The Repositioning of Lucozade
The Repositioning of Lucozade
This piece is on the repositioning of the bubbly, orange, glucose drink, that is Lucozade. From when Lucozade was first launched in 1927 as a medicinal home remedy by Beechams it has now become a highly successful soft drinks product.
In 1960 Beechams released its first advertisement for Lucozade showing to the large audience that their product was a quick cure for the ill, Lucozade was shown to be a fast, long lasting, effective way of giving them energy to fight their illness. There was a decline in sales in the seventies due to the improvements in health care, NHS and other hospital improvements.
Beechams repositioned its brand and changed its whole target audience, although they still continued to sell the original Lucozade product. This was a huge risk, which luckily for them paid off. Lucozade was advertised with a very successful athlete to appeal to a wide, sports orientated audience. They also produced a new smaller, portable bottle to accompany the sports feel. This was a great tactical move to advertise Lucozade with a gold medallist in the Olympics, at a time when sport was becoming an important part in peoples' lives. With people not only getting involved in sports but also watching it on television as the companies bought the right to view and film the events.
As time went on people's interest changed again with new technology being introduced. So in order to keep a wide customer interest Lucozade had to change its image and broaden its appeal to the public again in 1999. This time they used the borrowed interest of Lara Croft, the computer generated female action hero. This was another huge risk, because it's hard to judge how long she will appeal to the public. Nevertheless they changed the target market to targeting the computer audience as well as the young female and also the male audience. They gave her enlarged female characteristics, and a fit active body with features they could work with like her eyes. However they still kept the same idea of the drink giving the consumer energy. So the product would still appeal to the sports audience, but they have expanded the amount of people that would buy the product.
I will now focus on the three main adverts in which the product was repositioned.
The first advertisement is about a young boy who is in bed recovering from being ill and he is given the Lucozade drink by his mother. The director has chosen a typical 1960´s family so that more people can relate to it and hopefully buy or use the drink. The editing is done at a slow pace; with mainly mid and close shots being used to give a very close feel with the advert and real life. The mother is a stereotypical housewife, who has been chosen because the main target audience is the housewife. It would have been the wife that did the shopping, cleaning and caring for the family and she would also be the one that would give the Lucozade to her children.
The young girl who is between three to six years old looks angelic, like a perfect little girl, to give the an impression of a happy and loving family and it also gives an image of family perfection.
The boy is shown as energetic and active, even though he is supposed to be recovering from being ill because they did not want to associate negative impressions with the product and keep the focus on people getting better. The boy is seen drinking the Lucozade, which gives the impression that Lucozade has helped him to recover and ...
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The young girl who is between three to six years old looks angelic, like a perfect little girl, to give the an impression of a happy and loving family and it also gives an image of family perfection.
The boy is shown as energetic and active, even though he is supposed to be recovering from being ill because they did not want to associate negative impressions with the product and keep the focus on people getting better. The boy is seen drinking the Lucozade, which gives the impression that Lucozade has helped him to recover and has given him energy and made him active, as he is banging his drum and rolling around.
The advertisement is located in a normal young boy's bedroom that looks as if it has been lived in, so as to not alienate the audience by making it seem too tidy. The director has chosen the bedroom because it is where individuals spend most of their time when they are ill.
The advertisement starts with the boy dressed in his pyjamas in bed and you see his little sister dressed in normal clothes giving her brother a get-well card, which she has made herself. There is a voice over, which could arguably be the father figure. He says " Sally says get well in her own way". This emphasises that the boy is recovering from illness and also that there is a loving family relationship. The boy thanks her and then tries looking for his drum. The drum set is a symbol of energy and is continually used throughout the advertisement. He eventually finds them and starts beating the drum. There is another voice over saying "But you know nothing says 'get better' soon better than Lucozade."
The mother is then shown for the first time, she interrupts him and takes him into a new room where she pours him a glass of Lucozade. There is an extreme close up of the glucose drink in the next shot. He is now back in his room playing the drum, when the mother walks in and says "come on noisy" and hands him the glass of Lucozade. He stops drumming after her words and takes a large sip of the drink and looks back at his mum lovingly. A voice over cuts in and says " He's well on the mend now." There is a shot of the drums being left and the narrator says with "And when he wouldn't eat, Lucozade gave him energy to help him get there." The boy with his mother behind him hits the Lucozade bottle instead of his drum, and the narrator finishes with, "Yes Lucozade, Lucozade aids recovery."
The packaging is a large glass bottle, which can only be used in the home. The bottle is wrapped in orange cellophane to give it a medicinal look, which makes the packaging stand out.
The man delivering the voiceover sounds like he is about 40-50 years old, and his voice sounds authoritative, trustworthy and professional to help you believe what he is saying, he could be considered to be the father figure who is away from home working.
The slogan "Lucozade Aids Recovery" obviously suggests that the drink aids recovery. The written slogan reinforces what the narrator says. It is shown at the end and is a clear, snappy and memorable statement, which repeats the word "Aid" ("Lucozade Aids Recovery") to achieve this. This makes it sound like a fact.
