Fighting off attempts to hobble me and making the Dilmah mark in New Zealand

(Excerpted from the Merrill J. Fernando autobiography)

The success of my marketing platform in Australia produced interesting repercussions. When I made the claim that my single origin product stood apart from all others, as the latter were largely of cheap, multiple origins, the trade in Australia formed a new association called the Australian Tea Alliance. They invited the Dilmah distributor, Cerebos, to the first meeting and requested its representative to get me to attend the next.

I immediately divined their hidden agenda, which was to hobble my progress. Therefore, I advised Cerebos to tell the Chairman of this alliance, who was also the Chairman of a multinational in Australia, to send me a written invitation to join the alliance. I then received a letter from him, suggesting that we should establish a common promotional platform for tea, with the objective of increasing the general demand for tea and not for a particular brand. My response to him was that our objectives were mutually exclusive as, whilst his purpose was to sell any tea, mine was to market the finest tea on earth.

A few days later a senior member of the Australia-New Zealand Trade visited me in my hotel and again tried to persuade me to join the ‘alliance’. When I refused by saying that my mission was different to theirs, he responded that I would soon realize that I was making a mistake – a statement which was also an implied threat. Two weeks later I was informed by my distributor in Perth that a Dilmah consignment from Colombo had been confiscated by Customs in Perth. The reason? It was a chamomile herbal infusion marketed as restorative and a remedy for stomach ailments and that such claims were unsupportable.

Working with my lawyers, I found that a major competitor, Twinings, was making similar claims for its brand of chamomile tea. I sent a representational pack to the Melbourne Health Authority and found that it had approved it. When I confronted the official who stopped my shipment with this information, he advised me that there were powerful forces arraigned against me and that if I continued to fight this issue, my product would be barred from the supermarkets. Finally, I was compelled to recall that consignment of chamomile tea to Colombo, at a loss of USD 35,000. Shortly thereafter, the Chairman of the Australian Tea Alliance advised all supermarkets that I was making false claims about the exclusivity of my tea and that there was no difference between their product and mine, though they did not make such claims.

Through my lawyers I responded that their accusations were unfounded and that I was prepared to defend my position. Immediately, the Tea Alliance advised supermarket buyers that they did not mean to condemn Dilmah, but only sought to apprise them that my product was actually no better than theirs, though they made no such claim. That was a battle I had to fight entirely on my own as my distributor did not assist me.

Overall, in Australia, my experiences with distributors was unsatisfactory. My first distributor could not understand my marketing philosophy, because it was obviously quite different from that of all the other customers he serviced. My personal marketing system was based on direct contact with the buyer, and this distributor was not comfortable with that approach. I then moved to Cerebos Greggs, but the staff was inexperienced in the marketing of tea. These disappointing experiences finally compelled me to make my own marketing and distribution arrangements.

Dilmah in New Zealand

In New Zealand, I had been a bulk tea supplier to two major packers. One was Quality Packers Ltd., of which my good friend Pat Moore was the Chairman and Ian, the Chief Buyer. In the early days of my career in the tea trade, operating from Harrisons and Crossfield, Pat had been the Chief Buyer of Ceylon Tea for Salada Tea Company of Canada. The other was Well Tea Company, of which Trevor was the Chief Buyer. Pat’s buying from me was regular, whilst Trevor’s was intermittent and opportunistic.

Once, having been caught short of stock as he had not bought ahead despite my advice to buy Trevor persuaded me, on the promise of future regular buying, to send him four containers as I was the only supplier with reserve stock. However, despite that assurance, he continued to be an irregular buyer. In addition to these two, there were two or three other small-time operators.

When I decided to launch Dilmah in New Zealand, I first approached Balande, a French company, which unfortunately changed hands at that time. I then moved to a smaller operator, Nigel Scott, who at that time was not big enough to do justice to our brand. Jack and John Burton, who were selling my bulk tea in New Zealand, were not interested at first as they were unsure of the potential of Dilmah. I then approached other major players, Woolworths, Countdown, and Foodstuffs.

