Brands
ITC empowers Women across industries with HerStory campaign
MUMBAI: Marking International Women’s Day, ITC has launched the HerStory campaign, celebrating the vital role of women across science, agriculture, manufacturing, and entrepreneurship. This initiative underscores ITC’s commitment to gender equity by showcasing women breaking barriers across its diverse operations.
The campaign kicks off with a video honouring women scientists at ITC’s Life Sciences and Technology Centre (LSTC) in Bengaluru, highlighting their contributions to innovation. With women making up nearly 47 per cent of LSTC’s workforce, ITC continues to challenge gender imbalances in STEM.
ITC is also transforming shopfloors, with its Pudukkottai factory in Tamil Nadu employing 67 per cent women and the Khordha facility in Odisha operated entirely by women. These milestones reflect ITC’s efforts to increase female participation in the industrial sector.
Beyond corporate spaces, ITC empowers women in agriculture through Itcmaars, facilitating over 1,700 Farmer Producer Organisations (FPOs), ensuring at least one female director in each, and forming 25 all-women FPOs. More than 7,500 women farmers have been supported, driving sustainable agribusinesses. Additionally, ITC’s Women-Managed Agri-Business Centres (WMABCs) have enabled over 6,000 rural women across 12 states to become entrepreneurs.
At the grassroots, ITC’s women’s empowerment programme focuses on financial literacy, social security, entrepreneurship, and livelihood support. With over 6 million women benefiting from various initiatives including self-help groups, education, and health interventions the programme is fostering financial independence and community resilience.
Watch the video here
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.
