Attitude

The movie “A Lesson Before Dying” by Ernest Gaines is set in the South, at the time of the Civil War, when blacks won their freedom. Ernest Gaines is the first black man in the South during the Civil War when blacks began to gain their freedom. A black man named Jefferson was in the wrong place at the right time and was convicted of the killing of a white bartender. He was made a fool of in the presence of a jury by his own lawyer. His lawyer, trying to play a compassionate role, made Jefferson look like a “pig”, which infuriated the jury. Jefferson was called a “hog”, which really infuriated his mother.

Thinking that he would be found guilty of the crime anyway, his mother wanted him to his mother wanted him to paint a human being, not a “pig”. So the mother asked a school teacher at Wiggins to teach Jefferson that he was not a “pig” but a human being. When Wiggins visited Jefferson and paid attention to his timee of distress, they both had changing attitude toward what was happen and both learned an valuable lesson from each other. At the beginning of the story when Jefferson’s mom asks Wiggins to help Jefferson, Wiggins really didn’t want to be bothered with him.

He was flustered with his job as a school teacher and sick and tired of not living life. Even though he agreed to help Jefferson out, he still had no idea how he would do it. He took out his frustration on the children he taught, by telling them his problem. He said, “Do you know what his nannan wants me to do before they kill him?”(39) and “Suppose I was allowed to visit him, and suppose I reached him and made him realize that he was as much a man as any other man; then what, he’s still going to dye.”(39) These are key examples showing that he didn’t want to do this and he had a very negative attitude toward helping Jefferson. With his attitude for helping Jefferson being in a negative way and Jefferson’s attitude being negative because of what his attorney had said about him and him dying. How would he learn to became a man? Jefferson’s negative attitude was understandable because he was about to die, but he still had to realize he is a man not a “hog”. He believed what the attorney had said about him and when the judge asked if he had any last words he just, “looked down in self-pity and shock his head.”(9)

He was show assumed of himself that he wouldn’t eat or wear any of the things his mom brought to him. Even when his mom brought him his favorite dish he replied, “It don’t matter.”(73) As Wiggins stared to visit Jefferson they both started to change their negative attitudes about their situation. Wiggins started to open himself to Jefferson and he did the same. At first when Jefferson didn’t want anything for himself he was depressed about what was said about him, but as Wiggins made him realize he was a man he started being more like a man.

Wiggins had asked him if he wanted something and he replied, “I want me a gallon of ice cream”(170) he then smiled when wiggins said he would get it for him. This showed that he had something to look forward to. Wiggins then said. “Do you want me to bring you a little radio next time I come”, (172) which was another thing that made Jefferson a little happier. As the conversion kept going between them Jefferson started remembering the robber and started to get depressed. Wiggins than said, “Inez is still giving her fair up this quarter” (171) trying to get his mind off of the robbery. This starts to show that Wiggins is starting to care more and that Jefferson is starting to act like a man. Toward the end of the story Wiggins states to realize that he is reaching Jefferson and that Jefferson is starting to reach him.

He says, “Your more than a man than I am, Jeff.”(225) realizing that Jefferson taught him that no matter what little thing you can do to help someone out, you are influencing someone’s life for the better. Heroic actions not necessarily have to be big just talking to someone and listening is being heroic. Jefferson replied, “I’m go’n to do my best, Mr. Wiggins” (225) showing that he was going to be the best man he could possibly be. He had learned that he is a man and not a “hog”. He taught Jefferson to be a man and no matter what other people say he will always be a man. Wiggin’s gained great respect to Jefferson, during the day when Jefferson’s death was taking place he told his class this,” In a couple of minutes it will be 12:00p.m., I will ask you to get down on your knees and remain on your knees until I ask you to get up.”(250) Shown that his attitude toward Jefferson turned toward compassion for his time of death. Wiggins and Jefferson both taught each other a lesson, Jefferson is a man and Wiggins could be a hero even doing the simplest task. Even though Jefferson still dyed, he died a man.

People’s attitude towards abortion in Australia

Abstract:

The hypothesis, “It is apparent that in Australia people are not supportive of abortion. ” would be tested in the report. The aim of it was to reveal the current views of people in Australia towards abortion, under the circumstances of different age and cultural background. A questionnaire about justified reasons, legalization and values on abortion was constructed and the target group would be 20 international students and 20 local Australians.

The international students were mainly Chinese, and a few from South-East Asia. Though most participants did not have a really strong stance of supporting abortion or not, when there were further questions about Pro-choice behaviour and legalization of abortion, it was discovered that participants were actually in respect of freedom of choice, and agreed that abortion should be legalized. Therefore it could be said that comparing the 2 sides, participants were rather supportive to abortion.

Based on the results, extended researches covering a larger target group which could mostly represent different cultural groups could be conducted to test whether abortion was really generally acceptable or not or could it be legalized under all cases. Introduction Abortion had been a controversial issue for hundreds of years, discussions and debates were always held to argue whether it should or should not be declared legal.

This issue was crucial at all time because the attitude towards it were mainly influenced by various important values of life like morality, human rights and freedom of choice, adding that they were the key factors to determine whether it should be declared legal.

“Abortion can be defined as the expulsion or removal of an embryo or foetus from the uterus of the pregnant mother” (Blade, 2008). It could be divided into two types. First, the “spontaneous abortion” occurs when the mother’s body ejects the foetus due to different reasons, usually natural ones (without human effort).

This report focused on another type of abortion, “induced abortion”. This was what people usually mean when they use the word abortion. In other words, it was the “termination of pregnancy”. After the Federation in 1901, abortion was handled by the British Offences Against the Person Act of 1861. In the act, abortion was illegal , no matter under what circumstances. However, since then, abortion would be legal in some cases under the law.

For instance, Natasha,(1998), suggested that under the McGuire ruling (1986) in Queensland, abortion could only be legalized when the mother was in threat that abortion could preserve her life or health. Another case that abortion could be legalized was that if the newborn baby would die immediately or within a short period. For the current legislation about it in Queensland under the Queensland Criminal Code, the viewpoint remained similar that the court would prohibit abortion unless the mothers life or health is in danger.

Though, it did not reveal any response on the change of attitudes of people towards abortion. The aim of the report was to reveal the current views of people in Australia towards abortion, under the circumstances of different age and cultural background(international students versus local Australians). It appeared that nowadays more and more people were supportive to abortion. This view would be supported by the results from survey and then a discussion part of it would be included and at last the conclusion and recommendation would be formulated.

Methodology:

Questionnaires about the attitudes of abortion of people were used to collect data for the report. A qualitative methodology was used. The reason for choosing it was because the report focused more on depth, rather than quantity. According to the Family Health International (2005), a qualitative research provided information about the “human” side of an issue, which was often contradictory. It could also interpret the complex reality or create a better understanding to a specific situation and the implications of the qualitative data.

Another important point was that it could help identify intangible factors (age, gender, nationality, religion, etc) in the report. These factors were the keys that influence a person’s attitude toward the issue. The emphasis of the questionnaire was to understand participant’s standpoints for or against abortion, therefore 10 out of 14 questions were about their opinion, the rest were 3 attribute questions and 1 knowledge question. The total number of participants was 40. There were altogether 20 international students studying in Australia and 20 local Australians completed the questionnaire.

Among the participants, 23 of them were female and 17 were male. In the student group, 2 of them were under or below 18 and 18 were at the age of 19 to 30. Among the local Australians, 6 of them were between 31-45 and another 14 were 45 or above. A point to note was that for the international students, 15 of them were Chinese. To make sure the information would be kept secret, no questions were about identity or other private information. The questionnaires were given out in two ways. The first way was to distribute them at school and at homes, and another way was to distribute them through the internet.

Participants were quite interested to the questionnaire as they thought that it was a controversial issue. However in the process, participants found confused with the last open-ended question about the relationship between culture, age and abortion as it was not required to state reasons but lines were given. Moreover, due to a lack of time in completing the questionnaire, i. e. in 5 or 10 minutes, the data collected might be distorted.

Results:

The purpose of the questionnaire was to find out the attitudes of people in Australia towards abortion.

Questions were divided into 3 main categories: justified reasons for abortion, legalization of abortion and viewpoints and value towards abortion. For the justified reasons for abortion, a total of 8 choices were given to participants and they could choose more than one answers, including:

1. psychological reasons e. g. resisting abrupt change of life
2. economic reasons e. g. financial burden of raising children
3. unwanted babies e. g. pregnant in mistake
4. caused by rapes
5. unready for responsibility
6. as problems with relationship or wants to avoid single parenthood
7. mother has health problems
8. has already all the children she wanted or all children are grown

From the questionnaire, participants thought that the most justified reasons for abortion were “economic reasons” and “pregnancies caused by rapes”, both of them make 62. 5% of the total. The next would be “unready for responsibility” (35%), “unwanted babies” (32. 5%), “mother has health problems” (30%), “problem for relationship or wants to avoid single parenthood” (22. 5%), “psychological reasons” (12. %) and the least justified reason would be “has already children she wanted or all children are grown” (10%). For another category, legalization of abortion, there was an open-ended question asking the participants about one pros and cons of abortion. For the pros, there were several main ideas. First, people thought that after legalization of abortion, risks could be reduced as people no longer find doctors with no license to abort. Secondly, it would a respect to freedom of choice of people. Thirdly, there would be fewer children grown up in an unstable environment.

For the cons, people also got similar ideas, for instance, abortion was against the respect of life, i. e. killing innocent life. Also, people could be more irresponsible as they could abort legally. For the last category, viewpoints and values towards abortion, 6 questions were raised. Majorities believed that abortion was becoming common nowadays (25% strongly agree, 50% agree). For the question about whether the people’s views towards abortion was changing, bigger part of them agree with the statement (20%strongly agree, 40% agree) buy quite a number of people maintained neutral (32. %). For the question “ it is inhuman and should be banned”, the 2 sides were almost balanced (5% strongly agree, 32. 5% agree versus 7. 5% strongly disagree and 37. 5% disagree), about 17. 5% people chose to be neutral. In the question of freedom of choice, it was quite one-sided that it should be highly respected (40% for both strongly agree or agree, adding up to 80%). Asking about if it was acceptable in all cases, disagreement (20% strongly disagree, 42. 5% disagree) was more than agreement (32. 5% agree).

Though, quite a lot of people thought that they would have different views upon abortion in different cases (35% strongly agree, 32. 5% agree). For the last open-ended question about the relationship between age, culture and views towards abortion, the main ideas of the participants were that aged people, i. e. age group of 45 or above, would be more conservative and therefore have a negative view upon abortion. Moreover, they thought that people with different culture, particularly “westerners” in the Chinese’s eyes, would be more open and accept the idea of abortion.

Discussion and conclusion:

The aim of the report was to reveal the current views of people in Australia towards abortion, under the circumstances of different age and cultural background (international students versus local Australians). From the results, we could see that many participants did not have a really strong stance of supporting abortion or not, only a few do. For instance, about 70% of the participants agreed that they would have different views upon abortion in different cases.

The most “justified” cases would be pregnancies by rapes and economic reasons (It was logical that according to Thomson Reuters (2009), an income group of US$39,100 – $65,800 would need a total of $170,460 a year to raise up a children form 0 to 17 year old). Yet, there were enough data to test the hypothesis. There were data supporting the hypothesis. From the results, participants who did not fully support abortion were mainly female or Chinese, whom thought that abortion was inhuman and should be banned. The number made up 32. 5% of the total participants.

The reason behind was that female themselves would have real experiences in giving birth so they would have deeper thoughts than male. For Chinese participants, they were young but at the same time they were also deeply influenced by a traditional style of education. The curriculum focused on teaching people to have right values stated by the Confucius and other great figures. According to Vivien (2006), the vice president for education at the Asia Society, china should move away from the traditional forms of practices and adopt a broader curriculum to achieve the goal of becoming a real modern society.

