Brands
Meet the Heart: Zomato shows its passion for food
MUMBAI: For Indians, food is love. We tend to show how much we love a person by feeding the other till he/she gets indigestion!
Maybe that’s why the experiment called Zomato, which started six years ago, has crossed borders and is serving millions across the globe. “Looking back, we loved our food too much to go with boring, predictable choices. Or worse still, take a chance with a poor one. So we built something that would help everyone discover more than the usual. Before we knew it, our colleagues and friends were using this treasure trove of information, encouraging us to do more,” wrote the founder and co-founder Deepinder Goyal in a blog recalling how he and his team would have killed to get where they are right now.
Currently available in 17 countries and five languages, Zomato, has rebranded itself to keep pace with the transition it is going through. “As a global brand, we felt we needed a logo that could transcend languages, cultures, and geographical boundaries, and be recognised easily by people the world over,” said the company’s CMO Rameet Arora.
Goyal wrote that now people spend way too much time in front of screens on the digital social networks, and have stopped connecting with people in real life. “But we believe that a good meal, along with good company, is where we find answers to all of life’s challenges. A bad meal, even with good company, takes days to digest. This simple belief about ‘people and food’ gives us our wings and purpose.”
And hence, came the “heart” in the restaurant search and discovery platform. The new logo signifies its connection with those who share Zomato’s passion for food. The idea for the logo came from within Zomato, based on its philosophy and constant interaction with its consumers over the years. “We worked closely with Helvetic Brands of Switzerland to develop the design for the logo; the brand identity was defined and created in-house,” informed Arora.
And that’s not all. It recently announced the launch of its operations in Toronto providing detailed information for over 11,000 restaurants. “We currently see more than 30 million visits to our website and mobile apps every month. We are focused on becoming the world’s ‘go to’ restaurant search service and dining – our experts and our product pipeline are geared towards taking us there as we steadily expand our global footprint,” highlighted Arora.
In the coming few months, it is focused on growing internationally with launches in Malaysia, Vietnam, Ireland, Lebanon, Jordan, Kuwait, Oman and Colombia in the pipeline.
Brands
Faber-Castell India appoints Sunaina Haldar as director – marketing
With stints at Tata, SleepyCat and ADF Foods under her belt, Haldar is primed to redraw Faber-Castell’s brand story
MUMBAI: Faber-Castell India has poached Sunaina Haldar from ADF Foods, appointing her director – marketing as the German stationery brand looks to muscle up in a category that is rapidly reinventing itself around creativity and self-expression.
Haldar hit the ground running. “My first couple of weeks have been incredibly energising, understanding consumers, visiting markets, engaging with retailers and immersing myself into the world of Faber-Castell Group,” she said.
She arrives with considerable firepower. At ADF Foods, Haldar ran marketing across India and international markets for a portfolio spanning Ashoka, Aeroplane, Camel and ADF Soul. Before that, she was vice-president – marketing at direct-to-consumer mattress brand SleepyCat, where she helmed brand, content and performance marketing. Her résumé also includes a stint leading marketing, new product development and CRM for Tata SmartFoodz at Tata Consumer Products, no small proving ground.
Between corporate roles, Haldar also operated as a fractional CMO for early-stage startups, building marketing strategy and operational structures from scratch, a signal that she knows how to move fast with limited resources.
With 18 years straddling FMCG, D2C and the startup world, Haldar now takes the reins at a brand that has long owned the classroom but is clearly hungry for the living room. In a stationery market where the pencil has become a lifestyle statement, Faber-Castell has picked someone who knows exactly how to sell that story.
