Organised by the Delhi-based International Management Institute, the topic was part of the one-day seminar on `India Inc's Challenges for the Next Millennium.'

Quoting NCAER, Bose said that there are more middle and high income households in about 6,27,000 villages than in urban areas, and that the rural areas had a burgeoning base of consumers with high purchasing power. ``Rural masses have just about started taking to the consumption of packaged branded goods,'' he added.

However, according to him marketers have failed to realise the potential of this vast untapped market. ``The development of rural markets by marketers so far, has been incidental. They developed their products for urban areas and as consumption patterns percolated to rural areas, they attempted to get additional revenues from rural areas,'' Bose rued. Agreeing with him, S Neelamegham, dean (planning and international relations), Faculty of Management Studies (FMS), said that the time has come when marketers should make aggressive efforts at rural areas.

``The challenge is to exploit the vast untapped market--which accounts for 72 per cent of the total population.'' Professor Neelamegham stressed on better understanding the rural consumer whose needs, attitudes are different and diverse. Talking about product differentiation, he said that most product developments are urban focused though some companies such as LG, Marico, Colgate, Videocon and others have made efforts at focussing on rural markets with customised products. Later, at a panel discussion on `Services Branding: Umbrella v/s Individual Branding', Tara Sinha, TaraSinha Associates, who chaired the discussion, said a new category was emerging--mega brands. Mayank Bhargava, head-credit cards division, Citibank, and Ashok Anantram, vice-president marketing, ITC Hotels also made a presentation on the subject.