Ispahani Tea Limited

1. Introduction
Ispahani Tea Limited since 1820 Certification of ISO: 9001 and one of the famous private
conglomerate industries in South Asia. On 1900 its Head office was in Kolkata and later in
1947 they moved to Chittagong after that they build many corporate offices gradually in
Dhaka, Khulna, Sylhet and Tea Estate and production zones etc. In Bangladesh M.M
Ispahani Ltd is the biggest Tea trading company and captures a big market share of Tea
industry. “IspahaniMirzapore Tea” is the most popular Tea brand in Bangladesh which is
considered as a category and generic name of Tea more than a brand. The company has
strong distribution network where big organization like Unilever cannot go for head to head
completion. The group has many supplementary companies in different sectors. They also
serve the nation with Corporate Social Responsibility activities by founding EYE Hospital
which is known as Ispahani Eye Hospital and many educational institutes as corporate
philosophy. From the beginning they served good quality products and services to the
national and worldwide.

1.2 Objective of the Study

Board Objective
The broad objective of the study is to make an idea about the daily routine as well as factors
that influence to shape the daily activities and habit of media of a typical child

Specific Objectives
 To describe the company profile of Ispahani Tea limited
 To analyze the marketing activities of Ispahani Tea limited
 To describe SWOT analysis of Ispahani Tea Limited
 To find out problem of marketing activities of Ispahani tea Limited
 To give some recommendation of those identified problems.
1.3Rational of the study
A large number of buyers are concerned about the brand IspahaniMirzapore. Present market
scenario is not up to the mark for Ispahani Tea Limited because of huge competitors. They
need to improve this situation. This report is important to the concerned person of this
company to know why they need to improve their strategies.

1.4 Scope of the study

This report covered overall sales strategies of Ispahani Tea Limited and the present market
scenario of Ispahani Tea and how people specially the traders react towards this brand. Why
they need this tea rather than other tea brand.

1.5 Limitation of the study:

I had to go through some limitation while making this report. I tried my level best to
complete my report paper. I have faced some problems and limitations which are as follow:

Confidential information:
Every company has some confidential information. I faced difficulties to collect that.

Lack of experience:
As this is the first formal report which is prepared by me, lack of experience is also a
limitation.

Shortage of time:
The duration of my work simplest three months. But this period of time is not sufficient for a
complete and clean study. If I had enough time, I think it could be better.

Gender Issue:
As a girl it was difficult to visit market alone. I visited the market with an executive of the
organization from brand department when he visited the market.
2Methodology:
2.1 Data Design:
The sampling survey technique has been followed to make the report as given instruction.
The whole study has been separated in parts quantitative and qualitative. In questionnaire
only few parts are set in quantitative and most of the questionnaire has been set in qualitative
approach.
The survey of the study includes both open-ended and close-ended questionnaire format to be
asked for Tea Stall Owner directly. To collect data from Tea Stall author of the study went
for surveying in Dhaka Metropolitan Area best possible. The surveyed locations are Azimpur,
Lalbagh,New Market, Dhanmondi, Mohammadpur, Wari, and Mogbazar. Roadside and circle
based (nearby) Tea Stalls were selected to survey. Most of markets area has been skipped
during survey. Market area shopkeeper are too much busy to give interview. It suits best with
interviewing of road side Tea Stalls and more over these are highly noticeable to the
surveyor.
At first data collection method was started with an expected manner during the survey session
exchanging greetings and giving a short description of survey reason by referencing the name
of organization M. M. Ispahani Limited where the surveyor has come from. Later the session
has continued through informal friendly conversation.

I have collected data from two relevant sources. These are:

2.2 Source of Primary Data: Sources of primary data collections are as following,
❖ Conversation with the senior employees.
❖ Communication with consumers that frequently purchase service from Ispahani Tea
Limited.
2.3 Source of Secondary Data: Sources of secondary data collections are as following,
❖ Internet and company website (www.ispahanibd.com).
❖ Bangladesh tea board. (www.teaboard.gov.bd)
❖ Referred books.
❖ Annual report.

