Although the “new” Tropicana package has been pulled off the shelf for quite awhile, I still get asked about it all the time. And as I think about the big takeaway from all those discussions, I am concerned that the poor performance by Tropicana (or more accurately, Pepsi and the Arnell Group) has made some corporate leaders apprehensive about investing in better package design.At the end of the day, the Tropicana story is proof positive that great packaging design should be treated as a strategic activity. Here are three things that every VP, marketing director, or brand manager can do to avoid a calamity of Tropicana-like proportions:
1) Know your visual brand equities. All consumer-oriented companies do the work to establish their brand positioning and brand foundations. Leading edge companies also do the research to understand how the positioning and foundations should translate visually and what the implications are for various product pillars and packaging types.
2) Direct the agency (not vice versa). Engage your agencies early and tell them where your brands are headed. If you don’t come in with a clear perspective, the ad or design agency will tell you what they think—sometimes too convincingly in the case of Arnell—and the results may be in conflict with both the heritage of your brand and your long-term strategy.
3) Test for the right things. Nearly all companies do consumer testing to see what designs are preferred by consumers. But here’s the thing: consumers always prefer designs that they feel are more familiar, and as a result, marketing never learns if a breakthrough design is truly horrible (or just interestingly different).
4 comments:
I can not believe this! Just three hours ago, roughly, we were talking about Tropicana and how they put that little spout on top- because we bought some (horrid) Lemon Lime. We like the spout, but not its contents. All the razz-ma-tazz in the world won't make up for gunk inside.
Could you be more specific as to Tropicana's failure?
In January of this year, Tropicana unveiled a new packaging design for their orange juice cartons. It was a poorly-conceived design that failed to consider Tropicana's design equities and looked very generic. Consumers revolted vociferously, and less than 2 months later, Tropicana scrapped the design and brought back the old "straw in an orange" carton. Various estimates suggest that sales of Tropicana Pure Premium fell 20% during the six weeks that the new package was out, and Pepsico (Tropicana's parent company) lost around $35 million because of the effort.
Whoa! Thank you for the clarification. I'm from Oklahoma originally (though I don't admit it, living here in Texas) and we have a saying, "If it ain't broke..don't fix it." Thirty five million is nothing to sneeze at, is it?
M'bad- it was actually Minute-Maid juice I mistook for Tropicana.
Maybe they should have rolled out a significantly smaller test market first. I try to ask myself when things don't go as I planned,"Well, what'd I learn?"
Well, what'd they learn?
I think that Pepsico learned that they should have obtained a better understanding of what the core visual equities of their brands (Pepsi, Tropicana, and Gatorade) are first...and then figure out how best to evolve them. Coke has changed its packaging in various ways over the years too, but one thing they never change drastically is the curvy bottle shape.
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