Marketing Platform : Ode to Earth
Making Markets Work for the Poor

Overview

As an effort towards making markets work for the poor, ACCESS Development Services has initiated the ‘Ode to Earth’ a program designed to open a new arena for NGOs, producer groups and grassroots based artisans associated with handicrafts, initiate them into a network by providing them a marketing platform, give requisite technical inputs and the knowledge required for learning the market dynamics, ensuring the sale of traditional rural handcrafted products in the niche market they deserve.

The uniqueness of this initiative is that not only does it provides a marketing platform, but exposure and visibility to the beneficiaries and encourages knowledge sharing as well, working through three levels
i) Product development through design interventions and support on building quality, ii) Efficient production processes through supply chain management iii) Building a marketing platform and an umbrella brand for the products. The participating groups gain a lot through its technical workshops and counseling sessions, wherein inputs are providing to them on product and design development, quality up gradation,  pricing, packaging, visual merchandising, market trends, etc.

Objectives of the initiative

1. Provide Producer Groups partner NGOs, grassroots artisans/crafts people with a platform to market their products.
2. To help artisans/organizations to analyze their products and their potential for specific markets.
3. To direct artisans/organizations towards a future strategy for successful marketing

Ode to Earth involves a complete hand holding process, which consists of following steps:

• Identification of the craft clusters.
• Stakeholder identification.
• Orientation & Qualifying workshops and assessment.
• Requisite methodology of intervention for the selected groups
• Technical and Knowledge workshops and counselling sessions.
• The opportunity to showcase at the Ode to Earth exhibit.
• Post Facto analysis

Ode to Earth 2010 will take place from 16 to 19 January 2010 at the Constitution Club, Vithal Bhai Patel House, Rafi Marg, New Delhi.

Ode to Earth 2008

In 2008, ACCESS Development Services, in collaboration with ‘All India Artisans and Craft workers Welfare Association’ (AIACA) and Dutch organization ‘Women on Wings’ put together a new marketing initiative “Ode to Earth”.

 As a culmination of a long term well structured process, ACCESS organized the niche market event for 63 NGOs/Producer Groups interested in exploring the possibilities of marketing their handicraft products through Ode to Earth. The exclusive marketing event, held for three days from the 11th to 13th of November at the Ashok Hotel, New Delhi. The initiative was an attempt to enable small artisans to reach out to mainstream and high value markets by providing technical and design counsel to artisan groups, help them improve their skills, orient their products and make them aware of current contemporary market trends.

Through the Ode to Earth, the grassroots artisans and crafts people found a national platform which helped to establish short and long term business links for them and provide real-time interface with buyers, helping them to understand the interests of up­market buyers in their skills and products. The process also included orientation in merchandising and display, and provided one-to-one market and communication counseling.

With a special focus on West Bengal, Rajasthan & states of the North East, and organisations were selected by a technical committee on the basis of their organization structure and products after understanding their production processes, analyzing their skills and developing a technical brief for production of the identified products.
During & before the event, a Technical Team of designers (NID & NIFT alumni) and resource people  were associated with the producer groups / NGOs  through a series of interactive workshops, providing them counseling and expert guidance in terms of design & marketing vis-à-vis the Ode to Earth event .The aim of the workshops was to increase the capacity of the craft producer groups to better meet the challenges of the changing markets at hand, by assisting them to create products that could meet market standards in terms of design, quality, production capacity, pricing and competitiveness. It also provided an orientation to national exhibition, the experience of working along with seasoned designers who helped them gain the confidence of catering to large orders and  proved as good platforms for exchange of ideas.

Women on Wings, Dutch specialists in marketing and communication held a two day Market of Knowledge for the participants in developing and orienting their products to mainstream urban markets.
A technical team consisting of design and marketing professionals advised the groups on products, production, product orientation, and supply chain issues through a market readiness process. 
The purpose was to share knowledge and experience with Indian organizations, the experts trained participants and gave presentations on issues such as branding, visual merchandising, effective communication, product development, setting up supply chains, visual identity, visual merchandising.

The exhibition, held at the lawns at Hotel Ashoka, New Delhi attracted various customers and buyers over the three days interested in providing long term support to these artisans. The presentation, design and variety of products was formulated in a way to provide inspiration for business. The delicate open air exhibit was designed in white by designer Tara Lal from The Goodearth, with a team of expert visual merchandisers helping each group individually in showcasing their products unusually.   It provided an opportunity to the participating and artisans, many of who were participating in a national event for the first time, to have a direct interface with market, receive focused inputs on developing marketing strategies and hence ensuring long term development for the rural artisans and their craft.

 Nearly 3000 customers visited the exhibit over the three days along with various product sourcing teams from established stores and designer labels, resulting in generating extremely good onsite sales and large orders. The products and the huge variety got an extremely positive response from the visitors with many repeat customers as most of the artisans were first time participants and had got products especially tweaked and modified hence adding novelty to the usual goods on shelves in the Delhi market!