During the survey I got permission from my supervisor (Intern) and a Sr. Manager to set up
the sample size. Based on my ability to visit a market I fixed to study on 150 sample size
which is based on Dhaka metro city. I choose to use convenience sampling.
2.4 Analytic tool
I followed the same way what I learned during my internship period under the Business
Development department of Ispahani Tea Limited. Both surveyed primary data and internet
collected data have analyzed in Microsoft Office and Excel program. Raw data have been
processed, transferred and examined carefully.
3. Organization History & Background:

Ispahani Tea Limited since 1820 Certification of ISO 9001: 2008 and one of the renowned
private conglomerate industries in South Asia. Its head office was in Kolkata in 1900 and
later in 1947, it moved head office in Chittagong with many corporate offices gradually in
Dhaka, Khulna, Sylhet, and Tea Estate and production zones etc. The group is creating
opportunities of employment in various sectors day by day. In our country. It is the biggest
Tea trading company and occupies a giant amount of market share of Tea industry.
“IspahaniMirzapore Tea” is a popular Tea brand within the country which is considered as a
category and generic name of Tea more than a brand. The group has many subsidiary
companies in different sectors. It also serves the nation with (C.S.R) Corporate Social
Responsibility activities founding EYE Hospital and many educational institutes as corporate
philosophy. From the establishment it was committed to serving good quality products and
services to the nation and worldwide. This philosophy has been created a good corporate
image that influences the company among the community. It is beginning Ispahani as a group
is conquering the community love, dependence and support. It is established to serve the
nation with best quality products and services till the survival.
Ispahani is the largest tea company in Bangladesh. As a pioneer in Bangladesh's tea business,
they have introduced the first laminated pouch, double chamber T-bag, stack-up pouch, food
grade jar, three-layer wide pouch, 10 gram packs and bag-in-bag packets in Bangladesh
market.
In Bangladeshi perspective, tea means Ispahani. They are concerned about providing restless
satisfaction to our customers and enjoyable moments for a long time.

3.1 Organization Mission

Ispahani Tea Limited has a set of mission to see the business in Bangladesh and others
countries. Some of them are given below,
 Increasing the profit size by enhancing total sales.
 To be the market leader in the serving industry.
 Balancing the price with product and service quality.
 To secure consumer rights providing best quality food and service.
3.2 Organization Values
Ispahani tea limited maintains a highly ethical standard. Their values indicate some set of
criteria given here:
➢Respecting the competitors among industries.
➢Not to compromise with the quality issue.
➢Research and development.
➢Highest customer value.
➢Ensuring best utilization of the resources.
➢Appreciating the efforts.
➢Serving the society Corporate Social Responsibility.

3.3 Organization Strategy

Ispahani tea limited sets the business strategies for the well-being of company as well as for
the industry. Some of them are given below:
➢Fixing a clear objective to achieve.
➢Working as a team.
➢Adapting with the changed environment.
➢Conversing through integrity.
➢Searching for the best potential.
➢Caring for mutual benefit.

3.4 Organizational Chain of Command (Hierarchy for Marketing)

Ispahani Tea Limited follows a horizontal chain of command as hierarchy. Each of

department has individual structure for operation. Here the model marketing hierarchy is
given below.
 Top line Management

Chairman

Managing Directors

General Manager
Manager
Senior Manager (Marketing)
Middle line Management

Divisional Manager

Mid Line Management

 Territory Manager

Territory Officer

Sales Officer

Assistant Sales officer

3.5. Company Businesses

The company has different kind of business sectors in more than 13 fields of industry. Those
fields are Trading, Agro, Hospitality and Leisure, Packaging, Energy, ICT (Information and
Communication Technology), Poultry, Foods, Real Estate, Shipping, Jute, Cotton and
Textiles, Tea Garden and well established Tea Trade. A short description of these companies
and competitions is given here gradually.

Trading

The company has a trading wing named south east trading limited. It was established in 1979
and contains bigger project works like supplying for ports and shipping, utility provider’s
state owned organization road construction, water-sewerage in our country.

Agro
In agriculture sector the group established Ispahani agro limited in 2007 as having a
philosophy behind nation’s food security including three different wings of seed, bio
pesticide, and agro processing. It commits to meet country’s agro industry development as
operating business in a mostly agro based economy.

Hospitality and Leisure

Ispahani has hospitality and Leisure business named The Avenue Hotel and Suites located in
Chittagong. For catering it owns some stores named Pitstop Bakery and Sweets, Pitstop Store
and Pitstop Restaurant in the same premise. Theseprovide best quality food and refreshment
to the consumers.

Packaging

To serve with poly products for many industries like garment and textile, consumer food
packaging, see food preserving, tea packaging etc. Ispahani Marshal Limited is a pioneer poly
manufacturer in Bangladesh. It serves both domestic and multi-national companies beyond
border for many successful years.

