MUMBAI: In a move to capitalise on the booming cartoon-based toys retail market, Funskool India has entered into an agreement with The Walt Disney Company, to retail Disney's range of toy merchandise here. Funskool has launched the internationally popular Disney Princess dolls and Role-Play sets this year.
The products are priced between the range of Rs 299 and Rs 649 for dolls and between Rs 199 to Rs 1500 for the role-play sets.
The company is confident that the products, hugely popular worldwide, will appeal in India and hopes to garner a market share of over 20 per cent in the growing organised Rs 150 million category of 3-9 year range of toys for girls.
Funskool would be importing the Disney Princess products and distributing them in India. They also will be manufacturing board games and puzzles from their facility at Goa in India.
This move represents another step in The Walt Disney Company's business strategy in India. With demand growing for contemporary cartoon based toys in Indian market, this arrangement would prove beneficial both to Disney's famous 'Disney Princess' range that are very popular in the international markets and to Funskool.
The young girls' lifestyle brand continues to expand into more categories and countries, and is on track to become the largest global girls franchise in 2006 with 40 per cent growth in 2005 and 300 per cent growth over the last three years. The eight princesses - Ariel, Belle, Cinderella, Jasmine, Mulan, Pocahontas, Sleeping Beauty and Snow White - were brought together under the same marketing umbrella by Disney Consumer Products in 2000.
Disney Princess boasts platinum status on Billboard's Children's Chart and has three titles in the Top 25 chart with the "Disney Princess Collection" from Walt Disney Records; it reigns as the number one licensed Halloween costume assortment for 4 years in a row; has garnered 10 million worldwide circulation with 30 editions of its Disney Princess magazine, available in 75 countries. Having crossed $3 billion in worldwide consumer retail sales, the brand continues to be the fastest growing, nearly universally recognised brand Disney has ever created.
Funskool is also planning innovative Point of Sale (POS) materials to promote the toys and to bring out the excitement and variety of the Disney Princess collection in retail shops. To add to it, Funskool has a strong distribution network covering 5000 outlets across India, which would be
helping in the sale of the Disney Princess collection.
