Brands
New concepts and marketing tools lend teeth to IRS 2005
MUMBAI: More than Readership! That is what Media research Users Council (MRUC) in association with Hansa Research are looking to do with Indian Readership Survey (IRS) 2005. The two parties held a forum for the marketing media and advertising
community this morning. The aim was to familiarize the industry with improvements made to the IRS.
Two new tools have been added. The first is IRS Local Area Potential (Ilap). This is packaged to the clients specifications and provides demographic, penetration of product and service in potential areas like distribution, test marketing, below the line activity, growth etc with insights at micro area level for the products and service. MRUC states that till now all syndicated studies have been providing data at a city level. The marketer could only do analysis at a city level and not do any planning at the micro level. Last year IRS introduced the concept of sub-metro reporting wherein broad areas of big Metros were broken down to two to four parts. Ilap takes this concept forward.
Functions of Ilap: Ilap breaks cities into various smaller areas and enables the user to analyse these areas within the city. For instance Mumbai can be broken into 45-50 areas. Bangalore can be broken down into 15-20 areas. The number of areas depends on the size of the city. One can compare Juhu to Linking Road. A comparison can be made based on affluence , ownership and usage of products, media consumption. One can also compare brand shares for large brands across categories like personal care, consumer
durables, telecom, food and beverages. MRUC states that Ilap will be useful for people opening a new restaurant, multiplex, bank branch, super market. As far as marketing activity is concerned it is helpful in test marketing, below the line activity in terms of sampling and conducting outdoor campaigns.
The other new service that IRS 2005 has introduced is Household Premiums Index (HPI). This has come about as over the years advertisers and media planners have felt the need for an effective classification variable that allows for grouping of households by affluence levels. Though monthly income household (MIH) or SEC
have often been used as surrogates these variables do not always reflect the affluence or prosperity of a household. Hansa research developed HPI and this is an attempt to provide the marketing and advertising fraternity with a tool that facilitates a more efficient classification of households. Based on [prosperity. HPI enables the user to develop better strategies for targeting, profiling and market sizing.
Hansa research claims that HPI is a more systematic, standardized approach and tries to do away with research bias in formulating a premiumness index. The basic concept revolves around the philosophy “Less penetrated a product category, more premium is it with respect to another highly penetrated category.” Consequently the ownership of such premium categories entitles a household to be a part of a higher premium stratum. The premiumness scored accrued out of ownership/ purchase of a category is defined as the inverse of the penetration of that category. The summative score of a basket of categories gives the total premiumness score of a household. This raw score is indexed to a scale of 0 to 1000 to develop the HPI.
Hansa Research adds that HFI offers scope of better targeting and provides an option to study markets and target groups in a much more innovative manner. It also breaks the conventional wisdom that SEC is the most effective way of segmenting and classifying
audiences. HPI scores reveal that prosperity is not always directly correlated to SEC. This apparent from the fact that the top one per percentile of all households is exclusively constituted by SEC A1.
Hansa Research claims to be the fastest growing market research agency in India. It deals in customized and syndicated research. It clients come from a cross section of industries including media. MRUC is a non profit organisation. It is a regulatory body that conceptualises, facilitates and ratifies the findings of media research. It states that its aim is to ensure timely, credible, relevant and economical media research.
Brands
Zomato film highlights bias faced by women delivery partners
International Women’s Day campaign shines light on everyday stereotypes
MUMBAI: A food delivery may arrive in minutes, but the journey behind it can still carry a few outdated assumptions. This International Women’s Day, Zomato has released a new brand film that shines a light on the subtle but familiar biases faced by women delivery partners during their daily shifts. The campaign nudges viewers to rethink a simple idea that still surprises many people: a delivery partner’s ability has nothing to do with gender.
Instead of focusing on training for delivery partners, the film flips the perspective and gently turns the mirror towards society. Through a series of everyday moments, from collecting orders at restaurants to arriving at a customer’s doorstep, women delivery partners encounter reactions that many recognise all too well. Curious glances, surprised expressions and questions that hint at disbelief follow them along the route.
In a playful cinematic twist, the delivery partners break the fourth wall to address these reactions directly, offering light-hearted responses that quietly challenge the stereotypes.
The campaign also reflects a broader shift in India’s gig economy. As of February 2026, Zomato has more than 3,500 monthly active women delivery partners who collectively deliver over five lakh orders every month.
Eternal chief sustainability officer anjalli ravi kumar said building an inclusive platform economy requires both opportunity and acceptance. She said that as more women step into roles across urban last-mile logistics, the ecosystem around them must evolve to ensure they can work with confidence and dignity.
She added that enabling women to participate safely and comfortably in such roles is essential if India is to move closer to the goal of 70 per cent female workforce participation by 2047 under the broader vision of Viksit Bharat 2047.
Alongside the campaign, Zomato has been strengthening safety measures for women delivery partners. The company offers a 24 by 7 SOS emergency support system available in more than 800 cities, connecting partners to ambulance services, police and an internal response team when needed.
Women delivery partners also have the option to avoid certain delivery locations between 7 pm and 5 am if they feel unsafe. In addition, city-specific WhatsApp support groups in the top seven cities help women partners communicate easily, raise concerns and seek peer support.
For deliveries to hotels, lodges or guest houses, women partners can complete the order at the reception instead of going up to individual rooms. The delivery partner app also allows them to flag difficult or unsafe areas as black zones. More than 300 such zones have already been identified and temporarily marked unserviceable.
Through the film and these initiatives, Zomato hopes to spark a broader conversation about inclusion in the gig economy, one delivery at a time.