Despite there were data supporting the hypothesis, it was in a small proportion. We could find more data that was contrary to it. It also proved that people at older ages might not be conservative. Participants, mostly Australians (mostly aged 45 or above), were rather Pro-Choice. It was because of the trend of abortion. It was becoming more and more common. According to a table drawn by Wm Robert Johnson (2008), the abortion percentage rose from 15. 6% in 1984 to 21. 5% in 2006 in Australia. It might also be because of the cultural background.

Comparing to country like China, westernized countries emphasized more on freedom of people. From the results, there were 32. 5% of the total participants who thought abortion was acceptable at all cases. Most importantly, over 80% of them agreed that people should respect the mother’s decision. The data was supported by a report by Monash University (2002). It included a survey on AES voters and candidates (about 2000 people are surveyed a year) about their attitudes towards abortion, from 1987 to 2001.

The percentage of people choosing the criteria “ Woman should be able to obtain an abortion readily when they want one” rose from 38% to 59% from 1987 to 2001. On the other hand, the percentage of people choosing the criteria “abortion should not be allowed under any circumstances” dropped from 6% to 3% in that period. Another evidence was that when participants were asked about whether abortion should be legalized, 65% of them thought that it should be legalized. From the above, we could understand the current views of people in Australia towards abortion, at different ages and cultural background.

Though people did not have a strong stance of supporting abortion or not, we could find more evidence showing that people were actually more Pro-Choice than Pro-Life, in other words they would be more supportive to abortion, especially in recent years where abortion was more commonly found. Recommendations: Concerning the implications of the report findings, it was quite obvious that more people in Australia were actually supportive to abortion, based on their Pro-Choice attitude and the agreement of legalizing abortion.

The scale and the target groups of the report were small that might distort the real opinion throughout the country. However, based on the report findings, extended researches could be done in examining whether abortion was generally acceptable or not and the possibility to further legalize abortion, as participants of the questionnaire could already clearly state some pros and cons of legalizing abortion. The research should cover a larger target group as Australia was rather multi-cultural.

People in different culture could have their views in according to the religion, which was also important in this issue and not discussed in this report. To conclude, though the report did not represent most age and cultural groups in Australia, it could be the basis of further research in testing whether legalizing abortion was possible.

References:

1. Blade 2001, “Should abortion be legalized in Queensland, Australia? ”, Available at http://www. bladesplace. id. au/abortion-law-queensland.html
2. C. Natasha 1998, “Abortion law in Australia”, Law and Bills Digest Group
3. Family Health International 2005, “Qualitative Research Methods: A Data Collector’s Field Guide”, p. 1-2 “People and Place” 2004, Monash University, vol 12, no. 4 , p. 25 S.
4. Vivien, E. Owens 2006, “Education Abroad: The China Syndrome”, Edutopia magazine
5. Thomson Reuters 2009, “The cost of raising children”, available at: http://moneycentral. msn.com/articles/family/kids/tlkidscost. asp
6. Wm. Robert Johnson 2008, “Historical abortion statistics” available at: http://www. johnstonsarchive.net/policy/abortion/australia/ab-aust-qld. html

Consumer Perception And Attitude Towards Provocative Advertising

Statement of Problem

This report will analyse and critically evaluate consumer perceptions and attitudes towards provocative advertising. The following specific aims are targeted:

§  Define types of provocative advertising;

§  Assess positive and negative impact of provocative advertising for company/consumers;

§  Assess effectiveness of provocative advertising in gaining consumers attention;

§  Explain how consumers perceive the risk in provocative advertising.

Review of Related Literature

Modern consumer civilization is primarily based on the open market. Advertisements and publicity empower the open market and persuade consumers. As advertising nurtured during the passage of time through different markets, many stereotypes, functions, and norms have been reintroduced into customs. When masses take these standards and integrate them into their routine, supremacy, or domination is marked. As said by Italian scholar, Antonio Gramsci, these norms or ideologies are the basis of power and reliance in symbolic environments, producing a dominating society. Today’s culture is founded on signs and theories in advertisements and what is in between the lines. The following literature review aims to describe the basic concepts related with provocative advertising and its influence on consumers.

Types of Provocative Advertising

Before types of provocative advertising are explained it is helpful to describe what advertising is, in the first place.  Advertising is the structured mass communiqué of information, usually paid and normally influential in nature, employing both verbal and nonverbal elements, about products (goods, services, and concepts) by identified sponsors through various media. The goal of advertising is to persuade masses to react in a specified way, for example to purchase a service or product or to advocate a wide range of concepts, whether economic, political, religious, or social.

An influential advertisement produces an emotional response (Gordon, 2006). Emotions are prompted by clear, powerful benefits (Toubia, 2006), fear or alarm (Rossiter et al, 2004), or desire or demand (Helstein, 2003). For example Nike, through its association of knowledge, power, and truth, publicizes and authorizes a particular notion of a female athlete in blend with ideas of emancipation. The impressions are that utilization of their product distinguishes the user as a “real” athlete and that the “real” athletes are not delimited by boundaries, but are independent.

The word provocative is defined as something which is stimulating or exciting, either in a positive or negative fashion. Generally the words “provocative advertising” points to forms of advertising that utilizes shocking or sexy images to reach this goal (Pope et al, 2004). Some examples include nudity, sexual acts, abject poverty, car collisions, and death. Shocking content in an advertisement considerably boosts attention, promotes memory, and positively influences behaviour compared to milder advertisements (Dahl et al, 2003).

Provocative advertising operates through one of three factors: uniqueness, uncertainty, and misbehaviour of a social or cultural taboo. Distinctive stimuli can have a positive influence on attention to the advertisement, while ambiguity–the degree to which an advertisement is open to different interpretations–can lead to further processing and grant the chance for an artistic experience. Much advertising nowadays works implicitly – either below or minimal levels of, awareness (Penn, 2006).

Provocative images are used in advertising as a more common practice as compared to the last two decades. Major companies including Benetton, Calvin Klein, Citroen, Peugeot, Moschino, and Esprit have used provocative imagery in various advertising campaigns (Polegato et al, 2006).  Benetton has used images of boat people, an AIDS victim, a priest kissing a nun, and a cemetery. One significant type of provocation has been the use of nudity and sex, even though the advertisement is not for sexual demands, but relates to violence, drugs, and political or racial issues.

The advertisements found in Glamour and Maxim refrain from touching on the aspect or represent any interpretation of family or education. The advertisements though, do depict a hegemony found in society which appears as the natural standard, the upper-middle class white male. Men hereby gain their power by the portrayal of females as well as themselves, as long as they fit the norm. The general theme of these advertisements do greatly impact gender discrimination and the power of dominance over women, producing a dominant discourse and recreate this commanding ego of men. We do not see representations of real masses and society in advertisements, but rather we see depictions of personnel who stand for controlling social norms and values. This has become the conventional symbol of the two sexes in our society, and advertisements incorporating the attractive woman and dominant man only represent what our society has already been presenting.

Provocation engenders different responses between the sexes (Koernig, 2006). For example, in Western cultures, males prefer female nudity and vice versa (Nevala, 2006). Women may be more suitable to think over the underlying purposes of the advertiser and add greater connotation to the images than are men, who are supposedly more inclined to the marginal effects of the visual appeal (Nelson and Paek, 2005).  Asian, Black, Indian (Asian Indian), white and multiethnic British participants show systematic distinctions in advertisement processing among various groups toward the same advertisement (Wolin et al, 2003).

Several researched have also concluded that the product type implicated in advertisements emphasizing gender discrimination or nudity has an effect on watcher reaction, and much of this is connected to congruity. For example, a female model is more suitable for body lotion than for a ratchet set.  Generally, an individual’s reported attitude to an advertisement containing meek nudity will be considerably less positive when the advertisement is for a consumer product as compared to the occasion when it is an appeal for a cause and the greater the relevance of the erotica to the grounds, the more positive will be the image that an individual holds of that cause.

Positive And Negative Impacts Of Provocative Advertising

When evaluated from the view of results, provocative advertisements are much more influential than non-provocative ones. The positive impact of provocative advertising is the raising on consumer consciousness about an issue or product, which they may not have otherwise thought about. Examples of positive provocative advertisements are those against drug use, in which the negative image of frying eggs is associated to brain damage caused by drug use. The image is pleasant (most people like fried eggs for breakfast), but in some ways violent, when you associate your brain being fried similarly. The net intended effect is to discourage drug use which is an overall positive result.

Many negative effects of provocative advertising stem from the extended logic of the viewer who determines they can only be happy, successful, or if they are like the people portrayed in the advertisement. As mentioned earlier the most successful advertisement is one in which an individual spots with the concepts and people being portrayed, so their use of the advertised product is consistent with their self image. Since the consumer identifies with the advertisement on an emotional level, provocative advertising is intimately connected to self image.  For those people who cannot identify with the advertisement, instead of concluding that the product is at fault, they begin to think that if only they could change themselves, then they would be able to identify themselves with the product, and only then will they have happiness, success or whatever other emotion is being claimed.

Research has found that implicit self-evaluations (ISEs) and explicit self-evaluations (ESEs) are differentially susceptible to influence (Brumbaugh et al, 2006). This was measured after exposure to images of beauty in magazine advertisements or to control advertisements without any body images. Female participants’ ESEs and body-images were unaffected by conceptualized images of beauty, but, exposure to such images (as compared to control advertisements) led to a decrease in the relationship between beauty and the 3 basic characteristics (self, in-group, and gender) also a drop in the amount of snack food consumed during the course of the study. These findings suggest that women may not as easily correct for, or protect against, unsuitable social contrasts and other pressures to the self on the implicit level, at least in the domain of attractiveness.

Even not-so-provocative advertising has unintended effects on materialism, parent-child conflict, and unhappiness. These were investigated using vote-counting analysis (Buijzen and Valkenburg, 2003) and the analyses yielded a modest effect size for the relation between advertising and materialism and a moderate effect size for the relation between advertising and parent-child disagreement. Though, proofs for the theorized relation between advertising and sadness were not found.

Some negative effects of provocative advertising are direct. For instance, pro-tobacco marketing and media stimulate tobacco use among youth (MacFadyen et al. 2003; Wellman et al. 2006). Exposure to pro-tobacco marketing and media increases the odds of youth holding positive attitudes toward tobacco use (odds ratio, 1.51; 95% confidence interval, 1.08-2.13) and more than doubles the odds of initiating tobacco use (odds ratio, 2.23; 95% confidence interval, 1.79-2.77). Highly appealing marketing and media are more influential at promoting use (odds ratio, 2.67; 95% confidence interval, 2.19-3.25) as long as they were on the whole, attractive, sociable and reassuring; and supported young people’s view of smoking and reinforced their smoker identities. These effects are monitored across time, in different regions, with varying study designs and measures of contact and result.

Effectiveness Of Provocative Advertising In Gaining Consumers Attention

Increasing level of advertising competition has made it increasingly thorny to draw and hold consumers’ attention and to set up strong memory sketches for the advertised brand. A usual communication scheme to penetrate this competitive clutter is to increase advertisement originality.  Originality may have detrimental effects when consumers are more considerate to the advertisement at the cost of the advertised brand and may quickly wane when the advertisement becomes known. A stochastic form of the influence that advertisement creativity and acquaintance have on consumers’ eye fascinations to the key factors of advertisements-brand, text, and images – and how the information dug out during eye fascinations supports memory for the advertised brand was devised (Pieters, et al, 2002). Infrared eye tracking was applied to collect eye fascination data from 119 consumers who paged through two general-audience magazines containing 58 full-page advertisements. Memory for the advertised brands was assessed with an indirect memory task.  Creative advertisements drew more attention to the advertised brand. More importantly however, advertisements that were both creative and known attracted the largest amount of attention to the advertised brand, which improved subsequent brand memory. In addition, new and well-known advertisements were found to promote brand memory directly.

