Yeh "BATA" nhi "BABA" hai

After my last post on supply chain management, I would now like to post on the topic of "Logo Fraud".With the innumerable businesses that exist in our world today,it seems inconcievable that there are enough logos to go around.Having a logo that is unique to your business has obvious benefits - you will stand out as a company - but, especially for smaller concerns, it might be tempting to see a fantastic logo and maybe modify it just enough, so as not to attract copyright charges.
                        This is, important as the law differentiates between 'copied' work, which is self explanatory, 'derivative' work which is a copy of the original used as a basis of something new and 'influenced' work which is inspired by and similar to the original but is not the same.Under, copyright law the artist of the original piece of work also has rights over any derivative work.
                         This logo 'plagiarism' is quite misleading in nature and for the prospect of long term business not quite ethical either.This is the predicament my friends and I faced in the Mahabalipuram market.One of my friends was looking to buy a pair of sandals and we managed to locate a shop in the market which appeared to be a "BATA" outlet.
                         So we decided to go to the shop and check out the stock,few of us entered the shop while rest decided to wait outside and take a breather.Suddenly, I glanced at the shop's billboard and the logo it sported caught my attention, instead of the "BATA" that I had expected, it announced "BABA" in afont and colour combination that would be practically impossible to differentiate at a quick glance.
                         This kind of logo fraud may cause some short term gains but in the long run the business prospects of the concern would be hampered not to mention the loss caused to the original owner of the logo as well as to the consumer.
                          To illustrate this point further I am attaching as an example of MINI and the BENTLEY logo's.

Arup Roy Chowdhury-FT13115

Ayurvedic Cough Syrup

This is about last week.I had managed to catch the flu going in the campus and was severly under the weather.Unfortunately the cough syrup was not available with the medic and had to be procured from outside.So,i asked for a lift from my friend Harnek who thankfully took me to Mahabalipuram, so that I could buy the medicines.
We reached Mahabalipuram and found Kartik Medicals,a pharmacy on the Main road.I got the required antibiotics and asked for Dabur Honitus cough syrup for my sore throat.As,I had used it earlier,so I was sure it would relieve my sore throat, but to my dismay the pharmacist said that he did not stock the product,and suggested another brand Wincof Plus.
Having no other option I took the medicine and thankfully the syrup worked.Two days back I went back to the shop as I was curious why Kartik medicals did not keep "Honitus".The shopkeeper told me that he stocked all major medicines form all pharmaceutical companies.This response confused me further as Dabur is well known company and the "Honitus" is quite a popular cough syrup brand.So,i pestered him further and asked him why he did not have this Cough syrup.
The pharmacist told me that the Dabur distributor was at some place ese and he did not distribute to his shop or the four medical shops in Mahabalipuram.This to me is serious flaw in the companies distribution strategy.Inspite of having a good product,Dabur at least in our part of the country is not able to manage the supply chain effectively.