Home / Aug 30-Sept 05, 2025 / Cover Story / BOYCOTT USA, BUY INDIAN!By Arun Baba Naik
BOYCOTT USA, BUY INDIAN!By Arun Baba Naik
No Comments on BOYCOTT USA, BUY INDIAN!By Arun Baba Naik

BOYCOTT USA, BUY INDIAN!By Arun Baba Naik

Aug 30-Sept 05, 2025, Cover Story August 29, 2025 , by

LET’S be practical.
If Donald Trump has imposed 50% tariff over and above the existing ones on Indian products imported into the US, let us hit back by reducing the consumption, if not banning the following American brands in India.
Here are some categories and examples.

Food & Beverages
Coca-Cola, Pepsi – Cola and other soft drinks are among the most widely consumed beverages in India.
KFC, McDonald’s, Domino’s, Pizza Hut, Starbucks – American fast-food chains adapted to Indian tastes (veg menus, spicy offerings).
Lays (PepsiCo), Doritos, Pringles – Popular packaged snacks.
Oreo, Hershey’s, Snickers, Mars – American chocolates and biscuits.

Technology & Electronics
Apple (iPhone, iPad, MacBook) – aspirational and status-driven products.
Dell, HP – Leading laptop and desktop brands in homes and offices.
Google, Microsoft, Meta (Facebook, Instagram, WhatsApp) – everyday digital life depends on these.
Amazon (e-commerce, Kindle, Prime Video) – Major online shopping and streaming player.

Apparel & Lifestyle
Nike, Levi’s, Converse – strong presence in youth fashion.
Skechers, Under Armour – Gaining popularity in sportswear.
Coach, Michael Kors – Luxury/lifestyle segment in metros.

Automobiles
Ford (earlier), Jeep, Harley-Davidson – Iconic but niche.

Health & Consumer Goods
Colgate (originally American) – still the most trusted toothpaste brand.
Johnson & Johnson – baby care and healthcare products.
Procter & Gamble (P&G brands: Ariel, Tide, Pampers, Head & Shoulders, Gillette, Whisper, Vicks) – widely used in Indian households.

Goan Observer adds:
We should add to the list Boeing aircraft which supplies most of the aircraft used by Air India and other Indian airline companies. More importantly there are very good Indian substitutes for the products we are importing from United States.
In the soft drink category we have an entire range of Indian alternatives. The Parle group very successfully launched Thums Up, the Indian brand bought over by Coco-Cola. There are Indian soft drinks like Mangola and Appy and in Goa the soft drinks bottle by the Real Group including Kane. Incidently, Real group which completed 79 years on Ganesh Chaturthi Day, August 27, 2025 has been producing soft drinks or beverages for over 50 years.
There are a wide variety of indigenous substitutes for KFC (fried chicken), McDonald’s (burgers), Domino’s Pizza, and Starbucks coffee. Among other popular imports are chicken shawrama which is available as street food. Our own vada-pav is a much more economical buy and tastier vis-à-vis McDonald hamburgers. It is not widely recognised that the original McDonald hamburgers contain pork which to the majority of Indians don’t like very much except in Goa where choris-pav offers an excellent alternative to McDonald hamburgers. There are many domestic pizza chains like Smokin Joe.
FORTUNATELY, we have a wide range of all Indian sweets and savouries from roasted cashew nuts to “chakli, shankarpara” and Haldiram “burji” as alternatives for Lays and Pringles manufactured by multinationals like Pepsi. We have better alternatives to Oreo biscuit range in our wide range of Parle cream and chocolate biscuits and cookies. The Amul range of chocolates are a much better option to American Mars. Mercifully, the best known Cadbury’s and Nestle are made by British and Swedish companies.
In technology the HCL group of companies offer the entire range of desktop programs, notepads or notebooks and laptops. Though we are not aware of any company making iPhones, we can buy the Apple-manufactured ones in India. In fact, even Samsung and other smartphone manufacturers have units in India.
In the area of E-commerce, we have our own platforms like Flipkart and Myntra. We even have a search engine, Rediff.com as a substitute for Google. We are yet to developed social media networks like Meta and WhatsApp. But I am confident that TCS and Infosys can do the needful. In any case we are not dependent on Starlinks for our internet or web connections as Reliance offers alternatives. Similarly, Reliance also offers an alternative to Amazon Prime entertainment channels.
In the apparel and lifestyle area there are domestic alternative to Nike, Levis, Reebok and Canvas. The interesting part is most of the Nike’s and Reebok’s that we purchase are actually made in India. This is also true of the best sports equipment from cricket bats to tennis rackets with Punjab being the largest hub for sports goods. There are any number of domestic brands an Indian designer houses which offer substitutes for American sportswear brands.

IN THE PAST
IN the past we used to import all our automobiles from the US. Tata Motors now offers the widest range of automobiles in the country. The Tata companies also manufacture the premium Jaguar and Range Rover brands in automobiles. You can always switch to Vicco Vajradanti which promotes itself as a truth paste, as alternative to Colgate which is an American company. Wipro offers alternatives to Johnson & Johnson baby care and health care products. There are very affective Indian substitutes for Ariel, Tide, Head & Shoulders, Gillette blades, Whisper sanitary pads and Vicks.
It may be recalled that Nirma quickly developed 40% of market share for the detergents in the country. Godrej manufactures the entire range for toilet soaps. There is a company based in Goa which makes Stayfree sanitary pads. India can match any and every American imported product in over 90% of the areas.
India has one of the biggest markets in the world. Indian companies do not need American market. It is the other way around and the US needs the huge Indian markets for their products and services.
LET us pay back Donald Trump his own coin. We should boycott American products in favour of Indian products. We can continue to import from Europe and China, which offer much more economical substitutes and alternatives.

No related posts.

Search

Back to Top