Complexity harmfully influenced a variety of memory measures, but only for those who were less involved with the product category (Lowrey, et al, 2006). Creativity is another significant element of advertising. A set of randomly selected award-winner advertisements (Communication Arts) with a random sample of control commercials were compared (Till and Baack, 2005). The commercials were surrounded in TV programs and subjects for a naturalistic viewing experience. Studies 1 and 2 had aided and unaided brand and execution recall as dependent variables. For Study 3, brand attitude and purchase intent were the dependent variables of interest. Results pointed out that creative advertisement help unaided recall, but that creativity did not improve aided recall, purchase intention, or brand and advertisement behaviour.

The influence of provocative advertisements depends on culture, personality age of the individual, and their past experiences (Schlosser, 2003). The degree to which self-image is affected is different among different cultures. A cross-cultural examination with 750 female respondents from five European cities of the model self-image of women in terms of health and beauty revealed distinct cultural variation in model self-image in terms of healthy and beautiful beauty types (Bjerke, et al, 2006).  Persons with certain personality characteristics are likely to evaluate provocative advertisements and their products differently. Overall, extroverted subjects evaluated them in more positive ways than introverted subjects. In addition, their evaluations of the advertised brand were more positive if the portrayed product image is more congruent with their real or model self-concepts (Gurari et al, 2006).

One Example

“Feminists celebrated this week when the Advertising Standards Board (ASB) upheld complaints that billboards advertising Windsor Smith shoes breached community standards of taste. (http://www.brisinst.org.au/resources/wynter_vivienne_shoes.html)

The billboard in question plays on the imagination to portray a woman in her underwear apparently about to engage in an act of oral sex with a fully clad man wearing said shoes.

The National Women’s Media Centre called on women offended by the billboards not to have sex with men wearing the shoes.

That comment led to a storm of media and protest, culminating in the ASB asking for the billboards to be pulled down.

This is a triumph for women and men anxious about the imagery of women in the media. Portrayal of women as sexually subservient subjects of men insidiously damage our fight for equality and equal status in the community.

But we’re concerned at the power of the ASB to enforce its decision. As this article goes to screen, Windsor Smith have agreed to comply with the request in ‘their own time’. (http://www.brisinst.org.au/resources/wynter_vivienne_shoes.html)

In other words the company can take quite some time to take away the billboards – hundreds of which are tactically positioned across the country.

This begs the question: did Windsor Smith intentionally design the billboards to aggravate objection? The company was asked to cover some digitally enhanced and clearly exhibited cleavage after complaints about its last advertisements.

NWMC realizes the company has another equally provocative advertisement on the drawing board. Was the whole campaign designed to attract publicity and flog shoes? This could only occur under self-regulation – a regime introduced under the Howard Government where the ASB can say ‘please remove your ad’ to advertisers but has no power to enforce the decision, which makes the ASB look like a bit of a toothless tiger.

On the up side, men in my circle of friends have all been greeting me this week with the words “I’m not wearing Windsor Smith!” (http://www.brisinst.org.au/resources/wynter_vivienne_shoes.html)

Maybe the shoes are getting a bit of a reputation as being for men who are having trouble getting introduced to available women. But stay tuned. This type of deliberately provocative advertising is a new millennium phenomenon. One silly advertisement has been removed from billboards on the grounds of taste but under our weak regulation system it will surely soon be replaced by another – perhaps even by the same company.” (http://www.brisinst.org.au/resources/wynter_vivienne_shoes.html)

How do consumers perceive the risk in provocative advertising?

There are two main risks of provocative advertising, desensitization and distortion.  The motive behind more and more provocative information and actions are exposed in available is because it has become acknowledged and liked over time. People now enjoy and expect risky actions; and have become familiar to such attitude. Thus awareness of a problem or stimulation of people to act on something requires an out of the ordinary approach. This has a negative impact on product developers, since in order to convince the consumer to switch brands they have to put in extra work to make their product stick out. This leads directly to the second danger of advertising, distortion.  This happens because for any given category of product there is really a limited number of material combinations that can truly make something unique and different. Thus the challenge is to create an image around a product that is functionally equivalent to its competitor that distinguishes it. Normally, there is nothing to distinguish it so the advertisement relies on a play on word to give an impression of something, but never explicitly stating it, on which basis consumers respond. This can result in wasting of money, or improper use of a product. For example the recognition of long known consumer brands like Bayer Aspirin or Tylenol give the impression that these substances are totally safe, and yet they are not and must be used with caution.

Research Methodology And Data Collection

Standard methods are used in the evaluation of statistical data on advertising impacts.  Usually the core of the study consists of stimulus type (TV, radio, print) advertisement type (e.g. mildly erotic or nonerotic), product (e. g. cola, sunglasses, AIDS research, and SIDS research) and brand design. TV advertising can advance how children perceive your toy but it can’t make a limp toy into a success. Sega’s irreverent, fun and provocative advertising was the envy of the industry but kids went for Sony PlayStation. Although it was at the time a new product with a very `young’ and questionable name, the PlayStation was successfully advertised as an awesome product.

Within such a group there may be subdivisions in relation to obviousness of the pro vocation, type of product, and image of the company, gender and age.  Usually participants are shown images or movies of the advertisement and are asked a series of questions. Subjects are often obtained through random selection and a sufficient number based on the standard deviation of their responses are asked to participate. The subjects’ attitude toward the advertisement is usually assessed through a modified version of a six-item scale ranging from definitely not” and “yes, definitely.” Crucial to any study is that the provocative advertisement is provocative and whether it is perceived to be congruent with the product. One-way ANOVA is used to calculate significant differences between two groups. Levene’s test is used to test variance of all the samples.  If this assumption of homogeneity of variance is not met, the statistical test results may not be valid.  Confounding variables influencing results are usually identified by asking participants to indicate their familiarity with and favourability toward each product category and cause type before and after advertisement evaluation.

References

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Summer training Report on How advertising influence youth attitude toward dressing UNDER GUIDANCE Mr. Vishal Jain MASTER OF BUSINESS ADMINISTRATION (RETAIL MARKETING) SUBMITTED BY Mr. TARUN KUMAR REG. No. 720593065 PUNJAB TECHNICAL UNIVERSITY JALANDHAR (Punjab) ACKNOWLEGEMENT Through this seminar report I want to throw the light on the topic “How advertising influence youth attitude towards dressing”, it gives me immense pleasure to present my training survey report before my mentors. With deep sense of gratitude I would like to take this opportunities thank my honorable project guide Mr.

Vishal Jain This report incorporates many developments, which have taken place in the field of advertising as well as fashion during last 25 or 50 years or so. I have therefore tried to provide a report, which gives a precise and up-to-date view of marketing in a lucid and novel style. It is an attempt to correlate the modern marketing strategies and factual part of the business. Later on while discussing the reactions of various classes of people, the interplay of marketing and advertising factors, which profoundly influence the behavior of people’s buying a product, has been duly emphasized.

Everything has been presented in a simplified and refined form, illustrated by well-chosen representative examples. Throughout the report, presentation of material has been sharpened by inclusion of data report. I have made a very sincere attempt towards clear understanding of the report. My inexpressible gratitude is to the supreme guide who enables me to bring up my ideas into the concrete forms. Many people have contributed in the preparation of the report. I express my sincerest thanks and indebtedness to Ms. Gagandeep for inspiring me in the development of my project.

I will be very grateful to my mentors and seniors and inquisitive executives for constructive criticism of report and their suggestions for its further improvement. My heartfelt thanks are due to them. Tarun Kumar CONTENTS 1. INTRODUCTION 2. HISTORY 3. RESEARCH & DEVELOPMENT 4. MONTE CARLO & COTTON COUNTY 5. NEW ARRIVALS 6. REVIEW OF LITERATURE 7. INDIAN DRESSING 8. COSTUMES FOR BOYS 9. NEED OF MARKETING STRATEGIES 10. ORGANISATION OF MARKETING STRATEGIES 11. OBJECTIVES & RESEARCH METHODOLOGY 12. LIMITATION OF THE STUDY. 13. ANALYSIS & INTERPRETATION 14. CONCLUSION 15. BIBLOGRAPHY 16.

QUESTIONAIRE INTRODUCTION Hearing is to forgetting, seeing is to remembering, doing is to understanding. Advertising is both an art and a business it tells the public at large about the availability of a product usually a consumer article and persuades the people through oral, visual and emotional appeals to buy the product. It presents an article in an attractive, respectable and highly useful way. Yet, like other arts it lies in concealing itself. To put it differently, advertisement of a certain product persuades us in a subtle way that we accept its publicized virtues as facts.

Wearing clothes with prestigious brand names seems to be very important for adolescents. This phenomenon was studied in the context of consumer socialization by examining the influence of three socialization agents, namely parents, peers and TV, on the development of French Canadian adolescents’ brand sensitivity and their relative importance. Controlling for socio-economic variables, multiple regression analyses were conducted separately for boys and for girls. For both genders, brand sensitivity is related to peer influence. Girls’ brand sensitivity is related to the importance fathers give to clothing brands.

TV exposure is not related to adolescents’ brand sensitivity. For boys and girls, peers represent the most important predictor of this consumer socialization. The results are discussed in the light of social and economic pressures and family relationships. Advertising influences the youth attitude towards dressing to a larger extent and has broad impact on the society and outlook of an individual personality. Fashions in dress have been current since the dawn of civilization. Fashions are meant to demonstrate the status of a person.

Advertisements make an appeal to our emotions and desires by associating the advertised brands with popular personalities such as film stars and sportsman. The style of advertising about the dresses combines pictures or cartoons with fine catchy phrases, musical tunes, and voice of advertising model, strong visual appeal. That is why they are most popular and most expensive of all. Advertising influences consumer’s subconscious mind. Youth tries to immediate the dressing sense of celebrities. Advertising has revolutionized the market of garment manufacturing.

In advertising everything is done to fetch the eyes of consumers and push up the sales. That’s why “William Shakespeare” remarked, “apparel ost proclaims the man”. Summarizing, in a nutshell here is a report, which has been made by thoroughly studying all the aspects of advertising world, Youth attitude towards dressing, market study etc. healthy criticism of the report is always welcomed. HISTORY Ludhiana is an important knitwear center located in North state of Punjab (about 400km from Delhi). More than half of the country’s hosiery products are supplied from here.

Commonly known as the Manchester of India and also as the industrial capital of small scale industry, the city has a business community that has proved its entrepreneurial strength all over the world. It has a long history in producing knitwear for the Indian market and is known for its woolen/blended knitwear including sweaters, pullovers etc. The word ‘knitwear’ is derived from the word ‘hose’, which means tubular that describes the shape in which the fabric was knitted, especially for socks. The first woolen knitwear unit was probably established in the last decade of the nineteenth century (maybe 1894) in Ludhiana for manufacturing socks.

Some others put the date as in the first decade of the twentieth century. Its origin can be traced to migrants from Kashmir, who settled in Ludhiana after a famine in Kashmir in 1933. These migrants brought with them skill of weave fine woolen fabrics and embroidery. Their skills were commercialized by the local traders who sought markets within Punjab and beyond. In 1935, the industry saw its first change with circular knitting machines introduced in the industry. They started manufacturing sweaters on these machines with cotton used as raw material.

