Vita-gum is being targeted towards a mixed gender including young adults, upper working class professionals and people who seek an active and healthy lifestyle. The typical vita-gum consumer will have a prospering lifestyle and need enough disposable income to select this type of gum, than compared to a cheaper branded gum that Wrigley’s possesses. It is thought that A, B and C1 consumer’s within the social-economic classification would be best suited to this type of product as they have the income to support the purchasing of Vita-gum. Financially strong people are more likely to take risks, and more apparent to try a new gum such as Vita-gum.
Consumer’s within this social-economic class prefer to spend their income on luxury goods, which can be linked to the Self-Concept theory. This theory defines that ‘people buy goods and services for the brand that they represent and its relation to the buyers’ perception of their own self concept or personality’ (Dubios and Duquense 1993, cited in Baines et al, 2008 p.116). In other words, consistently purchasing luxury products such as Vita-gum, than opposed to Wrigley’s cheaper brands symbolises their own values within their personality - they want what’s best, that’s available to them. Vita-gum would provide a substitute for any consumers who take various vitamin tablets - reiterating the point that people can take this form of vitamin intake on the move.
Vita-gum has been created in such a way that it’s trying to stop people from snacking between meals. This especially applies to adults as ‘Nine in ten British adults eat snacks between meals, nearly half of them on a daily basis. There are in total an estimated 13 billion at-home snacking occasions a year, and 6.4 billion occasions on the go’. (Mintel, 2008)
Age was a key demographic component in the selection of target markets for this innovative product. Evidence of this is expressed in Figure 2 below, showing that children consuming chewing gum dropped by 7 percentage points between 2002 and 2006. Although this data is a few years old it’s still relevant as to the present day where healthy eating is very important.
Figure 2: Bar graph showing consumption of Bubblegum and Chewing gum by 7-14 year olds between 2002 and 2006
Source: Mintel (2007)
Children’s decline in consumption of chewing gum has largely been put down to a “health crackdown” (Mintel, 2007). As a result, parents (especially mothers) are encouraging their children to eat more healthily, inevitably reducing the amount of purchases spent on chewing gum for their children. Furthermore, with reference to age, a child is less likely to worry about what products are good or bad for them. They are more likely to buy chewing gum or bubble gum products which contain sugar as this would satisfy their needs better; instead of more functional and healthier types of chewing gum such as Vita-gum. Children may use selective exposure when purchasing chewing gum without even realising it. In this case, they are filtering out irrelevant information which they do not require and buying chewing gum/bubble gum which appeals to them, for example, high in sugar than opposed to sugar free.
Figure 3 shows how functional the use of chewing gum actually is rather than it just being a snack alternative. ‘Sugar-free gum now dominates sector sales, and is the most widely used product’ (Mintel, 2009). This is emphasized in figure 2 below as 68% of chewers asked found that the sugar-free feature of chewing gum is the most important feature, emphasizing the interest in functional benefits of chewing gum. For young adults nowadays there is always the concern about maintaining a good figure so calorie consuming is of big importance – this is especially the case for young women. The diet factor plays an important part in this as consumer’s chew sugar-free gum as a low calorie snacking alternative to help slimming. Moreover, this can be perceived once again as evidence of Maslow’s theory of motivation, which states ‘self actualisation is reaching the full potential of one that is capable of doing’ (Maslow 1943, citied in Baines et al, 2008 p.14). In doing this a consumer is fulfilling their potential by having the ideal figure and feeling confident about themselves, as this product can act as an alternative to snacking in between meals. The diet factor is a huge motivation for this target market Vita-gum’s main selling point is its health benefits, and for young adults this would be a huge incentive to buy.
Figure 3: Bar graph showing the appealing features of chewing gum 2007 based on 1000 adults aged 16+.
Source: Mintel (2007)
The table also shows that 7% of people also chew gum for functional benefits e.g. vitamins. Even though this statistic is low its still represents a positive correlation in the sense that no chewing gum such as vita gum has been tried and tested before. However through Wrigley’s, Vita-gum will draw a positive association to consumers and this percentage has the potential to rapidly rise.