The latter, with about 60% of market share then, was very strong but it owned the Bell Tea brand. However, its buyer in Auckland, Shirley, was very receptive and agreed to provide me a warehouse, as she was impressed with the quality of our Ceylon Tea. Similarly, the other buyers and retailers we approached were equally welcoming and John Burton, both impressed and surprised by the responses, agreed to take on the distributorship. I subsequently met the Chairman of Foodstuffs who also agreed, enthusiastically, to support my brand. When I went back to Shirley to thank her for the facilitation, she regretfully declined to accept as her Chairman had sent her instructions not to touch Dilmah!

The fruits of perseverence

Despite these disappointments, my persistence and my faith, both in my brand and my God, paid off in New Zealand, as it had done elsewhere. The concept of the founder promoting his brand on television, radio, and magazines was an unusual, if not a unique marketing strategy, and attracted consumers to the brand. The media hype was reinforced solidly by an unwavering adherence to quality and every other attribute of the product that was advertised. The projected image of purity, singularity, and authenticity was complemented by the physical product. The slogan ‘Do Try It,’ backed by my image, was convincing in its simplicity. I used to get over 100 letters each month from satisfied customers, thanking me for bringing good Ceylon Tea, which they had enjoyed many years ago, back to the market.

From Australia and New Zealand, Dilmah gradually achieved a global reach and is now being sold in over 100 countries. It is the favourite brand of some of the best airlines and five-star hotels in the Asia-Pacific region. Emirates Airlines has carried Dilmah for 30 years. As a young tea trader, I carried my samples in my brief case in to the Albert Abela office in Sharjah and it was served on the airline in the very early stages.

That old association has now developed in to a unique relationship. In Emirates lounges the world over and in all its aircraft. Dilmah is the tea of choice. In December 2019, when Emirates Airlines launched the bar concept in its iconic Airbus 380, a special bar ceremony was held featuring Dilmah tea, at which within Dilhan and I were present. The launching of Dilmah tea 38,000 ft. in the air, between Dubai and London, celebrating the 27-year partnership between Dilmah and the airline, was an important event in the history of Dilmah tea.

With the growing popularity of Dilmah in Australia and New Zealand, I suddenly found myself becoming a celebrity! What caught the popular fancy of the public, as I mentioned earlier, was the concept of the founder personally selling his tea. Quite often I was referred to as “Mr. Dilmah”. I appeared in one of the most popular Australian TV programmes, ‘Home and Away,’ in a half-hour film on Dilmah and its founder. I was also featured on breakfast shows, whilst widely-read magazines ran three- to four-page articles with photographs.

In my media advertising of Dilmah in Australia, I went straight to the source instead of working through media agencies. With this direct approach I was able to work out how best to project exactly what I wanted. Quite apart from all other considerations, I think what captured the attention of the general public was the story of a small man from a small Asian country taking on the corporate giants in the West, in their own stronghold. That aspect of my marketing campaign generated a momentum of its own.

For over two years I struggled with the brand building of Dilmah in Australia and New Zealand. Eventually, despite all obstacles, legitimate competition, and sabotage, Dilmah restored the premier position of genuine Ceylon Tea in those countries. Whilst, after persistent struggles I was able to secure the help of the Tea Board for the promotion of a value-added, genuine Ceylon-owned brand, the Board, in a typical demonstration of the absence of both logic and awareness of priorities, was also funding the promotion of bulk tea being exported by one individual to Canada.

New Zealand is special

I have sold my Dilmah in over 100 countries. The travelling involved with the selling of my tea has enabled me to indulge in my passion for seeing new countries and experiencing new cultures, first kindled in my maiden visit overseas to the UK as young man in his early twenties. I have great memories of all the countries I have visited, the places I have seen, and the people I have befriended. However, nowhere else have I been so welcomed, or made to feel so much at home, as in New Zealand. I know that it is in New Zealand that I am best known and loved.