The second turning point in the history of this cluster was the introduction of Flat Knitting machines during 1940s and during the same period, the industry started importing wool for manufacturing woolen products. The Ludhiana knitwear industry cluster developed during the second world war, when the woolen jerseys were in great demand. In 1947 the Muslim population that migrated to Pakistan after partition, owned most of the machines so then the local population and the immigrants from Pakistan sustained this industry. Trade grew smoothly for next four decades. Myanmar was a very important market for Ludhiana knitwear till the 1950 i. . before the Myanmar Government imposed import restrictions. In the same year the Government of India also imposed restriction on imports and most of the inputs i. e. machines, needles etc at that time were being imported. The import restriction thus fostered development of indigenous machine manufacturers, spinning mills etc. Before the breakup of Russia into CIS, it was the largest market for the woolens made in Ludhiana. The breaking up of Russia forced Ludhiana to explore for new markets. Till then the focus of the cluster was largely on woolen products in the lower priced segment.

During the period of 1980s, the industry saw another change with introduction of automatic and computerised knitting machines. During 1981, the State government had set up a knitwear center with technical and financial assistance from UNDP and UNIDO, housing the most modern technology and equipment. The collapse of Russian market resulted in a major shakeout in the industry and several leading manufacturers were forced out of business altogether. At the same time the crises created a new generation of manufacturers, who learnt from Tirupur, Delhi and Bombay to thrive by shifting their business from winter wear to summer wear.

This paradigm shift eventually resulted in Ludhiana becoming more of a cotton and summer wear manufacturing center, while retaining its dominance in the domestic woolen market. Ludhiana has seen an enormous industrial growth in the last 8 years due to significant improvements in the law and order situation and a conducive atmosphere for Industrial growth. In order to attract the entrepreneurs to set industries, the State Government is providing benefits such as industrial parks and industrial estates as focal points. Although it is a highly labour intensive industry yet there is no systematic approach for providing training to the work force.

The importance of the Ludhiana knitwear cluster is evident from the following facts: *There are about 12000 small-scale units in the Ludhiana cluster *The total fixed investment in plant and machinery is Rs 300crores *Per capita investment in plant and machinery is Rs. 2. 13 lakh *The cluster is producing products worth Rs 5000 crores in a year. *The cluster provides direct and indirect employment to nearly 5 lakh persons *Per capita employment is 28 persons *The value of exports is around Rs 1300crores *Knitwear exports from Ludhiana has been growing at the rate of 25% since 1995 *Its share in total garment exports from India is around 3% More than 90% of woolen knitwear production of the country is from Ludhiana This sector comprises of some big organised composite manufacturers like Oswal Woolen Mills, Oswal Knit India (Pringle), Greatway, R N Oswal, Pee Jay International etc. that have a capacity of 0. 5 – 1. 0 million pieces each. In addition there are numerous medium and small scale units catering to local and export markets. The small-scale units are engaged in various activities like spinning of yarn, dyeing and processing of yarn and fabric, knitting, cutting, button holing and button stitching, washing and dry cleaning and label manufacturing.

This sector is a perfect example of ancillarisation and sub contacting in the country. The deep rooted knitwear industry in Ludhiana consists of both circular and flat bed knitting capacity. Structured knits, jacquards and fancy knits are especially from this centre. Auto stripers, velour & feeder stripers are other available options. Cottons, acrylics, rayon blends & woolen knitwear production is facilitated by an easy access to yarn production in the same region. The overall technological status is very low barring a few enterprises. The machinery and equipments are locally manufactured and are low in efficiency and quality.

The dyeing and finishing technology is highly polluting and consumes high amounts of energy and water. The knitwear industry of Ludhiana which has emerged as the largest self-sufficient sector in itself and has a huge potential of maturing into an eminent industrial name. Considering the size and potential of the Ludhiana Knitwear industry, it can be safely said that it will have a significant role to play in the changing global trading environment. It is therefore high time for the industry to become globally competitive and to make concentrated efforts. Analysis of Business Operations Product

The Ludhiana knitwear industry is a well-diversified industry. Product-wise it can be divided into two main sectors i. e. summer wear and winter wear. The main product for winter wear are sweaters, woolen socks, pullovers, cardigans, thermal wear, gloves, muffler, baret caps, shawls, jackets, jersey, and blankets, while for the summer wear the main product are T-shirts, cotton and blended socks, under garments, knitted bed sheet, knitted skirts, knitted tops, sports wear, night suits etc. Semiformal knitted made from double mercerized cottons blended with viscose and bed linen made for summer wear also fall into product basket of the Ludhiana luster. Raw material Most of the raw material is locally available. Cotton, Wool, Acrylic, Polyester, Nylon and Viscose are the main raw material used in the knitwear industry. Cotton is available in abundance as India is producing 1. 6 to 1. 7 million bales of cotton every year. But due to poor quality of Indian wool, generally the pure wool is imported from Australia, New Zealand or South Africa. Other synthetic fibres like Acrylic, Polyester, Nylon and Viscose are available indigenously. There are about 200 spinning units, which produce cotton, woolen and blended yarns. About 25% yarn is also exported from Ludhiana.

With increased level of Awareness through various exposure visits to Italy and China and interaction with the international buyers, Ludhiana manufacturers have begun to use new fashion varieties of yarn. The firms are either importing these new varieties of yarns from China, Australia and New Zealand or producing them in-house. Feather yarn and Crotchet yarn are examples of newly developed yarns. There is some collective yarn import also being done at Ludhiana. The fabrics used in the summer wear are locally knitted and use pure and blended cotton yarns and also synthetic yarns such as polyester, polyester cotton, polyester viscose etc.

Besides the above, there are various embellishments and materials requirement in the industry such as buttons, zip fasteners, sewing threads, thread lining materials, tapes, laces, labels, packaging material etc. that are easily available in India though not of very high quality in Ludhiana. In the dyeing sector, various dyes and chemicals are used for processing and finishing of yarns, fabrics and garments. Machines Ludhiana has about 4000 circular knitting machines out of which 1500 are fully automatic. There are about 500 flat computerized, 120 fully fashion and 50 to 60 thousand hand flat knitting machines.

There are local manufacturers who not only cater to the Ludhiana market but also supply throughout India. Many of the manufacturers having financial muscle import machinery from Italy, Germany, Taiwan, Korea etc. Of late there has been a provision of importing second hand reconditioned machinery from these nations under the TUFS scheme and many units are availing this facility. This machinery is much ahead of what is called ‘advance’ in the Indian context. This gives a technological uplift to the industry and in turn increases the quality of the produce.

There are 300 small and medium process houses. Most of them are traditional dyeing plants using hank dyeing. The number of package and fabric dyeing units are very few. The machinery used in dyeing is mostly indigenous while a lot of imported. Machinery is being used in finishing despite the fact that there is 25% import duty on machines. The import duty on the spare parts of these imported machines is 52% which means that the maintenance of these machines becomes a costly affair and is thus a detaining factor. There are around 25 units that are using imported machinery only.

The machinery that is locally available does not match the quality and productivity being offered by the foreign suppliers. Some of the manufacturers feel that this duty structure is a result of deliberate efforts to dump machinery. The machinery being imported is through indenters, which are around 25 in number. Direct machinery import is almost negligible. These indenters also give after sale service. Workforce: The Ludhiana knitwear industry is highly labour-intensive. It is estimated that the Industry has employed 5lakh persons.

Out of which, more then 2lakh are employed Indirectly. The concept of contracted labour prevails in the industry because of it being a seasonal industry and also to avoid the factories act. These indirect activities are related to the forward and backward linkages within the industry such as tailoring, embroidery, packaging, retailing and marketing etc. The labour available is migratory labour and is mostly unskilled. Though there are training courses being run locally, these are not being extensively used. Women workers, a major equirement of the garment industry is only 2% in number at Ludhiana. Although the biased attitude of the entrepreneurs towards women has been largely taken care of yet there is much to be done. Technical workforce is available but technical inputs are mostly given by the entrepreneur themselves who have practical industry experience and better knowledge gained by secondary sources. This is the reason why training levels are negligible in the cluster. The salary levels are low and despite the availability of professionals, their employment is very limited.

There is a lack of professional attitude amongst the managers and is being taken care of by unit level training programmes. Entrepreneurial Background: Most of the entrepreneurs in Ludhiana are self-made businessmen, who learnt the job while serving as workers in other units. Most of them lacked any technical or professional qualifications. Although these owners do not possess any formal technical education, their knowledge of materials, machinery and products is considerable. The owners perform all basic functions of marketing, procurement and finance.

This is precisely the reason why they do not want to appoint professionals or believe in training. The coming up second generation is again a mixed category, with some of them having professional qualifications before entering the family business, while others joining at an early age with shop floor and hands-on experience. The decision making powers are vested with the entrepreneur themselves. There is no delegation of authority and the amount of trust posed in the employees is very less. Production There are huge but fragmented capacities in the cluster and not much of subcontracting prevails.

Thus the capacity utilization is very low. It is 40% in units operating computerized machines while 80% in hand flat machines that are suitable for value added niche products. More than 60% of the units are working either as ancillary or vendors to their mother units. There is less differentiation with thrust on knit structures, silhouettes, shades and patterns, which are limited in range. This is a seasonal industry and the production capacity utilization is remarkably low in the lean season, which is from December to April for winter wear. Delivery schedules are seldom adhered to. Designing

Professionally qualified as well as experienced designers are available in the industry. Local institutes like Pinnacle, JD Institute and NIFD are serving the industry actively. But still Ludhiana is lacking in new designs because of no efforts being put on research & development. Most of the small entrepreneurs prefer doing this job themselves. The big ones, who are interested in keeping themselves abreast with latest trends visit nearby countries like Hong-Kong and Singapore to pick up some of the latest available samples. These are then modified to suit the needs of domestic market as well as that of some developing countries for exports.

The importers of developed countries usually provide their designs themselves. A proposal for collaboration with international institute likes CITER (Italy) & FIT (US) is under pipeline. Infrastructure Ludhiana is very poor as far as infrastructure facilities are concerned. The only airport, which is near to Ludhiana is not functional at the moment and it is required to increase its status from domestic to international airport. An international level exhibition centre for buyer-seller meets is needed so that it is easier for the buyers from abroad to visit Ludhiana. There are no proper facilities for labour force.

Due to scattered location of industries, the common effluent treatment plants do not work. Some units have installed them individually but they are working at much lower capacities. The conditions of roads is very poor and even the sewers are not laid down in some areas. The power supply is very erratic and very costly. Very recently this has been hiked by around 4%. Even the use of generator sets commands heavy taxes. There are no common facilities. MOT has announced a couple of schemes like TCIDS wherein the industry has to give a matching contribution. The cluster has already submitted a proposal in this respect.

In some areas, the associations have even pooled in resources for laying down roads and sewers. Finance Most of the units are financially independent with a strong base. Loans are easily available from banks and other financial institutions but preference is given to private financiers who provide loans at a higher rate. This is largely to hide the illegal business transactions. Various banks such as the SBI under its UPTECH programme is giving soft loans on their PLR and contributing initial Rs. 1 Lakh in terms of equity for technical up-gradation of units. Marketing Marketing is a very weak feature of the Ludhiana cluster.

At the outset, there is no distinction between the manufacturer and the marketer. There are a few firms who are selling directly through their own retail outlets such as Duke, Sportking or through marketing channels such as Monte Carlo, Pringle, Jain Udhay, Neva etc. Many units are doing job work for big brands such as Raymonds, Wills, Allen Solly, Esprit etc. Every year in two phases i. e. in January for summers and in July for winters, the manufacturers do their sampling and procure orders by displaying these in hotels at Delhi where they invite their prospective retailers.

A huge amount is spent in this process. An initiative in this respect has been taken by a few of the manufacturers in terms of collective and negotiated hotel bookings. It is being planned to conduct these meets in a collective fashion, which will reduce the cost of this activity. There is also a lot of price undercutting in the cluster. There is no emphasis on branding and this largely reduces the margins because the maximum value addition in chain is at this stage. To overcome this problem, a collective marketing and common branding project has been planned.

