Late on scene, Games merchandise does brisk business

NEW DELHI - Africans are busy buying vuvuzelas here, never mind that the blaring bugle originated in their continent! Indians are going for T-shirts with pictures of Shera the mascot, while Canadians are snapping up shot glasses. Commonwealth Games merchandise sales are skyrocketing, though some traders say it has come too late.

“Everything is being sold off and we are refilling every day. We are selling every day about 2,000 pieces of the over 36 items that are up for grabs,” Suresh Kumar, chairman of Premier Brands, merchandising partner and sole retail concessionaire for CWG 2010, told IANS.

The Games began Oct 3, but already T-shirts, vuvuzelas and Shera soft toys have proved to be the biggest hits.

“We have sold over 65,000 T-shirts already out of our first lot of 75,000. We have ordered another lot of 14,000 and we should cross the 100,000 mark.

“Around 21,000 vuvuzelas have been sold out of our total stock of 50,000 and 10,000 Shera soft toys have been picked up out of a lot of 25,000,” he added.

Other items selling like hot cakes include “mugs, batches, coasters, key chains and the 13-in-1 bandana”. The bandana, made available in different colours and designs, he says, can be worn in 13 ways and that’s why the name!

T-shirts, both collared and round neck, are available in eight colours for Rs.275 each with an option of either a CWG logo or the Shera imprinted on it.

“The shopping reaction is very good. Almost everything in the stock in the Games Village has been sold out as all visitors are buying something or the other,” Imran Shaikh, in charge of merchandising for the Organising Committee (OC), told IANS.

“Africans are preferring vuvuzelas, Indians are taking home T-shirts and mugs while Canadians are going for coasters and shot glasses…We are refilling almost twice daily,” he said.

The vuvuzela has been imported from China in two colours - bright yellow and red. The loud monotone bugle that took the recent FIFA World Cup by storm is priced at Rs.250 and comes with stickers of Shera the Games mascot, the CWG logo and safety instructions pasted on it.

Another import, the Shera soft toy, is available in three sizes - 4 inch, 6 inch and 9 inch for Rs.150, Rs.200 and Rs.250 respectively. The mugs, on the other hand, are available in a variety like magic mugs, night glow mugs, plain mugs and coloured inside mugs.

Despite the bullish sales, the delay will lead to eventual losses for Premier Brands.

“Our total investment is around Rs.5 crore and earlier we were anticipating a profit of about Rs.10-12 crore (over $2.25 million) but now the balance sheet will close at around Rs.8 crore ( $1.8 million) with a loss of anywhere between Rs.80 lakh-Rs.1 crore ($225,000), all because of the delay,” said Kumar.

The merchandise is made available at four official stores, four mobile vans and at 63 venues within 11 Games stadiums. While the stores are at the Games Village, Pragati Maidan, CWG headquarters and the Ashok Hotel respectively, the vans mainly go to schools with bulk orders.

Other goods adorning the shelves are caps, vizors, badges (small and big); notepads (50 pages and 100 pages), plates, national flags with the national anthem engraved in it; cover for mobile phones and laptops; sippers and musical instruments.

When it comes to pricing, Kumar said: “We are not selling anything at over Rs.300 - that’s our maximum price.” The cheapest item on display is a puzzle for Rs.26 and the maximum on the list is T-shirts for Rs.275 each.

Merchandising, however, began late in India for CWG vis-a-vis big ticket sports events in other nations. For the 2008 Beijing Olympics, it started as early as three years before the Games while the 2012 London Olympics’ flagship store and online sales have already started functioning.

“We were given four dates earlier but the OC failed to launch the merchandise and now we’ve had only a month in hand. We were even slated to sell the products in the entire country but now we are restricted only to Delhi and the national capital region because of no time,” said Kumar.

(Robin Bansal can be contacted at robin.b@ians.in)