in rural Maharashtra who spent more on his cell phone that I do working for a multinational corporation in Mumbai. He had a field, a flour mill and two tractors he would rent out. He may have had buffalos in his home but he also had money.Many multinationals have tried with mixed success to reach out to these hundreds of millions who have a bit of cash.Unilever’s “Shakti Lady” program that has village women going door to door explaining and selling products has not become as big as Unilever had originally anticipated.Meanwhile, many a grand plan for Internet country kiosks that would become hubs for product orders, telemedicine and even entertainment have failed because of bad Internet connections and power outages as well as computers that could not stand up to rural wear and tear.Still, there has been an unprecedented convergence of interest from governments, NGOs and local and multi-national corporations to find new ways to reach out and help the rural consumer here.The excitement about rural opportunities has spurred new innovations for products and services created specifically with the less affluent Indian consumer in mind.Phone companies have created new services aimed squarely at the hard-to-reach and often illiterate rural consumer such as dialing up music through your cell phone.Google is developing online bulletin boards that can be used by villagers that don’t know how to read or use a computer,toms shoes sale.Maruti Suzuki is wooing village elders to sell its cars while Hero Honda has a fleet of service motorcycles that can reach villages without roads,toms shoes online.The way products are distributed has also required some innovation. Many multi-nationals are trying to reach rural India through established networks of micro-lending and self-help groups. They are using women’s groups that gather regularly to borrow money for micro-businesses to sell everything from cell phones to cow insurance,toms outlet.German grocery-store chain Metro has tapped SKS Microfinance, one of India’s largest microlenders, to reach out to closet-sized mom-and-pop stores. The company, which is only allowed to wholesale in India, delivers groceries to the front doors of the small stores in the state of Andhra Pradesh after SKS screens them and lends them money.Another innovation in reaching the rural consumer that seems to be taking off is a kind of rental model. Most rural consumers can’t afford the money it takes to pay the full amount for some products that could improve their lives. But they would be willing to rent the products for a small amount per day.Few can afford solar lamps, for example, but many can afford to rent them for five rupees a day. This model not only brings a much-needed product to a less affluent consumer but also creates a new business in the village.I once watched one women’s group in rural Maharashtra explain why they wanted to buy a washing machine they couldn’t afford. While they used to consider a washing machine a luxury for rich, city ladies, they figured they could make it into a business, washing their neighbors’ cl Related articles:

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