There is very less participation in domestic trade fairs and the international ones are also seldom visited to get a feel of the market trends. The marketing in the export sector is targeted mainly at the buying houses. There are very few units that are directly marketing in the international market. Domestic market Ludhiana knitwear industry is doing Rs. 3629 crores business in the domestic market. 95% domestic demand for woolen knitwear is fulfilled by the Ludhiana cluster alone. The main markets for Ludhiana knitwear industry are high-end domestic markets in Delhi, Ahmedabad, Mumbai, Lucknow and Kanpur.

There is also a low-end middle income mass domestic market including immigrants from Tibet and Nepal. Another major market are the Government Departments, primarily defence and police, that is routed through tenders announced by these departments. Export market The global knitwear market is of about 200 billion USD. Export of knitwear from Ludhiana is of about Rs. 1371 crores. The main foreign markets for Ludhiana knitwear industry are the high quality conscious Americans, Europeans and the market of the CIS countries. USA and EU are high fashion and design markets.

The export being done to American and EU nations is primarily job work for big brands wherein the designs are provided by the buyers. There is very less export being done with manufacturer’s own label and that too is limited to Middle East and CIS nations only. The Middle East markets are low quality markets. An important feature of the knitwear export from Ludhiana is that almost 90% of export is carried out by the manufacturer exporters. There are very few merchant exporters. Around 25% of the yarn is also exported. There is a huge demand for synthetic fibres in the European nations.

These possibilities have not been exploited so far. Role of marketing agents Marketing agents are basically catering to the requirements of the domestic markets, both high-end and low-end middle-income segments. They provide two kinds of important services to the entrepreneurs; firstly they source orders from distant buyers and secondly they serve as a guarantor of the buyer for the manufactures. They are responsible for collection of money from the buyers after expiry of credit limit. In case of dispute, they reimburse 50 percent of entrepreneur’s dead payment. The intermediaries take away around 6% of the sales as commission.

This indirect link limits the feedback received from the final customers and results in low customer loyalty, besides reducing the profit margins. Decentralized sector The knitwear industry in Ludhiana is highly decentralized & varies in size. The small knitwear units are located in residential areas around Sunder Nagar, Madhopuri, Brahmpuri, Shivpuri, Purana Bazar and Bahadur ke road. The medium and large units are generally located in the outskirts of Ludhiana in the Industrial Area, Focal Point, Chandigarh Road or Jalandhar road. Most of the units are based in the residential areas converted into commercial places.

Only a few big units have their production units in eleven of the Government promoted industrial estates in the Ludhiana district. There is no exclusive industrial estate in the city for knitwear units. Research and development There is no stress on R&D activities in the cluster. The R&D is only in terms of new varieties and finishes of yarns and in terms of technology up-gradation. An exhibition on latest yarns was organized, where Chinese and Indian firms displayed their innovations. This created some awareness but the cluster still needs to put in more effort in this. Taxes and Duties

There is chain of taxes on industry which are stated as under 1. Excise duty on fibers – 12% 2. Excise duty on yarn(12%) / Excise duty on polyester filament yarn (34 %) so average duty on yarn – 23% 3. Sales tax on yarn – 4. 4% 4. Sales tax on Ready made & knitwear – 4 TOTAL (of 1+2+3+4) – 66. 8% Proposed Entry tax on yarn – 4. 4% The knitters and weavers of grey fabric can pay excise duty on an optional basis. The rate of excise duty on fabric, made ups and garments is 12%. This special Dispensation shall continue up to 28th Feb 2005. The industrial fabrics would however continue at 16%.

The Hand processing of textile fabric by independent Processors is exempted from excise duty even there is use of power in three Specified processes i. e. scouring, hydro-extraction and calendaring in the case of Cotton and man made fabrics. Policies and regulations •EXIM Policy 2002 – 2007: In the EXIM policy 2002 – 2005, Ludhiana has been awarded the status of town of export excellence for woolen knitwear. This will entitle Ludhiana cluster for the following benefits: – Recognized association of units will be able to access funds under MAI (Market access initiative scheme) for creating focused technological services.

Funds will also be available for undertaking market promotion efforts on country Product basis. – Receive priority for assistance in identified critical infrastructure gaps. There are two schemes namely Apparel Integrated Park for Exports and the Textile Center Infrastructure building scheme under which 37 crores of funding is available. Various benefits will be extended to the member units as relaxation in labour laws, common facilities etc. – Sample fabrics permitted duty free within 3% limit for trimming & embellishment and 10 % variation in GSM to be allowed for fabric under advance license.

Additional items such as zip fastness, inlay cards, evelets, rivets, eves, toggles, velcro-tape, cord & cord stopper are included in input output norms. – DEPB rates are permitted for all kinds of blended fabrics. Such blended fabrics are to have the lowest rate as applicable to different constituent fabric. Oswal Woollen Mills Limited (OWM), the flagship company of the Nahar Group of Companies is expanding its existing capacities by raising funds through a public issue and has obtained SEBI’s nod for the issue of up to 8,320,000 equity shares of Rs. 10 each through the book built route. The issue comprises of a net issue to the public of up to 8,305,000 equity shares and reservation of up to 15,000 equity shares for subscription by employees. The net issue will constitute 25. 05% of fully diluted post-issue capital of the company,” said Mr. Jawahar Lal Oswal, Managing Director of the company. OWM, was incorporated in 1949 and is a part of Rs. 19,000 million well known industrial conglomerate Nahar Group which also consists of Nahar Spinning Ltd, Nahar Industrial Enterprises Limited, Nahar Exports Ltd and Nahar Capital & Financial Services Limited based at Ludhiana in Punjab.

The Group is one of the oldest and well-recognized business houses in India. The Company is one of the pioneers in the organized Indian woollen hosiery industry. OWM made modest beginning as a manufacturer of hosiery items and over the years has emerged as a vertically integrated woollen textile company having presence in diverse markets, with wide range of products including branded woollen hosiery and cotton garments. OWM is the registered owner of well-known brand name ‘Monte Carlo’ for selling woollen hosiery and cotton garments which was added to the existing product portfolio in the year 2002.

International Society for Super brands has recognized ‘Monte Carlo’ as a ‘Superbrand’ for woollen hosiery garments since Fiscal 2003. The products in woollen hosiery segment are also sold under the brand names of ‘Canterbury’ for premium quality woollen hosiery garments while the specialty worsted woollen yarns and hand knitting yarns are sold under the brand name of ‘OWM’. Since March 2006, the company has started manufacture of indigo dyed specialty denim fabric, which has added to the existing range of rich product portfolios.

The Company has been certified to conform to the QMS Standard: ISO 9001:2000 by DNV Certification B. V. , Netherlands for the manufacture and supply of dyed and grey tops and yarn in worsted wool, pure wool, lamb wool, acrylic wool blends and polyester wool blends and angora, berthia and serge fabrics. The Company endeavors to strengthen its position in the in the retail sector and it plans to further augment its existing reach of ‘Monte Carlo Exclusive Brand Outlets’ by opening additional 106 outlets by Fiscal 2009 from the existing 44 outlets as of now.

Further, OWM is contemplating selling denim fabrics to ready-made denim garment manufactures in domestic and international market. From 2007 autumn and winter season, The Company would start production and marketing of fine micron pure merino blended knitted products for children in the age group of one to eight years for the Indian domestic market. In the Fiscal 2006, OWM had commissioned a co-generation power plant with multi fuel capabilities with an installed capacity of 3. MW to meet the entire power requirements of integrated yarn textile manufacturing plant. Post commissioning of this co-generation power plant in addition to cost reduction of power, the company would benefit from uninterrupted availability of power resulting in better quality of yarn and reduction in manufacturing wastage. Under the current expansion plan, it proposes to set up a co-generation power plant with installed capacity of 7. 5 MW, which is expected to meet the full requirements of power for integrated denim operations post expansion. Mr.

Kamal Oswal, Director said, “We also propose to increase capacities to manufacture additional 125,000 pieces of wool based knitted and hosiery garments together with additional 4,784 spindles for worsted woollen yarn and also increasing denim fabric weaving capacity to 20 million meters per annum from the present level of 15 million meters per annum. As a backward integration for the denim fabric weaving, we are also setting up a cotton spinning plant with a capacity of 14,400 spindles and 2,160 rotors. ” The Book Running Lead Managers to the Issue are UTI Bank Limited and Motilal Oswal Investment Advisors Private Limited.

Oswal Woolen Mills NAHAR GROUP, established in 1949 surges ahead to establish it self as a reputed industrial conglomerate with a wide ranging portfolio from Worsted Spinning, Cotton Knitted, and Cotton Woven Garments, Woollen Hosiery Etc. The group has spinning capacity of 0. 4 millions cotton spindles 25000 worsted spindles with turn over of $500 million inclusive of export turnover of $150 million. Out of total production, 60% of the production is dedicated to exports and the rest 40% for domestic market.

The production facility have been awarded ISO 9001:2000. Today OWM is the flagship company of the glorious Nahar Empire and a proud owner of widely loved Super Brand in Knitwear, Monte Carlo and Recoganised Super Brand Canterbury. The company boasts of a product portfolio that is truly large and varied. They include diverse types of Woollen, Acrylic and Synthetic Blended Yarns, Lambs Wool Yarn. The markets of NAHAR GROUP are cris crossed allover the globe with major clientele in Australia, New Zealand, Europe, Middle East, Africa, Russia and Asia.

The objective is meeting the buyers expectations with consistent quality backed by R & D divisions equipped with latest equipment, Cream of highly qualified technocrats and adhering to timely schedules. Today Oswal Woolen Mills LTD. is a company that owes its strength in the market and solidity to foresight of its chairman Sh. Jawahar Lal Oswal ,the professional inputs of the board of directors and able to team of highly skilled mangers OSWAL WOOLEN MILLS LTD is the Flagship company of over US$500 millions NAHAR GROUP OF COMPANIES

Oswal Woollen Mills (OWM) is the flagship company of the Rs 2,000 crore Nahar Group, which is an industrial conglomerate with a diversified portfolio that includes spinning, knitting, fabric processing, hosiery garments, knitwear and infrastructure. Starting off as a small hosiery factory in Ludhiana in 1949. It produces a wide range of products, which include diverse type of woollen acrylic, synthetic blend yarns, lamb wool yarn, woollen viscose and acrylic tops, textile fabric, woollen hosiery, thermals, knitwear and cotton Garments. The Company’s infrastructural base includes six factories with a workforce of 10,000 people.

OWM has recently become the first domestic company in the country to receive the prestigious ISO- 9001-2000 certification in the designing, knitwear, manufacturing and supplying category. Oswal Woollen Mills (Spinning Mill) Limited Garment Manufacturer Oswal Woolen Mills NAHAR GROUP, established in 1949 surges ahead to establish it self as a reputed industrial conglomerate with a wide ranging portfolio from Spinning, Knitting, Fabric, Hosiery Garments etc. Out of total production, 60% of the production is dedicated to exports and the rest 40% for domestic market.