Vita-gum appeals to the consumer’s psychographic interests – people who are intent on carrying out a healthy lifestyle. For this reason healthier people target adequate vitamin intake to maintain their health fitness. Moreover, this would be an ideal product to sell to these sorts of customers as they can pocket this product and chew the gum at their own accord as they are likely to be on the move a lot.
4. Brand positioning
Vita-gum is a unique brand and is a designed differently to other brands competing in the same market, which will allow customers’ to perceive something completely different, namely through product differentiation. ‘Product differentiation seeks to increase the value of the product or service on offer to the consumer’ (Hooley et al, 2004 p.375). The brand offered is different from other brands; it offers that extra quality in value. In view of the customer’s mind the packaging colour will be different to other competing brands in the same market. The product will also deliver better functional needs in terms of health benefits to the consumer as opposed to other chewing gum brands in the market.
Perceptual mapping provides an excellent illustrating of how competitors and branded products are competing in the same market. ‘Perceptual mapping represents a geometric comparison of how competing products are perceived’ (Sinclair and Stalling, 1990 pg.58). Figure 4 below shows how other competitors are fairing in the market, but also show how some Wrigley’s own brands are performing based on the price of gum and the quality perceived in terms of functional use to the customer. It also highlights gaps for where Vita gum could be positioned relative to other competing brands. There is definitely an opportunity for Vita-gum to be launched into the market. Although chewing gum is improving with each innovation, there is still room for improvement in searching for a better quality product - Vita-gum, therefore; justifies this. Even if the price is more expensive than opposed to competing products, the quality assures why customers will have to pay a little bit more. It will provide excellent competition with Cadbury’s 5 Gum and Peppersmith’s peppermint gum.
Figure 4: Perceptual map showing examples of Wrigley’s brands and competitive brands in the same industry based on supermarket prices and the quality of the product to the consumer.
5. Marketing Mix
Marketing mix is essential to developing Vita-gum. By doing so it allows to devise plans for marketing this product. The four P’s (Product, Price, Place (distribution) and Promotion) known in marketing terms can help to help to differentiate Vita-gum from the rest of the competition it faces within the chewing gum market.
‘Whatever the product is whether tangible or intangible, it can always be broken down into bundles of benefits that means different things to different buyers’ (Brassington and Pettitt, 2006, p. 290). The product offer of Vita-gum can be differentiated from other brands of chewing gum in the market. The total product offer shown in Figure 5 helps to position this product as something extra beneficial to the customer. Levitt (1986, cited in Hooley et al, 2004 pp376-377) suggested that ‘products can be seen on three main levels, being the core product, the actual product and the augmented product’.
Figure 5: Total Product Offer
Source: Marketingteacher.com (2010)
The product life cycle enables to distinguish the stage of where the product is at. Day.S (1981) constructed the product life cycle into 5 stages known as ‘the introduction, growth, maturity, saturation and decline stage’. Vita-gum will go through each of these stages over its lifetime. However, Vita-gum is presented within this model at the introduction stage largely because this is a new innovative product, which hasn’t received the awareness to make it flourish in the market as of yet. However through promotion techniques this awareness can be obtained, which will be discussed further on in the report.
Distributing this product is very important. It’s needs to be distributed in locations which are prosperous and wealthy. High income earners are likely to buy this product therefore the distribution needs to meet these customer’s needs. Identifiable areas using ACORN index can identify household locations in relation to family income. For example, Greater London is most associated with wealthy people; therefore this would provide an excellent example for where this product should be channelled and distributed to. To get the best out of this product it is important to use a selective distribution strategy whereby some, but not all available outlets will be used. Again adopting this strategy will set out an easier task of reaching the intended targets. Moreover, a selective strategy is appropriate for this product as we need to see acceptance of this product in the gum market. Further on down the line once the product becomes noticed within the gum market and sales increase, a more intensive strategy can be developed focusing the distribution on as many outlets as possible.
