Introduction

Vespa is

an

Italian

brand

of scooter manufactured

by Piaggio.

The

name

means wasp in Italian.The Vespa has evolved from a single model motor scooter manufactured in
1946 by Piaggio & Co. S.p.A. of Pontedera, Italy to a full line of scooters and one of seven
companies today owned by Piaggio.From their inception, Vespa scooters have been known for
their painted, pressed steel unibody which combines a complete cowling for the engine
(enclosing the engine mechanism and concealing dirt or grease), a flat floorboard (providing foot
protection), and a prominent front fairing (providing wind protection) into a structural unit.
In 1946 Piaggio launched theVespa scooter (Italian for "wasp") and within ten years over a
million units had been produced. The Italian language gained a new word, "vespare", meaning to
go somewhere on a Vespa. Vespa was first produced in Pontedera . The Piaggio factory carries
the name of its founder, Enrico Piaggio himself. In 1944, Piaggio engineers Renzo Spolti and
Vittorio Casini designed a motorcycle with bodywork fully enclosing the drivetrain and forming
a tall splash guard at the front. In addition to the bodywork, the design included handlebarmounted controls, forced air cooling, wheels of small diameter, and a tall central section that had
to be straddled. Officially known as the MP5 the prototype was nicknamed "Paperino" (either
"duckling" or "Donald Duck" in Italian).

Marketing communication mix:

P erso n a
l S e llin g

D ir e c t
M ark eti
ng

P u b lic
R e la t io
ns

A dve
r t is in
g

S a le s
P rom o t
io n

Personal Selling: Face to face interaction with one or more prospective purchasers for the
purpose of making presentation, answering questions and procuring orders. Personal selling is a
promotional method in which one party (e.g., salesperson) uses skills and techniques for building
personal relationships with another party (e.g., those involved in a purchase decision) that results
in both parties obtaining value.
Advertising: Any paid form of non-personal presentation and promotion of ideas, goods, or
services. Advertising is a form of marketing communication used to persuade an audience to take
or continue some action, usually with respect to a commercial offering, or political or ideological
support.
Sales Promotion: A variety of short-term incentives to encourage trial or purchase of a product
or service. Sales promotion is the process of persuading a potential customer to buy the product.
Sales promotion is designed to be used as a short-term tactic to boost sales it is rarely suitable
as a method of building long-term customer loyalty.
Public Relations: A variety of programs designed to promote or protect a companys image or
its products. A public relations is the practice of managing the spread of information between an
individual or an organization (such as a business, government agency, or a nonprofit
organization) and the public. Public relations may include an organization or individual gaining
exposure to their audiences using topics of public interest and news items that do not require
direct payment.
Direct Marketing: Use of mail, telephone, fax, e-mail, or internet to communicate directly with
or solicit response or dialogue from specific customers and prospects. Direct marketing is a
channel-agnostic form of advertising which allows businesses and nonprofit organizations to
communicate straight to the customer, with advertising techniques that can include cell phone
text messaging, email, interactive consumer websites, online display ads, database marketing,
fliers, catalog distribution, promotional letters, targeted television commercials, responsegenerating newspaper/magazine advertisements, and outdoor advertising.

For the vespa Itally the appropriate communication mix for marketing are,
1. Advertising
2. Public relation
I choose this communication mix because of the following reasons:

Advertising:
Increasing the sales of the product/service.
Creating and maintaining a brand identity or brand image.
Communicating a change in the existing product line.
Introduction of a new product or service.
Increasing thebuzz-value of the brand or the company.

Advertising is considered as highly public mode of communication and people consider this kind
of promotion more because they consider that the offer they have been made through the media
is standard. It is the medium of communication where a seller can repeat its message many times
and this as a result help buyer to compare the sellers product with other competitors or substitute
available.

The most common way of advertisement is TV, radio, newspaper, broachers and
magazines etc.The advertisement is really beneficial in creating long term relationship
between consumer, product and business. E.g. coca-cola uses all time red color for
advertisement of their product and uses same advertisement many times a day to attract
customer.

Public relation : Public relations is a strategic communication process that builds

mutually beneficial relationships between organizations and their publics. public relations
also encompasses the following:

Anticipating, analyzing and interpreting public opinion, attitudes and issues that

might impact, for good or ill, the operations and plans of the organization.
Counseling management at all levels in the organization with regard to policy
decisions, courses of action and communication, taking into account their public

ramifications and the organizations social or citizenship responsibilities.

Researching, conducting and evaluating, on a continuing basis, programs of
action and communication to achieve the informed public understanding
necessary to the success of an organizations aims. These may include marketing;
financial; fund raising; employee, community or government relations; and other

programs.
Planning and implementing the organizations efforts to influence or change
public policy. Setting objectives, planning, budgeting, recruiting and training
staff, developing facilities in short, managing the resources needed to perform
all of the above.

The reasons for not choosing the remaining communication mix are:

1) Personal selling:
Costly - employing a sales force has many hidden costs in addition to wages. Not suitable
if there are thousands of important buyers.
2) Direct marketing:
direct marketing is the demand from consumers to end unsolicited contact from
companies. Consumers do not appreciate privacy intrusion or the sheer mass of
communication, referred to as spam or junk mail, received on a daily basis. Other

disadvantages include generating poor quality leads and failing to bring a high number of
repeat customers.
3) Sales promotion
Sales promotion could not be a substitute to compromise in quality and effectiveness of
marketing. After a consumer uses a coupon for the initial purchase of a product, the
product must then take over and convince them to become repeat buyers.
In addition, sales promotion activities may bring several negative consequences,
including clutter due to the number of competitive promotions. New approaches are
promptly cloned by competitors, as each marketer tries to be more creative, more
attention getting, or more effective in attracting the attention of consumers and the trade.
Competitors and their sales promotional activities
Vespas main competitors are Yamaha and Honda. They are all doing various promotional
activities. Vespa is doing online ads, ads in magazines, organizing various contests
whereas Yamaha is doing test drive, college activities, customer meets etc. Talking about
Honda they are doing advertisements and test drive .