Press Release / Industry / Mosquito repellent coils nowhere near as cost-effective as it seems: Bonafide Research

Mosquito repellent coils nowhere near as cost-effective as it seems: Bonafide Research

Newer innovative formats, growing awareness of various products and its benefits, increased advertising and promotional events by manufacturers and the reach to rural areas are to spur the growth of mosquito repellent market in India.

India has a bug-friendly climate catering to the wide usage of mosquito repellent products, which includes various formats such as mats, coils, aerosols, gels, creams, and the clutter breaking innovation of paper strips. In spite of a wide array of formats, 56% of Indians do not use mosquito repellents and the number climbs to worrying 72% when it comes to rural areas. This is mainly due to the higher price points and lack of electrification in the rural areas, which automatically leaves the old-fashioned coils as the only option in rural areas, ruling out the usage of vaporizers and mats. With increasing disposable income and growing awareness regarding the usage of mosquito repellent products, the usage of coils have been accepted in the rural areas. Moreover, with rising awareness of the health issues related to the smoke emitted by coils the usage of coils has been lessened.

Looking at the per night cost of all formats of mosquito repellents, coils are nowhere near as economic as they seem, but are actually costly with an average 2.5 Rs. per night cost. The clutter-breaking product of paper strips repellents, which was first launched by GCPL under the brand name Good Knight Fast Card, is a paper; valued at Re.1 for a strip; which burns for three minutes and protects for almost 4 hours. After four hours a new paper is to be lighted which makes the per night cost of paper based mosquito repellents to reach to almost 2-3 Rs., which is not far from that of coils. The paper repellents are widely accepted among Indian households as it has attracted a large number of consumers with its barrier-breaking price and its added features of TFT as one of the safest active molecule and no exposure to smoke after three minutes. It has brought a prominent change in the usage of mosquito repellents in rural areas where they either expose themselves to the smoke caused by coils or use old methods of neem and tulsi due to high prices of repellent products.

According to recently published report of Bonafide Research “India Mosquito Repellent Market Overview”, coil and paper repellents have high per night cost whereas the most economical format is liquid vaporizer with per night cost as low as 1-2 Rs. The Liquid Vaporizer based repellents are valued at high prices ranging between 50-75 Rs. for about 45 nights duration catering only to the high-income homes. In addition, the lack of electrification in rural areas makes its usage limited to the urban homes. With gradual increase in the economic condition and the growing reach of electricity to rural areas, the scope for usage of electric based repellents such as mats and vaporizers will increase. Moreover, there is a scope for newer formats such as battery based vaporizers and mat machines to reach the rural areas which can be easy to use in areas that lack electricity and also economical to middle income homes. With the entry of newer formats such as aerosols, cream, lotion etc. the market for non-electric based mosquito repellents will also grow.

According to Twinkle Victor, Research Associate with Bonafide Research, “Coils and Mats are assumed to be economic due to its packaged low prices, but in fact they have high per night cost with a pack containing only 10 coils, making the consumption of pack sooner and the number of packs and it’s overall cost higher. While the high priced vaporizers tend to be more economical and effective with less consumption over the month span, despite it’s initial higher prices that actually are lower when compared with it’s per night cost.”