1. Objective

To suggest a strategy for Amar Chitra Katha to capture the new age generation in the comic industry and to explore various avenues of investment.
2. About Amar Chitra Katha

Since its inception in 1970s, Amar Chitra Katha witnessed success by entering the niche segment of comic industry, the Indian traditional method of storytelling and transfer of mythological knowledge. It became popular in early 80s with all-time favourite titles like “The Mahabharata” and later by “Tinkle”.

A. Challenges of ACK
Since 90s, with the entry of colour televisions, Amar Chitra Katha has been facing challenges due to the change in the interests of children towards substitute productes. Although a pioneer in mythology oriented comics, ACK faces tough competition from other indigenous graphic content companies (Chandamama, Champak, Children’s Digest, etc), international comic books (Tintin, Asterix, Marvel and DC titles, etc). With the changing times the penetration of television and internet media (animated cartoon movies and children shows on Cartoon Network, Nickelodeon, Pogo, etc.), YouTube video channels and digital online games also pose a major challenge.
Also, the contribution margin for Amar Chitra Katha is decreasing with the increasing costs and decreasing sales volume. Traditional advertisement is not faring good for Amar Chitra Katha, and it is looking at other avenues for increasing profitability and increasing sales.

B. Strengths of ACK
 Good content generation – ACK has developed expertise in generating good and authentic content who go through hundreds of reference before developing the story and also focus on suitability of content for a children’s book. Its reputation over authenticity till date is impeccable.
 Focus on learning with cultural values – ACK is still following its founder’s vision of imbibing the young generation with inherent cultural values of Indian society. The stories published by ACK also reflect such ideology.
 Changing with times – One of the core capabilities of ACK is to change according to the requirement of contemporary customers. Inviting themes and stories from children and adults highlight their forward thinking mind-set. This was also a great mechanism to increase engagement with target customer.
 Affordability with good reach – Unlike other competitors, ACK focus towards catering to the needs of the rural customer highlights their dedication to serving Uncle Pai’s passion. In spite of increasing cost, they tried to price their product within reach of rural customers.
 Reputation/Brand Name – ACK enjoys greater amount of brand recognition and recall among its target audience. Its characters are immortal and easily identified by people of all generations.