‘Do Try It,’ the words which have accompanied Dilmah across the globe, were born in New Zealand, when Daron Curtiss, Head of Waves Communications, then a small advertising agency in New Zealand, convinced me, despite my reservations, that the most effective way to convey my passion for tea was to tell the world personally. Until then. Australia-based Sri Lankan singer Kamahl had been the image and voice in the Dilmah advertisements. But Daron was so right in his alternative view to project me instead. That was in 1994 and Dilmah has been working with them ever since, whilst Daron and his wife Shirley have become my very dear friends. Establishing a connection with Daron and his company was serendipitous. I discovered them in the Yellow Pages!

Daron was hesitant initially on the grounds that he had minimal knowledge of the tea market but, providentially, as it has happened in every Important juncture of my life, the unseen hand intervened. Just a few weeks before my initial approach to Daron, Shirley had bought Dilmah tea from their local Howick supermarket. In itself a fortuitous incident, but from the first tasting itself they had become converts.

At first, I was doubtful of the effectiveness of Daron’s marketing strategy. After going through the shooting of the first commercial with Daron’s team I returned to Sri Lanka, having told him that if the strategy did not work, on my return to New Zealand I would have to find another advertising agency. On my next trip to NZ, a few months later, at the airport Customs counter, an officer looked up at me and said immediately: “You are that guy on TV.”

During the same trip, in another instance, as we got in to Daron’s car after a re-shoot of a Dilmah commercial, a few young people parked next to us rolled down their windows and yelled in unison, at the top of their voices, “Do try it!” That cleared all the doubts in my mind; Dilmah had arrived in New Zealand. Within a year of the broadcasting of the new Dilmah advertisement, Dilmah’s market share in New Zealand rose from below two to eight per cent.

The Curtiss family’s involvement with Dilmah went much further than advertising. In 2011, the Foundation unveiled the Daron Curtiss Centre for Graphic Design, at the MJF Centre in Moratuwa. Supported by Daron, this centre offers classes in graphic design to underprivileged children and young adults. Students include several who are physically handicapped, for whom competence in a highly-marketable skill opens a path for economic advancement and independence.

Perhaps it is the natural warmth of the New Zealanders that enables them to greet me so spontaneously, wherever I appear in public. People from diverse walks of life, sports icons, media personalities, chefs, bar tenders and waiters in hotels, and shoppers in supermarkets have stopped me to tell me that they like my Dilmah tea.

Iconic Kiwis, such as cricketing great Sir Richard Hadlee and the peerless All Black Sir Graham Henry, have personally supported projects launched by the MJF Charitable Foundation. A blindfolded Sir Hadlee, playing the forward defence against a cricket ball with a bell, in an engagement at the Moratuwa Centre with visually-handicapped cricketers of the Cricket Live Foundation, of which he is the patron, is an image that will endure.

The late Mike Dormer was another dear Kiwi, tea importer, and founder of the Willows Cricket Club, Christchurch, through whom several tours of the club cricket team to Sri Lanka were arranged. A reciprocal tour of a Sri Lankan, under 21 team, took place in 2011, playing five matches with NZ teams.

Nigel Scott, General Manager of Dilmah, New Zealand, who has been with Dilmah for 27 years, is another such friend. Richard Ballantyne, former Managing Director of J. Ballantyne and Company, is another Kiwi who has helped Dilmah in his country. Leighton Smith, the sophisticated but challenging voice which has dominated the airwaves of New Zealand morning radio for three decades, has given much airtime and helped to promote Dilmah. Along with his wife, Carolyn, he has been closely associated with the Dilmah journey in their country. They have also become close personal friends.

In his insightful personal memoir, ‘Leighton Smith, Beyond the Microphone,’ under the very flattering heading ‘The finest man on earth,’ he provides an unsolicited endorsement of my personal marketing ethos: “Without quality, especially in a competitive market like tea, all the advertising in the world will not build the sort of brand loyalty that Dilmah has. “

Sir Anand Satyanand, 19th Governor General of New Zealand (2006-2011), was also very supportive of the Dilmah promotion in New Zealand and continues to follow its progress closely. With his long involvement in and contribution to public interest issues and assignments, it was the aspect of the Dilmah commitment to social welfare, that captured his attention most. He and his wife Susan became great friends as well.