The production facility has been awarded ISO 9001:2000. OWM is the flagship company of the glorious Oswal Empire and a proud owner of widely loved Super Brands in Knitwear, Monte Carlo and Canterbury. The company boasts of a product range that is truly large and varied. They include diverse types of Woollen, Acrylic and Synthetic Blended Yarns, Lambs Wool Yarn, Woollen Viscose & Acrylic Tops, Textile Fabric, Woollen Knitwear, Hosiery & Cotton Garments The knitting industry in India can be classified into following groups: • Hosiery knitting for undergarments • Flat knitting for sweaters and winter garments Socks knitting for socks and stockings • Warp knitting for dresses, furnishings and industrial applications In the recent times, knitting sector has undergone enormous modifications that have resulted in an increase in efficiency, ease of operations, use of computer aided designing etc. The various reasons for the growth of knitting industry are as follows: • The capital investment for starting a new knitting unit is relatively small than that required for other fabric producing industries. • High productivity and very low preparatory process as compared to weaving. More flexible and easy changeover of styles and designs to keep up with the frequent fashion changes in apparel market. • Knitted fabrics are comfortable and are in tune with the time. • Knitwear don’t require ironing and thus it gives people a carefree feeling while traveling etc. • Low labour cost per unit as compared to weaving. • Wider scope of designing in a knitting machine at a lower cost as compared to weaving. Traditionally pure wool was more commonly used for knitted fabrics. But its cost being very high and production being very low, it could not meet the requirements of the increasing population.

Due to these constraints, the use of acrylic and other noncostlier fibres like jute have overshadowed wool in the knitting sector. Optimal utilisation of the manufacturing capacities of the industry is required to face the global challenge in terms of quantity and price in the post WTO quota regime. Most of the hosiery/knitwear manufacturing units in India are in the small-scale sector. India is the largest producer of cotton in the world, with Gujarat as a number one cotton producer with a yield of 300-400 kg per hectare. It is expected that within a couple of years, it will touch the mark of 550 kg per hectare.

Therefore India has an abundant supply of the basic raw-material for knitwear industry. Presently, the main centers where this industry is located are Ludhiana, Tirupur, Delhi, Culcutta, Banglore, Ahmedabad, Saharanpur, Surat, Kanpur and Mumbai. About 95% of the nation’s output of woolen/acrylic knitwear and over two third of its bicycles and parts production comes from Ludhiana. Tirupur is famous for cotton hosiery and most of its produce is exported. Knitwear industry uses various types of yarns like woolen, worsted, cotton, blended and various other types of fancy yarn.

However Ludhiana, which is very famous for woolen knitwear makes substantial use of acrylic fiber and less of pure wool because of its high price. This is primarily because wool as a raw material is produced mainly in Australia, South Africa and New Zealand and the import duty on the same is very high. The industry in India mainly imports wool either in its fiber stage, yarn stage or old woolen rags, which are then recycled. In terms of looks and feel for a common user, acrylic and woolen seem to be similar. At present world cloth market stands at 200 billion USD and the share of knitwear is almost 50% of the total market.

China has a hold over 24% of the global knitwear trade. While the domestic apparel market in India is around 9 billion USD wherein knitwear has only 15% share. If we analyse the per capita consumption of fabrics, the share of knitted fabrics in the Indian market is around 3% as compared to the world average of 13%. Globally, the per capita consumption of knitted fabrics is 31 kg in the US, 20 kg in the EU & 24 kg in Japan, whereas in India the per capita consumption is 0. 2 kg per annum. This proves that there is huge scope for growth of knitted fabric in India.

Significance of knitwear in garment industry The survival of knitwear industry depends on the survival of the garment industry. At present, the knitwear industry has only 43% share in volume of garment industry but the same is increasing at a very fast rate due to the comfort properties of knitted garments. As on January 1 2002, there were 50,000 units in India engaged in garment manufacturing, of which 9600 were in the knitted sector and 40,400 in the woven sector. Year 1999 2000 The garment sector in India is growing at the rate of 7. % in volume, but a notable point is that this growth has been largely supported by the growth in the knitted sector at a rate of 11. 4% in volume. Knitwear accounts for 18% of foreign exchange earned by the country from export of all commodities. Garment exports from India in July have registered a growth of 20% in value terms and is at 379 million USD as against 316 million USD, in the same period last year. Both the sectors of the garment industry i. e. knitted and woven have progressed over the last decade & a half but in the later half of the decade, the knitted sector has overtaken the woven sector in terms of volume.

Significance in export It is expected that the textile sector would fulfill the export target of Rs. 65,000 crores this year, out of which the knitwear contribution will be about 15% – 20%. The union Government has fixed the export target of 50 billion USD for the textile items by the year 2010, the share target for garment is at 50% i. e. 25 billion USD. Country’s Export of garment from Ludhiana region during Jan-December 2001 was 705. 19 crores under quota countries, while export of garment from India was of 21414. 52 crores.

Thus the percentage share of Ludhiana in export of garment was only 3. 29 %. The total global garment market is of 198. 7 billion USD. (From clothesline). Destination of export Presently U. S. A. , Canada, South Africa, U. K. , Germany, France and U. A. E are the main destinations for knitwear exports from India. West Europe, Australia, Japan, Middle East, Russia, Poland, Kazakhstan, Turkmenistan & Ukraine countries are big importers of knitted items. Yarn from India is exported to almost the whole of the world but more so to Bangladesh, Sri Lanka and Korea. Competitors

China, Bangladesh, Vietnam, Indonesia, Pakistan and Sri Lanka give severe competition to India in the world market. The share of China alone in the world market is 24% while that of India is just 3%. Import Barriers India’s import duties on wool fiber, textiles and apparel are highest amongst the world. Duties remain high at all stages of the pipeline and exporters also face nontariff barriers such as special import licenses for wool fabrics etc. The import duty on raw wool is 22% and on wool-top it is 50% with an additional duty of 11. 5% payable on imports. Besides this, the total duty on the wool yarn is 67. %. Import duty on machine is 25% while import duty on machine parts is around 52%. Sometimes the maintenance of imported machine becomes costlier. Because of this, the manufacturers avoid purchasing of modern imported machine. Oswal Woollen Mills Ltd enters capital market [pic] [pic] NEW DELHI: Oswal Woollen Mills Limited (OWM), the flagship company of the Nahar Group of Companies is expanding its existing capacities by raising funds through a public issue and has obtained SEBI’s nod for the issue of up to 8,320,000 equity shares of Rs. 10 each through the book built route. The issue comprises of a net issue to the public of up to 8,305,000 equity shares and reservation of up to 15,000 equity shares for subscription by employees. The net issue will constitute 25. 05% of fully diluted post-issue capital of the company,” said Mr. Jawahar Lal Oswal, Managing Director of the company. OWM, was incorporated in 1949 and is a part of Rs. 19,000 million well known industrial conglomerate Nahar Group which also consists of Nahar Spinning Ltd, Nahar Industrial Enterprises Limited, Nahar Exports Ltd and Nahar Capital & Financial Services Limited based at Ludhiana in Punjab.

The Group is one of the oldest and well-recognized business houses in India. The Company is one of the pioneers in the organized Indian woollen hosiery industry. OWM made modest beginning as a manufacturer of hosiery items and over the years has emerged as a vertically integrated woollen textile company having presence in diverse markets, with wide range of products including branded woollen hosiery and cotton garments. OWM is the registered owner of well-known brand name ‘Monte Carlo’ for selling woollen hosiery and cotton garments which was added to the existing roduct portfolio in the year 2002. International Society for Superbrands has recognized ‘Monte Carlo’ as a ‘Superbrand’ for woollen hosiery garments since Fiscal 2003. The products in woollen hosiery segment are also sold under the brand names of ‘Canterbury’ for premium quality woollen hosiery garments while the specialty worsted woollen yarns and hand knitting yarns are sold under the brand name of ‘OWM’. Since March 2006, the company has started manufacture of indigo dyed specialty denim fabric, which has added to the existing range of rich product portfolios.

The Company has been certified to conform to the QMS Standard: ISO 9001:2000 by DNV Certification B. V. , Netherlands for the manufacture and supply of dyed and grey tops and yarn in worsted wool, pure wool, lamb wool, acrylic wool blends and polyester wool blends and angora, berthia and serge fabrics. The Company endeavors to strengthen its position in the in the retail sector and it plans to further augment its existing reach of ‘Monte Carlo Exclusive Brand Outlets’ by opening additional 100 outlets by Fiscal 2010 from the existing 44 outlets as of now.

Further, OWM is contemplating selling denim fabrics to ready-made denim garment manufactures in domestic and international market. From 2007 autumn and winter season, The Company would start production and marketing of fine micron pure merino blended knitted products for children in the age group of one to eight years for the Indian domestic market. In the Fiscal 2006, OWM had commissioned a co-generation power plant with multi fuel capabilities with an installed capacity of 3. MW to meet the entire power requirements of integrated yarn textile manufacturing plant. Post commissioning of this co-generation power plant in addition to cost reduction of power, the company would benefit from uninterrupted availability of power resulting in better quality of yarn and reduction in manufacturing wastage. Under the current expansion plan, it proposes to set up a co-generation power plant with installed capacity of 7. 5 MW, which is expected to meet the full requirements of power for integrated denim operations post expansion.

Mr. Kamal Oswal, Director said, “We also propose to increase capacities to manufacture additional 125,000 pieces of wool based knitted and hosiery garments together with additional 4,784 spindles for worsted woollen yarn and also increasing denim fabric weaving capacity to 20 million meters per annum from the present level of 15 million meters per annum. As a backward integration for the denim fabric weaving, we are also setting up a cotton spinning plant with a capacity of 14,400 spindles and 2,160 rotors. The Book Running Lead Managers to the Issue are UTI Bank Limited and Motilal Oswal Investment Advisors Private Limited. Mr. N. D. Jain, president of the company, announced sale policy of textile products for the year 2007-2008. Mr. Jain informed that the company was manufacturing textile products of highest quality which are best in country. Oswal Woollen Mills Limited (OWM) is the  the flagship company of the Nahar Group of Companies. OWM, was incorporated in 1949 and is a part of Rs. 9,000 million well known industrial conglomerate Nahar Group. The Group is one of the oldest and well-recognized business houses in India. The Company is one of the pioneers in the organized Indian woollen hosiery industry. OWM made modest beginning as a manufacturer of hosiery items and over the years has emerged as a vertically integrated woollen textile company having presence in diverse markets, with wide range of products including branded woollen hosiery and cotton garments.

OWM is the registered owner of well-known brand name ‘Monte Carlo’ for selling woollen hosiery and cotton garments which was added to the existing product portfolio in the year 2002. The products in woollen hosiery segment are also sold under the brand names of ‘Canterbury’ for premium quality woollen hosiery garments while the specialty worsted woollen yarns and hand knitting yarns are sold under the brand name of ‘OWM’. Since March 2006, the company has started manufacture of indigo dyed specialty denim fabric, which has added to the existing range of rich product portfolios.

The Company has been certified to conform to the QMS Standard: ISO 9001:2000 for the manufacture and supply of dyed and grey tops and yarn in worsted wool, pure wool, lamb wool, acrylic wool blends and polyester wool blends and angora, berthia and serge fabrics. Monte Carlo India – Mens Fashion, Formal Office & Fashion Shirts, T-shirts, Jackets, Womens Cardigans & Sweaters Over the years, Monte Carlo has established itself as a brand name trusted world-wide for its excellence in quality and eminence.

Some of our products include sweaters, cardigans, cardigan sweaters, Mens pullovers, T-shirts, trouser, shorts, Womens cardigan sweaters & womens sweater. All our clothes are designed in a manner to give our customers the ultimate feeling of comfort and ecstasy. Our collections also includes a wide range of thermals and track suits India. In our compilation of exquisite clothing and qualitative attires we have variety of jackets India like Womens jackets, sleeveless jackets, Mens jackets & Shirts like fashion shirts, formal shirts, office shirts & wholesale shirts etc. “Dress up by the ways of world and eat what you please”

When getting ready for new day it’s all about looking fresh and feeling energetic. Dressing up in a fine manner and carrying it all with grace is what actually recites the personality and the real “you”. Styles change every season so there is no point in limiting and sticking to one style but it’s always better to experiment wisely. The dressing style of Men: The clothing styles change every season but there is one constant touch that unleashes the kind of taste you have. When it comes to men’s clothing its important that the colors are right and same goes for the cuts.

