Having collected contact data, we were good to go with our Email and Whatsapp campaigning. Slowly, our marketing efforts started yielding results as we had stringers across India showing up to try the new Kizuna Premium Japanese Badminton strings. These orders for sample pack, though small in numbers, were spread across the country which assured us of our possible reach. Thus, we overcame the barrier of breaking into the first mover’s clan.
Now came an unexpected challenge. We were sure that the biggest task would be to get these stringers to try our strings in the first place. Once they were made to understand the potential of the string and how good it was compared to it’s the competitors in the market, we were sure it would sell like hot cakes. Contrary to our expectations, not all first mover’s came back for repeated bulk orders. On enquiring, we got to know that some of them faced the issue of snapping of strings (the thinner ones) while gutting. Now this was unexpected to say the least. On consulting with our Japanese R&D team, we got to know that Kizuna strings are generally on the softer side compared to the string dominating the Indian market. Coupled to this was the minimal gauge of our premium strings like Z58(World’s thinnest string of .58mm), D61 (.61mm), inappropriate method of pulling crosses and the poorly managed clamps of stringing machines. Thus, on confirming with our customers, we concluded that most of the stringers in the market were not well equipped to handle such thin gauges.
After quite some brainstorming on how to educate them to deal with these strings, we came up with an idea to caution them of the nature of these thin strings and how to go about them. Thus, we decided to place a caution notice in each of the orders just to give them a heads up on the required delicate handling of these strings. To supplement this, we also sent them tutorial links to pulling crosses and servicing of clamps. We monitored this process and took regular feedbacks from our customers for close to one month. Not surprisingly, we found that none of our stringers faced the issue of snapping while stringing. Thus, we dodged a bullet and incorporated these measures into our regular operations.
Follow this space for regular updates on Kizuna India’s journey in India.