The ongoing COVID19 pandemic has apparently shaken up businesses all over the world and people are staying at home for being safe due to Coronavirus fear. Meanwhile, people are spending their money on various technology products that provide them the best entertainment at home. Such a range of devices also include smart TV and today, people are searching for the best smart TVs for entertainment, binge-watching and adequate freedom to explore the digital content on a big screen. In a quest to know about the impact of COVID19 on the television industry, Rajeev Ranjan, Editor, Digital Terminal spoke to Mr. Arjun Bajaj, Founder of Shinco India, an Indian smart TV brand with an affordable TV range. The discussion went on the current market landscape, Shinco’s service commitments, and growth prospects in 2020. Read the complete interview below:
Rajeev: As the production units have been allowed to open post lockdown so how are the operations going on currently for Shinco? Is there any shortage of labourers due to COVID-19?
Arjun: Initially, there were a lot of issues because of the labour shortage as a lot of trained labour migrated back to their hometowns. However, now things are better now as we have hired and trained the new ones so the efficiency has been improved.
Rajeev: How do you see the overall impact of COVID-19 on the TV market? How have your sales targets impacted due to changes in consumer buying behaviour?
Arjun: Talking about the overall impact of COVID-19 on TV market post lockdown we see that LED TV's have shown a surprisingly huge demand as People in this lockdown have realised the importance of big smart screen to keep them entertained at home and we are hoping the demand continues to stay like this.
Rajeev: How are you offering the service support to your customers in this challenging time? Please share your strategies to serve the customers with best-in-class support in the coming months.
Arjun: We were one of the very few brands who made sure that our customers received full support during the lockdown. We ensure 60% of the service calls were resolved over video and voice calls and anywhere where there was a part requirement customers were quite understanding and waited till lockdown was lifted. Our team was working continuously during the lockdown and our call centre and mobile app were fully working Shinco app were operational for the easy of our customers.
Rajeev: COVID-19 pandemic has totally wrecked about 2 quarters in this calendar year so how are you planning to accelerate your business further in the rest of 2020? How are you working with your channel partners?
Arjun: We are hopeful if the demand for TV's continues to increase like this we will meet the lost sales and meet our targets for this year.
Rajeev: How do you see the market scenario for TV manufacturers ahead in 2020? What would be the major growth driving factors in this period?
Arjun: It is a very positive time for manufacturers like us as we have seen a rising demand for the purchase of TV. The driving factors are TV being the biggest entertainer as many people are still avoiding themselves to step out from home till now cinema halls are shut but as per the Unlock 5.0 guidelines they are opening but still, people have a fear that they should not get infected by COVID-19. There are many other things happening nowadays like IPL matched, Football and other sport matches that are not allowing the audience in stadiums so there has been an increase in the demand of the televisions as people wants to enjoy at their home only and this will continue for some more time till the Covid-19 virus is controlled.