There are a few basic colors that actually suit men these include blue, black, white, grey, cream etc. Another vital tip for dressing will be to iron your clothes every time you wear them. When dressing up it’s not just about clothes but accessories as well. For that “ideal look” it’s important to always have a few things like watch, tie, pen, cuff link and tie pin. Once equipped with all above and a positive attitude you are all set to rule the world. The dressing style for Women: Dressing correctly is most confusing for women. Be it casuals or formal the only secret to look just “right” is to be graceful.

Although a few rules are standard for both men and women but still they have a wider range to choose from. When dressing up for a normal day its better to sport a simple look accompanied with a few accessories. A light make up with a serene identity is the idea to unite all the positive energies and bring out the confidence. More than any thing else it is mandatory no matter what you wear it should be comfortable because your wardrobe exactly portrays you individual identity. High waist or low waist only thing that matters is to be able to carry it well.

All said and done remember be true to yourself. To look trendy and fashionable it’s not important to change your wardrobe with every season what matters is to actually feel “Trendy”. Shopping Tips Shopping is one of the most favorite hobbies for both men and women. It is regarded as a stress buster activity. Despite of its soothing nature shopping can be troublesome at time so here are a few tips that guide you to enjoy the entire experience. • Most importantly you should be dressed casually so that you can easily take off and put back in the dressing room. • If you are not the “firm” kind and you annot decide by yourself, remember to take a friend with you who can guide you well on what actually suits you. • Until you are not shopping for pleasure remember to make a list of it all and shop only for the things that you need. • Keep trying new styles you never know what suits you until you have an experience; you might surprise yourself. • The best way to make sure that something is comfortable is to actually try it well. When you are about to buy something; move you arms and sit down that will give you a better idea of whether it is worth buying or not. With all the above ideas and tips now you are all set to buy just the right lothing and that too without any inconvenience. So, Get ready and get going!! How to buy? Find the Item – the website has been designed in a very user friendly manner with all the classification done all you need to do is to choose from the categories and order the product. Keyword Search – in case, you are looking for a particular dress type the item code ore a bit of its description you can access the item using the search option. Learn about the item you found – Before you actually buy the product make sure that you have all the details of the product like • Item no. Its description • Order no. • Price • Images Shipping and Payment Details: Make sure that you have read the details of the product and the Payment Information and other Shipping Instructions. New Arrivals Montecarlo Ladies Collection 08-09 Monte Carlo the flagship  brand  of  Oswal  Woollen  Mills   has Unveiled its s/s 08-09 collection. Dedicated to women are three lines. — Alice in Wonderland, Uber – dona and the New Proportions All the three collections are done by keeping one thing in preview, that it should be for every women,be her a college going girl or ur home maker.

Alice’s Wonderland inspired knit collection embodies design , colorful patterns and prints , with soft material and dynamic cuts, colorful threads. Tees in multi-colors and stripes also take their own place. Colors are rich and aristocrat , cardinal reds , majestic purples with off whites and soft ekrus. Browns , turqs and theatrical fucias ginger with light peach, sophisticated rose accents , contrast dusky vintage pinks. Uberdona– A desire for beauty and all the finer things in life. This party collection offers a range of kurtis crafted with extreme fineness and embellished with pearls and shells , metals and threads , flowing fabrics.

The New Proportions – A casual daywear – an interplay of clean cut silhouettes , pastels and earthy colors , fine cottons and minimal embroidered patternsPick a shirts or a tunic to dress down for effortlessly stylish daywear and it make sure to steal u a second glance. The trousers are baggy . Tastefully selected pieces lend timelessness and opulence to fashion – that’s what Monte Carlo ‘s / s 09 collection is all about. Price range – Rs 345 onwards – u can’t resist it!! Available – Monte Carlo’s exclusive stores and MBO’s. MonteCarlo Trousers Monte carlo offer more:

A perfect timeless look which shines you apart from the crowd. A perfect blend of premium fibres which gives the monte carlo trouser a uniqueness of its own. In the season we present you a complete range of classy chinos , edgy linens ,premium cotton lends bio-polished for a peach skin finish will give an extra smooth feel. The enzyme and silicon in these trousers makes the fabric extremely soft ideal and anti crush makes you feel beginning the day even at the end. A complete gracious range which starts from Rs 699 – Rs 1495. This season Monte Carlo has introduced its new LEXUS(miracle cotton) Wrinkle free Cotton(trousers). hich is made of 2 ply100s California PIMA cotton to give premium lustre and strength, Ultra light, high density, fabric with resin coating makes it a perfect non-iron trouser. New colour lock technology to keep colour fresh & bright wash afyer wash. For sporty look there is multi pocket cargos with different washes. And the Cargo range for men comprises of multi pocket cargos with detailing of snaps, velcros and zippers. Garments are treated with ultra enzyme wash and softeners to provide a trendy washed look and soft hand to the garment to increase the wearing comfort.

Canterbury Monte Carlo’s Canterbury is a premium brand that delivers elegance, soft luxury and creativity in intrinsic patterns and styles for those who settle for nothing but the best. The collection liberally uses superior quality of pure cash wool in fine count of eighteen micron. This makes the woollens lightweight and extremely warm. These garments have an excellent hand feel, drape gracefully and fit perfectly on all body types. The Cantebury  collections introduced every season pullovers and cardigans in 100 % pure cashmere wool and cash wool for both men and women.

The exciting Canterbury range has exclusive designs that come in unique colour combinations. The designs comprises of intarsia – classic argyles (diamonds shapes) and patterns of checks. Single colour self structure with links and transfers. The collection is available in fusion of urban neutral colours with a predominance of shades in blues, in evergreen greys, the elegance of beiges and brown, dull blues and the bright hues of turquoise. The fall winter 2009-10 collection has more than seventy designs on offer for its customers. Monte Carlo : It’s the way you make me feel Brand : Monte Carlo Company: Oswal Woolen Mills Ltd[pic]

MonteCarlo is a premium knit wear brand in India. Launched in 1984, this brand is dominating the Mass + Class segment winter cloth market. Oswal has around 50% market share in this segment. With the booming retail sector driving the growth of Readymade clothing in India (estimated to be to the tune of Rs40 bn) no one can resist extending their brand to readymades. That is exactly what MonteCarlo is doing now. MonteCarlo ( which is a super brand) has similarity with Color Plus (discussed in previous blog) in that it created a market for itself in a category that was dominated by lesser known brands.

Monte Carlo was careful in brand building and the ads were catchy and theme oriented. Since I am in South India where there is little market for woolen clothes, still the ads shown in national channels used to excite me. The ads were full of “feel good” factors with great models and excellent imagery. All the ads had Romance and two people discovering a relationship. The print ads were like that of ” ColorPlus” gave a premium touch to the brand. It is said that most of the earlier models of this brand are now superstars including Mallika Sherawat, Arjun Rampal to name a few.

Monte Carlo is promoted with the baseline “It’s the way you make me feel”. The catchy point of the TVC s is the music which always set the tone for the message. The brand is still communicated along the same themes since two decades. The company spent lot of effort in making sure that the premiumness is not lost in campaigns. This is going to pay rich dividend when the brand is getting into the competitive world of every day wear. The brand was extended to T shirts in 1999 with the brand Summerz. In 2001, the brand forayed into everday wear market under the sub brands Wonderhugs and Trouserz and introduced ladies wear in 2003.

This year saw the national launch of cotton wears from Monte Carlo. The company was carefully ramping up the distribution and retail strategies to ensure that this brand succeed. The price range of readymades is in line with the premium brands like Van Heusan and Louis Philippe. So Monte Carlo can expect some serious competition. With the kind of success this brand had in the winter wear market, it is reasonable to believe that Monte Carlo has the potential to be a ” Color Plus”. Hope that the brand will be built along the same themes that made it successful. REVIEW OF LITERATURE

Oswal Woolen Mills NAHAR GROUP, established in 1949 surges ahead to establish it self as a reputed industrial conglomerate with a wide ranging portfolio from Spinning, Knitting, Fabric, Hosiery Garments etc. Out of total production, 60% of the production is dedicated to exports and the rest 40% for domestic market. The production facility has been awarded ISO 9001:2000. OWM is the flagship company of the glorious Oswal Empire and a proud owner of widely loved Super Brands in Knitwear, Monte Carlo and Canterbury. The company boasts of a product range that is truly large and varied.

They include diverse types of Woollen, Acrylic and Synthetic Blended Yarns, Lambs Wool Yarn, Woollen Viscose & Acrylic Tops, Textile Fabric, Woollen Knitwear, Hosiery & Cotton Garments The knitting industry in India can be classified into following groups: 1. Hosiery knitting for undergarments 2. Flat knitting for sweaters and winter garments 3. Socks knitting for socks and stockings 4. Warp knitting for dresses, furnishings and industrial applications In the recent times, knitting sector has undergone enormous modifications that have resulted in an increase in efficiency, ease of operations, use of computer aided esigning etc. The various reasons for the growth of knitting industry are as follows: 1. – The capital investment for starting a new knitting unit is relatively small than that required for other fabric producing industries. 2. High productivity and very low preparatory process as compared to weaving. 3. More flexible and easy changeover of styles and designs to keep up with the frequent fashion changes in apparel market. 4. Knitted fabrics are comfortable and are in tune with the time. 5. Knitwear don’t require ironing and thus it gives people a carefree feeling while traveling etc. 6.

Low labour cost per unit as compared to weaving. 7. Wider scope of designing in a knitting machine at a lower cost as compared to weaving. Traditionally pure wool was more commonly used for knitted fabrics. But its cost being very high and production being very low, it could not meet the requirements of the increasing population. Due to these constraints, the use of acrylic and other noncostlier fibres like jute have overshadowed wool in the knitting sector. Optimal utilisation of the manufacturing capacities of the industry is required to face the global challenge in terms of quantity and price in the post WTO quota regime.

Most of the hosiery/knitwear manufacturing units in India are in the small-scale sector. India is the lar

“From a genuine abolition point of view, Mr. Lincoln seemed tardy, cold, dull and indifferent, but measuring him by the sentiment of his country – a sentiment he was bound as a statesman to discuss – he was swift, zealous, radical, and determined. ” Frederick Douglass, 1876 source?

Introduction

He survived the tragedy and depression to become America’s Greatest President. He had the courage to destroy slavery, but he took a Civil War and the loss of 600,000 lives; his beliefs cost him his life, but without him the United States of America would not exist today. Abraham Lincoln, America’s model hero, was a man whose courage saved the nation from destruction. His early life was poor and brutal; he was born on the 12th of February 1809 in a one room cabin in rural Kentucky, a frontier state of America. His family were farmers, he was the first of his family to read; Abraham Lincoln was different to from his friends.

The young Lincoln was a child of induce curiosity, he loved to hear people, gave well crafted, well delivered speeches. He would often go to places where such speeches were being made; he memorized parts of them and he would come back and give those speeches to his playmates. It was in Lincoln’s nature to embrace new experiences and when he was nineteen he had the opportunity to travel 1200 miles down the Mississippi river. It was a journey that will change his outlook of life forever. He was confronted with the realities of slavery; what he did see was probably the most horrific aspect of slavery and that as the destruction of slave families, the selling of slaves and the use of slaves literally as pieces of commerce. But when he returned to the North, Lincoln left the family home striking out the most exciting town of its day, New Salem – Illinois; here he would be his own man. When he came to New Salem, that was a deliberate choice on his part, to turn his back on the world of farming, the agrarian lifestyle, and coming to New Salem is really a deliberate choice to plunge himself into the world of 19th century of commerce, capitalism, the Industrial Revolution and everything like that.

