?Sri Sri Ayurveda to introduce spices, organic staples; expand global presence

Spiritual leader Sri Sri Ravi Shankar’s Art of Living Foundation’s FMCG arm, Sri Sri Ayurveda is all set to take the FMCG industry by storm with the introduction of spices and organic staples in the Indian market.

The company majorly focuses on Ayurvedic products across categories such as breakfast cereals, health drinks, oil, spices, personal care, oral care, cookies and ready-to-cook items.

Currently, SSA has 30-35 products on offer in the market, ranging from shampoos, creams, toothpaste, soaps, honey and ghee among others.

Arvind Varchaswi, Trustee on the Board, Sri Sri Ayurveda Trust, said, "Our product range is going to increase specially in the FMCG sector and also the commodity sector."

Tej Katpitia, Chief Marketing Officer, Sri Sri Ayurveda, said, "This year, we will be majorly focusing on Ojasvita – our health drink with seven power herbs. Malt and chocolate flavours are getting the best consumer feedback and volume currently."

He further added, "Apart from that we will also be expanding into the food segment. We will be launching our masalas – spices and cooking masalas – this month. We have quite a healthy range of around 13 products lined up and along with this we will also be getting into organic staples like organic moong dal, split dal, chana dal and toor dal to name a few."

The brand is also looking to introduce more specialty products like brown sugar and whole wheat atta.

The Bengaluru-based company, which has recently launched its health drink brand Ojasvita, endorsed by Olympic silver medalist P V Sindhu and National badminton coach Pullela Gopichand, is currently selling products through 600 franchised stores, but plans to open 2,500 outlets in India in 2017.

Besides, SSA already has an online presence and sells products through its websites. SSA’s online portal, Sattva Store, also offers apparel, wellness and personal care products, food, and handicrafts, among other things.

Katpitia said, "SSA typically is expanding both through the general retail and regular distribution channels. We have franchise stores all across the country. Given the demand of our products and positive response we are getting from the market, we are going to focus on general trade, modern trade, e-commerce and franchise stores for expansion. We already export our products to several countries across the globe. We are looking forward to scaling our presence and soon we will be launching our products in Russia."