Recommendations
1. Leveraging Existing Capabilities
For short term initiative, ACK should focus on maximum utilization of existing capabilities and popularity. This includes focusing on existing product portfolio and also extending product range relevant to target customer.
a) Merchandising of popular ACK characters (School bags/ notebooks/ toys)
With a growing market of branded merchandise of animated characters in India, it is an ideal time for Amar Chitra Katha to enter this market by licensing their main characters. Many confectioneries have also used animated characters to promote their sales by giving freebies associated with popular characters. Similarly we can merchandize some of the popular characters of ACK like Suppandi, Shikari Shambu, kalia etc by partnering with school supplies like school bags, water bottles, lunch box etc. We can also promote merchandises like toys, t-shirts, game puzzles of ACK’s special characters with a selected collection of their range of products. Gauging by the present popularity of ACK, this will fetch a considerable revenue for ACK.
b) Tie up with Kids Newspapers for Comic Strip
Children are excited and wait for the newspaper to arrive on that particular day of the week when the newspapers come with a kid’s weekly section such as young world of the Hindu etc. So, we can partner with some of the leading newspapers like The Hindu, Times of India and other regional newspapers to print comic strip on mythology and other characters in their kid’s weekly section. We can publish puzzles, comic strips and also publicize for quizzes and contests that are being held with Camlin and others.
c) Initiatives in foreign and Regional language
ACK should initiate publishing in more foreign and regional language. The success of Japanese manga in European and South East Asian countries highlight the presence of a nascent market there. Even Chota Bheem has also penetrated in 12 other foreign markets where it enjoyed considerable success.
d) Comic Con Festival
Comic Con India is the comic-based convention held in India. A Comic Con generally lasts for 2 days, and includes several workshops, interactive sessions, interviews and speeches by various comic book artists and writers On similar lines ACK too can organize such comic con festivals for children in the age group of 5-15. These festivals help the organizers realize the followership, explore new opportunities and gather competitive intelligence.
e) Tie ups with Kids Brands & Product Placement Advertisement
ACK should on-board brands targeting kids like Chocos, Complan, Camlin, NECC etc on their various product in form of product placement advertisement. They should subtly place those products on their stories like Superhero character get energized by drinking Complan, which will not alienate readers. This can be a great form of revenue generation for ACK. Moreover, they can tie up with these companies who can provide freebies like Sticker, Tazzos to attract more customers to their brands like Suppandi stickers with Cadbury Gems.
f) Tie up with Kids stores and Hyper Markets
ACK should tie up with kid store chains like Mom & me, First Cry etc. where they are presently absent. This will give the great exposure in selling books as well as merchandise via these stores. Further, they should tie-up with hyper markets where parents along with their children visit. Placing the products on strategic location like billing counter will lead to greater amount of sale for them. 2. Technology based initiatives
With increasing penetration of technology in India market and greater affordability of using these technologies, it is an ideal time for ACK to venture in this domain. These will also increase the sale of their traditional books.
a) Enter Animation Industry (Movies & TV Series)
ACK should venture into the animation industry inform of TV series and movies. The current size of the animation industry in India is estimated at USD 300 million and growing at 20-25% annually. The psychographic analysis of its target segment of 7-12 year old children will highlight their greater interest towards animated story telling over books. This initiative will rekindle their attraction towards ACK’s mythological stories.
ACK should partner with television channels like Cartoon Network and Pogo to produce animation series featuring both mythological chronicles as well as their well-established Tinkle characters. This will be a better viable revenue model as well as targeted outreach over creating YouTube channel. Further, this will increase their visibility among a wide audience base and indirectly increase their traditional sales. While the cost of animation is no longer prohibitive, the investments in this space are still significant. But recent success of “Chota Bheem” surely validates that there is enough scope of success on this platform. Its revenue has been growing at 20% a year for the past two years with Licencing & Merchandising contributing 40% to the top line.
ACK should also venture into producing animated feature length movies in future. With increasing penetration of these movies among children in India and outside and recent success of mythological movies like “Bal Ganesh”, this would be a perfect opportunity for ACK to enter this space and gain international presence.
b) Audio Book and Radio Shows
Audio books can be a great way to reach out to new audience. It should be targeted to mostly working parents and should be provided on regional language also. Further, radio shows like “hello Suppandi” will be a great form of marketing and customer engagement for ACK.
c) Introduce in Web & App Platforms (E-book, Mobile App & Games & PC Games)
This is an ideal time to launch ACK app which will provide the entire plethora of ACK merchandise with convenient ordering facility. Children can also play games and quizzes in this platform. E-book version of the earlier launched book should be provided on pay per book basis.
PC penetration in Indian household was quite significant. ACK should develop Flash & Video games which can be used as a cost effective alternate form of marketing. This can be done initially by offering free game cd along with the book. For further versions, the customer should buy these games from online & offline outlets. These will also encourage more number of children to buy the book.
3. Developing New Content
a) Age-wise segmentation & Market Research
ACK should segment its audience based on age into primarily three segments – i. (4-7) years; ii. (7-11) years and iii. (11-14) years and start developing new content pertaining to the changing requirements of its target audience to obtain greater success in present market. Adequate amount of concept testing trial and market research should be performed before the official launch of the product in mass market to gauge its acceptability among target audience.
b) Education Module for Schools & Age-wise Segmentation
ACK’s Tinkle can also tie up with schools to provide educational modules for primary classes. These modules can comprise of some course content regarding science, history, sports, careers, culture and environment along with activities, puzzles and interactive projects. It can help educate students through content that is interactive, informative, positive and engaging. This not only helps ACK build long-term relationships and increase expanse but also goes with Uncle Pai’s dream of children learning with fun ‘edutainment’, as it:
 Creates awareness on a range of subjects and stimulates interest in learning
 Helps children develop the habit of reading and improves language skills
 Provides information that is relevant to school curricula and projects
Even they can tie up with HRD ministry to create awareness regarding environmental concern via their platform creating an awareness among children at a tender age in a playful manner.
c) New themes (corruption, environment, cleanliness & hygiene)
Cartoons are a great way to educate and lighten up a heavy topic for comic relief. Bringing across topics of current importance and relevance is another means of diversifying ACK’s content. The readership of comics, which is generally assumed to be children, in this case can also easily reach out to anybody who is a socially aware and conscious citizen. ACK can bring to forefront contemporary topics like ‘Clean India’, ‘Save Water’, ‘Anti Corruption’, and so on.
d) Developing Mascot
ACK should build their own mascot to differentiate themselves from other competitors. This will increase brand recall and recognition of ACK among children and increase their top line in the long run. This might be achieved by highlighting any particular character as face of the company. 4. Conclusion
The current situation is no different as it’s existence is being threatened by changing customer preferences, thinning margins due to introduction of digitally enhanced media and so on. But there are various avenues which can be explored to bring ACK back into the game. The analysis of risk vs cost1 for each of recommendation is attached in appendix. To catch its spiral fall what can be done immediately is to leverage its existing capabilities and reach to enter into domains such as merchandising, organising comic con festivals and tie-ups with kids brands (Camlin, Chocos), online/offline stores (Mom&me, first cry..) and newspapers. This would be easier and less time consuming to implement for the company in the short term. In the long term, to develop with the changing technological scenario ACK can venture into the field of animated content (Movies, episodes, games). It can launch audio books and organise interactive programs (“Hello Suppandi”) over the radio. Also an interactive integrated app/webpage can be developed which is a one-stop shop for ACK’s media (books, animations, games). These initiatives though cost intensive, but will be of great significance given the tech savvy customers ACK has to cater to in the future. Along with the above mentioned products going in line with Uncle Pai’s dream of making learning fun for children, ACK can also introduce special modules for schools with course-work(science, maths) based books and quizzes. New line of comics based on contemporary social themes (Clean India, Anti-Corruption) can also be developed. Also though ACK has a strong brand name but having a mascot of its own will only add to its appeal among the young readers and customers. The timeline of launching strategy2 is also attached in the appendix.