Lincoln’s passion to reading continued into his adult life and so that his ideas of fairness will becoming increasingly developed; America was changing, expanding day by day, and Lincoln wanted to be part of it. By 1847 he had studied enough to pass the bar examination, he had decided to become a lawyer. But also he plunged in the world of politics, and he loved politics even more than law because for him law was a means to politics, and his practice as a lawyer was always bound up by his political ambitions. In Illinois he met a woman named Ann Rutledge, but Lincoln’s life took a tragic turn when Ann died.

Her death plunged Lincoln into a deep depression, but hard work overcame this black spells. He had become a successful local politician, and the ambitious young Lincoln was proving difficult to ignore. Lincoln, had an extraordinary talent and he quickly established himself as a charismatic speaker and talented politician; increasingly ambitious he decided to move again, leaving New Salem he went to live in Springfield – the State Capital of Illinois and there he met and married Mary Todd. Lincoln moved on to the National stage, becoming a Congressman for the District of Illinois.

The country was uneasily divided in to 15 free and 15 slave states; when Kansas wanted to join the Union, a fear debate appeared: should it be a slave state or not? In the South it was another commodity that was the key to the slave issue: cotton. By 1840, cotton was more valuable than everything else the United States of America exported put together. By 1860, the value of slaves (were about four millions slaves) was greater than the value of all the American railroads, all the American manufactures and all the American banking put together – slavery was the main event in the America.

Lincoln was always opposed to the slavery, because it was the contradiction of his yearning for transformation and self improvement. In 1858 Abraham Lincoln decided to candidate for the United States Senate. At the beginning to the campaign, he made a speech in which he said that the United States was a House, but a House Divided by slavery; to survive it would have to be either all free or all slaves. When he candidate for the presidency of the United States, more than anything else I think he won because for those people who were opposed to slavery he was the only choice.

From my point of view Abraham Lincoln was completely opposed to slavery because, from historical point of view at that time slavery was the answer at to the disputes between free states and slave states. After the Civil War, the North was developing through commerce and its new industrial capacities, meanwhile the South was flourishing through the cost of labor – manual labor and the use of slaves.

The Issue Of Slavery In The United States Of America

The issue of slavery represented one of the most important factors which shaped the history of the US and especially the way in which it came to develop. It was seen for many decades as a subject for social upheaval, political debate, and most importantly a matter of human rights. However, regardless of the historical nature of the issues discussed in these debates, there are certain personalities which influenced, in a positive or negative way, the entire debate.

In the case of slavery, one such personality was Abraham Lincoln one of the most important personalities of the country and at the same time an essential part in the debates on slavery. Although his name is often related to the Emancipation Proclamation or to his debates with Stephen Douglas, his beliefs on the issue of slavery stand above these acts or events. In this sense, he often argued his opposition to the “peculiar institution” despite the fact that he was not a stranger to the slavery phenomenon.

Still, his beliefs and conviction make him to this day one of the most representative figures of the emancipation of slaves throughout the US. In order to have a better understanding of the actual reasons which justify the fact that Abraham Lincoln considered slavery to be wrong, it is important to consider the historical background of the era and observe slavery in a wider framework. More precisely, Lincoln’s beliefs on slavery were the result of growing tensions between two rival concepts: free and slavery state. After the end of the Civil War, the North was developing through trade and exploiting its new industrial capabilities, while the South was thriving at the cost of manual labor, through its special commercial relations with the English but more importantly through the use of slaves. As a consequence, the local landscape was different: New York was ranked the dominant and the most populated urban area, where as in the South a significant urban area was represented only by New Orleans. These economic tensions made their mark on the way in which politicians and even local people came to understand the status of black people.

At the same time though, the new American nation was built on the principles of freedom, democracy and most importantly on human rights. The Declaration of Independence Lincoln often cited stated included the famous passage on the freedom of man. Thus, “all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness”[1]. Despite the fact that these words represented the enthusiasm of the Founding Fathers and that they are even today the framework of the American democracy, at the time they were easily interpretable.

This was largely due to the fact that slavery was seen in the North as a terrible wrongdoing, while in the South it was viewed as a necessary practice. This drew the attention on the way in which black people were treated and especially to the fact that they were not considered human beings endowed with inalienable rights and freedoms, as well as civil duties and political ones. Taking these aspects into account it can be said that the discussions on slavery in which Lincoln was engaged focused on two pillars.

On the one hand, there were the political discussions with the Democrats and especially with his direct opponent, Douglas; on the other hand, there were the moral issues Lincoln brought on the issue of slavery. However, these debates intermingled as Lincoln and Douglas became engaged in the political fight for the state of Illinois. While these confrontations had a political aim, they brought into the spotlight two different views on slavery and emphasized Lincoln’s moral convictions and the way in which these would change. The Civil War played a major part in the drafting of Lincoln’s opinion on the issue of slavery.

In this sense, he used the notion in order to rally support for the unity of the nation. Thus, he points out that “we all declare for liberty; but in using the same word we do not all mean the same thing. With some the word liberty may mean for each man to do as he pleases with himself and the produce of his labor; while with others the same word may mean to do what they please with other men and the produce of other men’s labor”. This was the main argument he used against the beliefs of the Democrats. However, the discussions were held at the political level mostly.

In this sense, the argument in fact represented a means through which Lincoln pointed out the fact that while the Republicans were the proponents of a stronger role for the federal government, the Democrats supported the idea of a looser central government. In the end the discussions came down to the issue of slavery in the sense that the Republicans were in favor of abolishing slavery in certain states, while the Democrats considered that the people must decide on whether the states should be free or should allow slavery and slave trade to take place.

The moral argument Lincoln used revolved around the issue of the wrongfulness of slavery. In this sense, he constantly pointed out that “I particularly object to the new position which the avowed principle of this Nebraska law gives to slavery in the body politic. I object to it because it assumes that there can be moral right in the enslaving of one man by another. I object to it as a dangerous dalliance for a free people—a sad evidence that, feeling prosperity, we forget right”.

It is rather hard to believe the fact that the moral aspect determined Lincoln to support the abolition of slavery. The times were rather difficult for the entire nation due to the tensions between the two sides of the country. The North and the South were being divided by an issue on which people could not be convinced through moral arguments. Nonetheless, Lincoln went on saying that the mere arguments promoted by the Democrats in support of slavery were not convincing either. Thus, necessity in his view cannot be considered an argument because it is the man who decides on his own necessities.

In this sense, while Douglas throughout his arguments points out the fact that the right of the people to chose over the issue of slavery is a God given right, Lincoln counters him by appealing to the idea of right and wrong yet again. More precisely, “God did not place good and evil before man, telling him to make his choice. On the contrary, he did tell him there was one tree of the fruit of which he should not eat, upon pain of certain death. I should scarcely wish so strong a prohibition against slavery in Nebraska”. The technique used by Lincoln to include the idea of religion nd of divine justice was a crucial point he made in his argument against slavery and a point he used in trying to determine the change in attitude towards the change in the way slaves were viewed and their treatment as human beings rather than as cattle or mere objects or property. The fact that his arguments were based on moral considerations was an issue that became clear during the presidency of Abraham Lincoln. Despite the fact that he is considered to be an emancipator, he never actually advocated the idea of emancipation, but rather a reconsideration of their status.

This is an evident fact, especially from the point of view of his later statements. In this sense, he later argued that “I have never understood that the presidency conferred upon me the unrestricted right to act officially upon this judgment and feeling” considering that the moral issues he advocated did not have to become state principles. This viewed summarizes the changes that took place at the level of his policy once he became president of the United States.

The Emancipation Proclamation

He promoted the wrongfulness of slavery as an immoral act; yet he did not support the actual emancipation of the black people. His views became clearer and they can easily be summed up by one of his statements. Thus, “I protest against the counterfeit logic which concludes that because I do not want a black woman for a slave, I must necessarily want her for a wife. I need not have her for either, I can just leave her alone. In some respects, she is certainly not my equal; but in her natural right to eat the bread she earns with her own hands without asking leave of anyone else, she is my equal, and the equal of all others ”. Therefore, he viewed slaves equal only in their state of birth not in their rights as part of the society.

This view represents an important aspect in the way in which his attitude changed in time. Thus, as a candidate for a particular region of the United States, regardless of its importance, he could promote the morality of slavery or its lack. However, as a major public figure, he did not have the political support or the democratic one to advocate the freedom of the slaves. Nor did he want to take that road. One of the most evident proofs was the fact that “Lincoln in the first year of the war repeatedly defined is policy as a restoration of the Union- which of course meant a Union with slavery”. Therefore, despite the noble discourse, neither Lincoln nor the public were ready for a change that would, on the one hand uphold the Declaration of Independence, and create disequilibrium in the Union. Despite the serious oscillations Lincoln experienced throughout discussion on slavery, the issue of the empowerment of slaves was addressed in 1865 as he pointed out that “it is also unsatisfactory to some that the elective franchise is not given to the colored man.

I would myself prefer that it were now conferred on the very intelligent and on those who serve our cause as soldiers”. This change in attitude can be considered to be the result of a thorough reflection on the role played by slaves in the Civil War. This particular aspect was dealt with in his Second Inaugural Address as he pointed out the fact that the war in itself was a punishment from God, one which must be understood as a sign of reconciliation. More precisely, “The Almighty has His own purposes.

Woe unto the world because of offenses; for it must needs be that offenses come, but woe to that man by whom the offense cometh. If we shall suppose that American slavery is one of those offenses which, in the providence of God, must needs come, but which, having continued through His appointed time, He now wills to remove, and that He gives to both North and South this terrible war as the woe due to those by whom the offense came, shall we discern therein any departure from those divine attributes which the believers in a living God always ascribe to Him. The answer to such a question was in Lincoln’s view one that the nation must act according to God’s will and offer the rights to all individuals “who have prayed to the same Bible. Although his arguments were yet again morally based and in touch with religion, he pointed out the necessity of considering slaves as human beings with the same God as white people. Overall, it can be said that the political background of Abraham Lincoln’s activity was important for the way in which he managed to construct his beliefs on the issue of slavery.

Although at times he reduced the enthusiasm for the reconsideration of the conditions of the black people, he tried to promote a new direction in the discussions on the matter by introducing the element of morality related to slavery. Towards the end of his presidency however he came to acknowledge the role slaves played in waging the Civil War, in winning it and most importantly the role they must have in healing the wounds of the new nation. Well organized and well written paper, but the absence of references for large section raises the question of academic honesty.

Bibliography

1. Abraham Lincoln, The writings of Abraham Lincoln, V02 Ericson, David. The Debate Over Slavery: Antislavery and Proslavery Liberalism in the Antebellum America. New York: New York UP, 2000
2. Fehrenbacher, Donald, Abraham Lincoln, a documentary portrait through his speeches and writings, Stanford , California, 1964
3. Harold Holzer,Sara Vaughn Gabbard,Lincoln Museum (Fort Wayne, Ind. ), Lincoln and freedom: slavery, emancipation, and the Thirteenth Amendment, Southern Illinois University, 2007
4. Kenneth L. Deutsch, Joseph R. Fornieri, Lincoln’s American Dream – Clashing Political Perspectives, Washington, D. C. M.
5. McPherson, James. How President Lincoln Decided to Issue the Emancipation Proclamation. The Journal of Blacks in Higher Education, No. 37 (Autumn, 2002) The Avalon Project. “The Second Inaugural Address: Abraham Lincoln, 1865”.
6. The Yale Law School Project http://www. yale. edu/lawweb/avalon/presiden/inaug/lincoln2. htm 1/20/2012 7:41 PM
7. The Declaration of Independence
8. Ericson, David. The Debate Over Slavery: Antislavery and Proslavery Liberalism in the Antebellum America. New York: New York UP, 2000, p. 157
9. Abraham Lincoln, The writings of Abraham Lincoln, V 02, p. 82