To ensure greater footfall during the Ode to earth marketing event, ACCESS provided good advertisement and publicity with personalized invites, online advertising and good print & media coverage. Media channels like NDTV-Metropolitan Nation, CNB IBN and Dainik Bhaskar provided national coverage to the event & promoted it as an exclusive event for the niche collectors of hand crafted products.

Being at a common platform at the event, people from the handicraft sector came together and had the opportunity to recognize the challenges and the changes required vis-a- vis the design & quality aspect of the existing products. It also helped the artisan groups in defining their identity in an extremely competitive marketplace, making their business more effective and viable.

The Process

1. Identification of the craft clusters & Stakeholder identification: The initial step shall involve need assessment of the potential areas, states requiring intervention in the livelihoods sector. Special emphasis will laid on working with craftspeople from the underserved States.
2. Orientation & Qualifying workshops: These workshops targeting approx. 75 promising artisan groups/individuals shall be organize to get the baseline information of the invited beneficiary groups/ individuals, profile of the craft being practiced, existing products or product range through one-to-one interaction between the facilitators and the producers. It shall also serve as an orientation process to get selected groups to understand the projected methodology and processes involved. These workshops shall also help in understanding and evaluating the skill level, production processes, capacity and the areas requiring intervention as per the individual need of each group.
3. Requisite methodology of intervention for each group: A team of professionals shall plan the tailor made future intervention involving requisite ingredients like design orientation, product up-gradation and other technical inputs including market intelligence and product pricing etc.
4. Formulating a technical team: This shall include formulating a technical team which shall include sector specialists for capacity building, designers with national and international exposure and market experts to conduct technical workshops. Collaborative efforts shall be made with institutes like AIACA, reputed design institutes; Marketing & communication agencies of national and international caliber.
5. Technical workshops: This involves executing a series of workshops with the identified groups at the grass root level to ensure market readiness. These workshops shall be conducted at the local and state level. The groups shall be monitored and guided by the technical team at every phase to ensure maximum impact. The workshops shall give inputs on :
   1. Profiling of the groups and products
   2. Product & Design development
   3. Market Readiness
   4. Branding
   5. Packaging
   6. Costing & Pricing
   7. Capacity building
   8. Business Development Planning
   9. Follow up mechanism
6. Knowledge workshops: These knowledge workshops shall be marketing workshops which shall focus on components and strategies that relate to organizing and promoting better markets for the poor. They shall be a platform for sharing knowledge, learning, and networking. The workshops shall be a prelude to the national market event and international experts shall train participants and give presentations on issues such as branding, visual merchandising, effective communication, product development, setting up supply chains, visual identity, visual merchandising etc.
7. Boulevard of new markets: The Ode to Earth exhibit: This shall be a three day national marketing event where more than 100 producer groups, organizations, artisans shall showcase their high-quality handcrafted products in a creative way to a niche clientele. The presentation, design and variety of products shall be formulated in a way to provide inspiration for business. The exhibit shall be thematically designed by well known designers and all display spaces shall be set up by expert visual merchandisers helping each group individually in showcasing their products. Held at an up market location, the exhibition shall attract customers and buyers interested in providing long term support to these artisans. It shall provide an opportunity to the participating artisans, most of whom shall be participating in a national event for the first time, to have a direct interface with market, receive focused inputs on developing marketing strategies and hence ensuring long term development of the rural artisans and their craft.
8. Publicity: In order to ensure greater footfalls during the event, ACCESS shall publicize the Ode to earth vigorously. A media plan shall be envisaged to involve the local media (print & film) and along with other promotional campaigns
9. Counseling: During & before the event, a group of reputed designers, marketers, specialists will constantly associate with the producer groups / NGOs and provide them counseling on market readiness, merchandising, market analysis, market segmentation, and market group of experts will be drawn from national and international experts.
10. Post Facto analysis: Post the event, each Producer Group will be provided a scorecard on how they fare in the event, and areas that they can improve for future events. A post-facto analysis shall be done to assess the impact of the event with respect to the overall business generated during the fair, feedback formats for measuring the performance of the participants, assessing the needs of the potential clients vis-à-vis the products marketed, identifying of NGOs networks working out the possibility of having specific assignment with them, and identifying funding agencies and potential partners to support development actions
11. Follow ups & continuous activities: The Ode to Earth process shall also provide various market led business oriented solutions to the affiliated member groups.
    • Market Linkage follow ups
    • Buyer seller meet
    • Monthly information sharing
    • Umbrella brand: Ode to Earth
    • Design inputs

Contact

Radhika Kumari, Project Coordinator
The Livelihoods Secretariat
ACCESS Development Services,
28, Hauz Khas Village
New Delhi, India
110016
Email: radhika@accessdev.org
Phone: +91 11 26510915

Registration

Registration details will be updated soon.