In addition, Wrigley’s Plymouth based factory will provide the excellent assistance of shipping the product around the country to the important retail outlets. This product is not high-risk to the customer; therefore the channel distribution doesn’t require a lot of knowledge within its intermediaries and can be transferred from Wrigley’s straight to its retail outlets. The access of Vita-gum for customers is very important. It’s classification as an impulse product means it needs to be in view of the customer’s when they go to purchase their goods at the till. If this doesn’t happen then the likelihood is that this product won’t achieve the sales it can aspire to.
Vita –gum will adopt a market penetration strategy as it would be seen the most logical tactic to go ahead with the launch of this product. For this reason, charging a lower price at first will hopefully embark on a large volume of sales and recoup the necessary research and development investment that way. Additionally, if the consumer purchases the product consistently then this will symbolise their intent of liking this product. Furthermore, a few months down the line the price can increase if sales figures are high. At this point, customers may still purchase the product at a higher price as it had become habit forming to them, knowing that it’s of good quality. In terms of value, Vita-gum will provide consumers with that extra quality to their chewing gum making it more of a luxury product as it satisfies needs of consumer in many ways. A, B and C1 customer’s within the socio-economic classification will go the extra mile to spend money on a particular product such as this one as will people who are intent on pursuing a healthy lifestyle.
Based on competitor prices in the chewing gum market, this product will be priced at £1.99, incorporating 15 pieces of chewing gum. This may be a higher price when compared to other chewing gum brands, but the quality of this product will justify its price. However, during its initial phases the product will be reduced by 25% of its long term price to intensify sales. This period will stand for 5-6 weeks and will be priced at £1.49.
Finally promoting this product will help to position the product and communicate with the intended target markets. ‘Marketing communications is the process of transmitting messages with the objective of making the organisation’s products attractive to target audiences’ (Doyle P, 2006 p.248). The product will appeal rationally focusing on the functional benefits of the product. By influencing the buyer’s behaviour and getting the message across that this product satisfies the needs of the consumer it is more likely to attract the target markets that have been specified. The perceived benefits put across will engage the consumer towards the product mainly through emphasizing its health benefits. The products emotional appeal will seek to evoke positive feelings about the brand to motivate purchase. In this sense the emotional appeal will involve David Beckham holding vita-gum. Being such an iconic figure, people will be drawn to his presence, acting as a pull strategy to influence consumer behaviour. The Vita-gum advert will operate on ITV1 between the hours of 7pm and 11pm as these target markets are more likely to watch television during this period.
Furthermore, posters will also act as another function for promoting this product to the customer. The picture will incorporate an image what is shown within the advert. This will be constructed as an image of David Beckham holding Vita-gum. Again this should draw the attention of customer’s to the product as they will know straight away who the person on the poster is. Vita-gum will also be representative in health magazines for both young men and women. Again this will pinpoint its focus on the functional and rational appeals it offers to the reader, mainly targeting people who adopt a healthy lifestyle. Vita-gum will also give the opportunity for customers to view the product online. The website will be printed in writing in the various mediums mentioned allowing people to have a more detailed look at the product and what it offers to them.
The campaign intensity will cover a period of 2-3 months. This should provide enough time for the delivery of the product’s rational and emotional appeals to the customers. Results of the intensive campaign will include monitoring the number of sales once the advert has been first shown to the public. The website will also act as a form of monitoring results– numbers will be monitored to see how many people visit the website. On entering the website customers will briefly have to select their age category, what their occupation is and what their interests are in order to analyse if the target markets specified are being targeted appropriately.
In conclusion Vita gum is definitely in line for a push into the gum market. Based on market research and customer preference this type of product would be well suited to the public. Moreover, Wrigley’s is one of the leading gum company’s therefore its recognition in the market is attractive to consumers. With Wrigley’s own new innovative brand Vita-gum consumers will draw a positive association to the product knowing it’s of top quality.
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