The Loya milk brand has been below the milk segment ladder over time, for this reason, Promasidor Nigeria Limited owners of the  product embarked on a sales promo designed to deepen the  brand’s visibility  in the premium milk market, but Princewill  Ekwujuru acknowledged it’s a step in the right direction, but yet there  remains some questions to  be answered by organisers of the promo.

Every brand has its playing level. If a product does not have the financial muscle to play in the big league, it has to lay low or engage in activities that could help shore up its market share.

This has been what other brands, particularly milk brands have been doing recently to either raise their market profitability or consolidate on their position, this also, is what Loya milk tried  doing when it floated a N50 million promo, where milk brands like Peak Milk, Dano, Richmilk, Cowbell, owned by Promasidor, which is gradually losing its share in the market.

Philip Kotler, a marketing professor had posited that there is hierarchy in every market or product category. His words, The first is the market leader, the second is the challenger, third, the follower, the fourth, the market nicher and lastly the new entrant.

According to Kotler, ga follower or nicher should not challenge the leader.h But itfs unfortunate, in these segment Loya milk do not belong, but only trying to, with the promo which eventually has not paid off.

To make matters worse, Loya milk believes not in visual adverts and print, while it has low rate in radio ad,  if not  for  recent promo and  minimal billboard displays here and there.

However, in a market ruled by WAMCO’s Peak Milk, the Loya milk promo was designed to wrestle the market from Peak and draw loyalists, Loya with the promo was capitalizing on the water incident that befell WAMCO, but from investigation Loya is just not doing too well.

Mr. Kachi Onubogu, General Manager, Marketing, of the company, during  the flag-off of the promo, had said, Loya milk is one of the leading brands from the stable of Promasidor, known as a market leader and consumer driven, also noted that Loya milk was of high quality and innovative with product offerings that excite and exceed consumers expectations.

He also noted that the milk was re-launched in September 2010 to re-position it and further strengthen its equity in the premium segment of the Nigerian dairy market, today that position is not realizable.

From all indications, the promo was beautifully designed visually, but as the offer draws to a close, it is becoming clear that the market is not as Loya friendly as was expected. First, the noise level does not seem to be as high as would draw the large number that the promo anticipated. What was wrong.?

On investigation about 2,000 Nigerians bothered to send in entries for each of the promo draws. If it is considered that a large number would make repeat entries week-in week-out, then one can come close to determining just how unattractive the promo has been for the people.

A number of factors might just be responsible for this. The first is the strong presence of Peak Milk and Dano atop the market. Although in marketing, it is wrong to discourage the foray of any brand into any market segment of choice, even with postulation of Kotller, many people are of the view that it was a miscalculation for Promasidor to have ventured into the premium milk category.