The second advertisement was shown during 1980. It features Daley Thompson, the Olympic decathlon champion, who is shown growing tired during a training session. He drinks Lucozade, which refreshes him and gives him the energy to start running again. The celebrity, Daley Thompson is used to endorse Lucozade because he was very popular at the time. He was the Olympic Decathlon champion, and Lucozade wanted to be associated with his success. In doing this Lucozade changed its image and expanded its target audience to the sporting youth market. This is evident in many places: The music used is a heavy metal style, which was popular with teenagers at the time. The nature of the music is loud and at a motivating pace, which builds up to a point (when the traffic light goes green). Because of this nature of loud and rhythmic music the listener will hear and associate the music with the brand, and the brand with the product making the product better known.
The bottle shape has also changed, although the old large bottle is still on sale. The new bottle is much smaller, making it portable. It has changed from being a medicinal type drink to a refreshing energy drink that people can carry around with them and buy in any shop. Daley Thompson shows how portable it is when he flicks the bottle in the air with one hand.
The narrative of the second advert is Daily Thompson training on the running track. He gets tired during the training and pulls out a new slim portable, bottle of Lucozade. This gives him a burst of energy. And he resumes his position in the starting blocks. There is then a traffic light sequence where the advert is building up to a huge finale, aided by the music. He then bursts out of the blocks and storms down the racetrack. It is a great spectacle to watch, seeing him in full flight. The camera shows his physique and also the product placement of the Addidas logo on his shirt. You get the shot of him with his face and shoulders then a caption comes up and you hear Des Lynem, the sports commentator saying "Lucozade the refreshing glucose drink." That reinforces the whole sporting aspect.
The Traffic lights are used in an abstract way, which gives the advertisement a more modern approach. The fast editing style enhances the dynamism of the product, which gives the advertisement pace and makes it exciting and explosive to watch. The director has also used advanced techniques like crossing the line where you see him burst out of the starting blocks from one side then the camera moves back in time and you see him do the same but from another angle, again making the advert more exciting and explosive to watch.
In the third Advertisement, made in 1999, the campaign centres around the computer game character Lara Croft. Lara is shown being chased by a pack of wolves in a typical Tomb Raider scenario set in a huge temple like complex, and runs out of ammunition for her handguns. She turns showing her perfect body and starts to run until she arrives at a ruined bridge and almost falls off. You see a lantern fall down the seemingly bottomless drop. There is no way across, and the pack of wild wolves with snarling teeth and red eyes are ready to pounce on her. Lara is trapped. Her face changes she looks slightly worried. She bends down and reaches inside her rucksack. The in-game inventory pops up, and Lara scrolls through various snack foods that stereotypically give energy: a chocolate bar, a can of cola caffeine, until she gets to a picture of the Lucozade bottle. She skips all the other products as if she is disregarding them and the only thing that can save her is Lucozade. The drink is selected and as in the game zooms towards the viewer. You then see her drinking the Lucozade; there is a crabbing effect round her face and drink. Lara turns around to face the dogs with a knowing smile on her face. You then get a dog's eye view of her blowing a very feminine kiss at them. There is great emphasis on the sound of the kiss, the clicking of the guns when they were empty and also when she breathed a sigh of relief when she was refreshed after drinking the Lucozade. These were all highlighted by the silence, apart from those actions in the scene and therefore adding emphasis on these particular sounds. These subtleties give the advertisement depth and shape. You then get a high angled shot of her jumping off the broken bridge then a low angle close up of the dogs jumping off following her to their doom. Lara manages to grab onto a ledge and save herself. She leaps up onto the broken bridge showing her enhanced features and pulls out the Lucozade bottle to show the audience, the name and new style of bottle. This creates the image that Lucozade will save you in times of crisis, will give you confidence and make you successful as well as providing you with much needed energy. The Lucozade seems to give her the mental and physical energy to save herself, for she now jumps off the bridge. She has outsmarted the wolves with the help of Lucozade.
Lucozade has kept its male youth market by involving several features in this advertisement. Lara's breasts and bottom have been accentuated to enhance the sex appeal of the advertisement. The computer graphics style would also be appealing to young computer game players, which has become a hugely popular leisure activity.
Lucozade has now expanded its appeal to women as well, by having a female heroine, who would feature as the female icon or role model. She also challenges the wolves, which are depicted as evil by their foaming mouths and red eyes, creating a good versus evil theme. Lara is depicted as independent and confident (when she blows the wolves a kiss before jumping off the bridge) and she does not need a man to save her even though she shows the fear of the wolves when she runs out of ammunition and her pupils shrink, which would appeal to women.
Throughout the advert, Lara's energy bar is displayed at the top of the screen, just like in the game. When Lara drinks the Lucozade the energy bar moves from almost empty to full, which shows how energizing Lucozade really is.
The bottle has changed to a more streamline shape with the brand name adopting the same streamline shape of the bottle. There is also a soundtrack to this advert, which is very distorted; there are no patterns or rhythms to it. This adds to the overall scene of danger and rapid movements as she tries to get away from the wolves.
When Lara slams the Lucozade in front of the camera she is saying that it is one of her most useful things in her Tomb Raiding adventures and she doesn't know where she would be without it and is inviting you to try it and buy it too.
Overall I think the adverts have been incredibly successful at achieving what they set out to do. They have produced very griping adverts that make the viewer watch with interest and awe. Each advertisement has captured the feel and trend of that particular moment in time. Making the audience want to buy the product to help them in their lives, whether they are performing sport, recovering from illness or escaping from some extreme and challenging situation!