Energy

Ispahani has a power (electricity) supplying company named pahartali power house for its
factory including a project agreement with power development board of Bangladesh
government and that plant is situated in chittagong nearby the one of company factories.

Information and Communication Technology (ICT)

Broad band telecom services limited provides I.C.T solution to country’s internet usage
industry. It was founded in the year of 2002. It covers 7 divisions including 48 districts of the
country in an outstanding network.

Poultry

In 1997 Zareen farms limited was established for serving eggs and chicken to meet up the
country’s protein demand as initially a public limited company joint venture with m. M. Agha
limited. It provides 5.5 million day-olds chicks and 7.76 million eggs per year to the market.

Foods

Ispahani foods limited is a subsidiary company of ispahani group and was founded in 1999
factory plant located at gazipur. It does agricultural and food businesses like manufacturing
fast moving consumer goods (FMCG). The product category is rice, potato chips, energy
cookie biscuit, chanachur, bakery and snacks item ISPI powder drink etc.

Real Estate

It has two companies named Free School Street Property Limited and Nasirabad Properties
Limited as their real estate wing. These help to develop and design companies and for third
party construction like road, building etc. Another company named Sikomi Properties
Limited provides company’s tea state water plantation facilities.

Shipping

In Bangladesh, Ispahani limited has been acting as second oldest agent for many shipping
lines for more than 50 years. It operates the business as a non-vessel operating common
carriers for renowned agency like hoegh lines, Oslo etc.
Jute
Though jute industry is considered as one of the sunset industries in Bangladesh ispahani
have glories progression in this sector. In early 1950, Chittagong jute manufacturing
company limited was established to produce jute and supply. Later another company was also
established named as victory jute products limited and because of losing demand it turned
into a warehouse business.

Cotton and Textiles

Pahartali textile & hosiery mills is a unit of Ispahani’ thread yarn manufacturing business. It
provides categorized high quality yarns to country’s export oriented knitting industry
remarkably from the establishment year of 1954. It is termed as one of the biggest yarn
suppliers among the suppliers and most revenue earning department for Ispahani group.
Tea Garden

Ispahani group owns four tea gardens across the country. Mirzapore, Gazipore, Zareen tea
estates are located in MoulaviBazar,Sylhet and Neptune tea estate is located in Chittagong.
These estates supply tea for own company and for the market dealing at the Chittagong tea
auction. Those gardens yield on average 1800 kilos the highest amount achieved nationally.
In tea gardens ispahani produces a small volume raw rubber sheet and its 75 percent of total
productions are being exported to the international market.

Tea sale
Ispahanimirzapore tea is the most famous and sole largest tea categorized brand in
Bangladesh. It pioneers the tea market segment from the very beginning of country’s tea
manufacturing history. Ispahani tea department is one of the most profitable revenue sections
for the company considering since its operation. Its tea blending and packaging factory,
located in Chittagong ensures the best quality of packed both for foreign and local market to
be served. Tea .it is providing quality tea product and for that it has been achieved IOS
9001:2008 certification because of excellence management coordination. Being as market
leader in branding arena it becomes a household consumer brand name too. Community
recognizes the brand as a category wherever it is found appreciably.

Sales Volume of Ispahani Tea

Ispahani tea limited during my internship session i got opportunities to work in different
department of the organization mainly under their business development. This development
also does marketing, research and planning for tea department. According to last tea sales
record (source: audit 2017-18), Ispahani tea department has been sold out to 20 million kg tea
(approximately).
Size of Workforce

Ispahani limited as a group provides work for more than 10000 employees and this number of
employment rate is enhancing continuously.

