Unilever dominates 100 Sri Lankan 'Leading Brands'

Underlining the strength of its brand portfolio, 11 brands marketed by Unilever Sri Lanka were ranked among Sri Lanka's top 100 private brands.

This is by far the highest number of brands of a single company to be listed in the top 100 rankings.

These rankings were compiled by Brand Finance Lanka and published in the inaugural edition of the 'Brands Annual'. TNS Lanka provided independent research for these ratings.

Significantly, all 11 Unilever's brands were listed within the top 50, with nine brands ranked among the top 25, further highlighting the company's remarkable achievement.

Unilever brands occupied three slots in the first ten, with its iconic brand Sunlight, which is celebrating its 125th anniversary this year, grabbing second place followed by Lifebuoy at number five and Signal at number six. Not very far behind were Surf Excel and Lux securing the 11 and 15 positions.

Sunsilk, Pears and Vim occupied the 21, 22 and 25 positions. Astra, ranked at No. 27, Marmite at No. 32 and Fair & Lovely gaining the 39 place completed the Unilever brands in Sri Lanka's Top 100 private brands list.

The ranking evaluation measures brand management, brand presence, emotional connection, functional performance, and rates brand preference to determine brand value. The heritage, associations and corporate reputation impacting a brand are also included in the evaluation.

Chairman of Unilever Sri Lanka Amal Cabraal stated that brands are at the very heart of the Unilever business and as such the company is deeply committed to building and developing brands and markets, through consumer and shopper insight led innovation and consistent investment backed by appropriate technology, powerful processes, and brilliant market execution.

"Our efforts to ensure our brands deliver best in class value propositions have yielded excellent results in the market place where our brands have secured the No. 1 position in every category we operate in. We have always taken pride in the emotional and physical connect our brands have with the consumer and we strive to ensure that all our brands reinforce the Unilever promise of 'adding vitality to life'. Naturally, we are extremely pleased that our efforts in this regard have been recognized in this independent survey", he added.

Ruchi Gunewardene, in a feature article titled Lessons from Multinationals, published in the Brands Annual gives credit to Unilever's role in developing the Marketing function in Sri Lanka. "Unilever alone has as many as 11 brands in the top 50, which is perhaps why it is often referred to as the 'University of Marketing' in this country", writes Gunewardene.