Pakistan’s homegrown sanitary napkin brand Butterfly is making waves in a market long dominated by international giants like Procter & Gamble. Santex’s Butterfly has managed to achieve what many considered impossible– doubling its market share from 12% to nearly 25% in just a few years.
And this is not a sudden change spurred on by external circumstances. Santex has been on a mission and has seen consistent growth, with customer preference changing fast. As a result, a battle has ensued between P&G and Santex.
Can Always always stay relevant?
Butterfly has been around for a while. The sanitary napkin brand was first launched by Santex in 1983. In a market that was still developing, this was Pakistan’s first local feminine hygiene product to hit pharmacies and the retail market. But Butterfly’s story begins with a bit of failure. Despite its unique positioning as the only authentic and branded local pad manufacturer, the brand struggled to maintain its position against international competition. In the mid-1990s, P&G introduced the Always brand to the Pakistani market and for all intents and purposes blew Butterfly out of the water. Their products were not well known, or well-stocked.
It was part of P&G’s strategy of coming in hard in new markets. Just think about it. For an entire generation of Pakistanis, the word ‘Pampers’ is synonymous with the word diaper, even though pamper is the brand name of P&G’s product. It is the same way washing powder is known as Surf no matter what brand it is, simply because Unilever’s Surf Excel had gained such popular appeal and recognition. In the same way, sanitary pads were known as Always.
What Santex did right in the face of this assault was to not give up. From the mid 1990s all the way up to now, they have continued to produce, market, and sell. Over the years, the number of Pakistani women entering the formal workplace has increased. The female labour force participation rate rose from under 16% in 1998 to a peak of 25% in 2015. And this is the labour participation rate, meaning the number of women increasing in the work force proportional to the overall population. All in all, as the population has increased, millions of women have become a part of the workforce.
A result of this has been the increased use of convenient sanitary products such as Always and Butterfly that are easy to find and reliable. According to the National Institute of Health, nearly 20% of women use menstrual pads in the country, while 66% still use traditional cotton cloth. While this number is low, the study noted it has risen from close to nothing at the turn of the century. And to cater to this need, Always was the dominant player in the market.
Until 2018 that is.
The turning point for Santex came with a trend all the way in Kenya. The content in this publication is expensive to produce. But unlike other journalistic outfits, business publications have to cover the very organizations that directly give them advertisements. Hence, this large source of revenue, which is the lifeblood of other media houses, is severely compromised on account of Profit’s no-compromise policy when it comes to our reporting. No wonder, Profit has lost multiple ad deals, worth tens of millions of rupees, due to stories that held big businesses to account. Hence, for our work to continue unfettered, it must be supported by discerning readers who know the value of quality business journalism, not just for the economy but for the society as a whole.To read the full article, subscribe and support independent business journalism in Pakistan