Ispahani’s Competition among Industry

Ispahani is a market leader still now in the Tea Market segment. Other brands like Seylon
(from AbulKhayer Group of Companies), Taaza (from Unilever), Fresh, No. 1 (from Meghna
Group of Industries), HRC (from HRC Products Limited), Tetley (marketed by ACI Limited
in a Joint venture with Tata Group), Danish (from Partex-Star Group), Shaw-Wallace (from
Shaw- Wallace Bangladesh Limited), Pusti (from T. K. Group of Companies), Muskan (from
S. A. Group of Industries) and Finlay (from The Consolidated Tea and Lands Company
Bangladesh Limited) are the most branded Tea competitors in the market. In recent years
only Taaza is considered as strong competitor of Ispahani Tea Brand in city market. At the
time of market visit, I have noticed that most of the wholesalers say that Taaza is the second
best selling product after Ispahani. Seylon is being popular day by day and increasing its
acceptance to the hot tea stall and hotel at an increased growth rate. In my survey it is also
noticeable Seylon is capturing large amount of market share especially at Hot Tea Stall
market in Dhaka city. Some competitors are performing well in cities or any particular
locality but an intensive strong distribution channel strategy and strong brand value to the
people of Bangladesh have made Ispahani Tea brands indomitable. In Textile section,
Pahartali Textile & Hosiery Mills (PTHM) faces severe competitions in the relevant industry.
In this industry other market players like Beximco, Square, Badsha, and Desh are the main
competitive Textile manufacturers. Here PTHM’s position is well enough serving various
 range of cotton yarn supply and it is considered as one of the profitable unit for Ispahani.
Ispahani Foods Limited is a growing food item manufacturer of the group. Here competitors
like Square Food & Beverage Limited, Akij Food & Beverage Limited, Pran-RFL Group,
Bombay Sweets etc. are good performers among food and beverage industry. In comparison
of competitors’ success Ispahani Foods Limited can be regarded as question marked unit in
order to Boston Consulting Group (BCG) matrix. In Agro division, Ispahani Agro Limited
(IAL) faces huge competitions by well-established companies. Here IAL has to face
competitors like Supreme Seeds, United Seeds, Petrocam,LalTeer etc. are the main market
players. Being a new company in agro sector since 2007, IAL is considered as developing
one for the group. As a group Ispahani competes with other mergers by diversification of
many units of business. Large and established companies like Unilever, Beximco, ACI,
AFBL, Square etc. have made the industry more competitive than earlier booming period. In
only Tea sector Ispahani occupies the market as monopoly. To sustain in the industry M. M.
Ispahani Limited would like to serve the market with best quality products and services as
following set of corporate ethics.

3.6 Ispahani Tea Distribution Channel

Ispahani distributes their products 64 districts in Bangladesh. They have total 26 divisional
warehouses and 528 Depots across the country. They transfer their products to sales centers
from the divisional warehouse. After that, the Sales center employees are selling products to
the retailer. Finally, consumers are buying from the retailer.

Ispahani / Sales Centers

Manufacturer Tea Retailer Supper
Division 517 Depots Shop Department
Blend and Warehouse Consumer
Packaging across the al store Shopping
Factory. Country. mall

Distribution Channel & Place

3.7 Product Line in Ispahani Tea Limited

In Bangladesh the way of consuming tea differs place to place. For this reason the company
launched different branded Teas throughout the country. Here some of their Tea brands are
given below including the existing market area.
 Brand Name Served Area
Blender’s Choice All Districts
Five Star Bogra
Green Spot Chittagong, Rangpur, Bogra
Hot Tea Stall All Districts
Hotel Dust Bogra
Lion Dust Rangpur and Rajshahi Divisions
Lion Leaf Rangpur and Rajshahi Divisions
Mayur Dianjpur, Rangpur, Rajshahi and Khulna
Mirzapore BL All Districts
Mirzapore BOP All Districts
Mirzapore BRD Dhaka
Mirzapore PD All Districts
Mirzapore TB All Districts
MTB Bag in Bag All Districts
Superior Tiger Dinajpur,Rangpur, Rajshahi and Cox’s Bazaar
Tea Stall Special All Districts
Zareen All Districts

3.8 Awards

Ispahani tea limited have achieved the following awards-

❖ 'Overall Best Brand' award across all categories in 'Best Brand Award 2018' and the 'Best
Brand Award' in the hot beverage category for the fourth consecutive year amongst all local
and multinational brands operating in Bangladesh.
a city hotel
❖IspahaniMirzaporeBanglabid Silver Efficacy

❖IspahaniMirzaporeBanglabid Gold Native

❖The most chosen beverage brand in Bangladesh (Kantar World panel Brand
Footprint 2017)
❖The Most Attractive Packaging Award (Blender’s Choice Premium Bag-in-Bag Tea Bags)
❖ IspahaniMirzapore Tea No. 1 Hot Beverage Brand 2017.

❖IspahaniMirzapore Tea No. 4 Overall Brand 2017Amongst MNC & local brands across all
categories.
❖IspahaniMirzapore Tea No. 1 Hot Beverage Brand 2016
❖IspahaniMirzapore Tea Best Local Brand 2016Amongst local brands across all categories
❖IspahaniMirzapore Tea No. 4 Overall Brand 2016 Amongst MNC & local brands across all
categories
❖ IspahaniMirzapore tea Best Hot Beverage Brand 2015