.
Nevertheless,
even as Eros Huang of Top-Insight remains unfazed over
the challenges - "Pokemon is now all set to penetrate
deeper into the Indian market and we have definite plans
to develop it," he said - a large portion of Indian
parents are certainly waiting with bated breath for
their children to outgrow the craze when they cross over
into their teens.
(Copyright 2004 Asia Times
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Feb 25, 2004
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