Diageo India's playbook: Making premium more accessible

PRAVEEN SOMESHWAR flaunts a Guinness notebook as he chats with us in his 10th floor office at Bengaluru’s premium commercial address, UB Towers. “This is just to remind me, here’s a global powerhouse beer brand which we need to bring into this country,” says the MD & CEO of Diageo India (incorporated as United Spirits Ltd or USL in India). His favourite is Guinness 0.0, its zero-alcohol variant, which he zebra stripes (that is, alternates between non-alcoholic and alcoholic beverages) with Lagavulin 16, a single malt from the alcobev company’s global portfolio, whenever business takes him to London. “Anyone I meet, who knows about Guinness, asks me ‘why aren’t you bringing Guinness to India?’” he adds.

Just as one wonders if Someshwar is following his predecessor Hina Nagarajan’s premiumisation strategy, he clarifies, “When the overall business is doing well, I wouldn’t go and change anything dramatically just because I have come in afresh. But if I were to do the same thing, it’s kind of sad too. So, it was a great time to refresh.”