Rotomac Pens: End of An Era
Rotomac Pens revolutionized the Indian stationery market way back in 1992-era. Interestingly, the ubiquitous “Pan Parag” was the parent company of Rotomac pens. The same Pan Parag, a gutka kind of chewing product, which featured the Duo of Shammi Kapooor and Ashok Kumar talking about – “Baratiyon ka swagat Pan Parag se kijiye“. Pan Parag made Kanpur city as ‘The Masala City” and created a masala industry having brands like RajShri.
In those times, there were no strong stationary brands and the quality of pens were pretty bad. Market was dominated by fountain pens. Rotomac launched the transparent ball pens with strong marketing blitzkrieg that established a super strong brand in the minds of consumers. Rotomac pens roped in the Bollywood super stars Salman Khan and Raveena Tandon as brand ambassadors. Like Pan Parag, the marketing team came up with a memorable and catchy tagline of “Likhte likhte love ho jaye“. Salman khan proudly connected the pen to aspirational India (yeah we are talking 1990’s here!).
Most of the ball pens had an opaque outer body. which made it impossible for consumers to know how much ink is left in the pen. French brand Reynolds was another competitor with complete white body. Rotomac understood this problem of consumers and launched a total transparent crystal clear pen. The product was accompanied with another excellent and humorous campaign focusing on ‘Sab kuch dikhta hai“.
Rotomac pens ruled the market for some years and was exporting to many countries. Later due to alleged bank loan frauds and internal dynamics, it lost its glory. Many ‘me-too’ brands appeared that copied the design of the pen with poor quality and cheaper price. However, one fondly remembers the famous legendary ads and the first love with those shiny ball pens. Those were the days!