Le fiasco Tropicana: les chiffres

Un post de BusinessWeek nous donne les chiffres permettant de comprendre pourquoi Tropicana a retiré des linéaires son nouveau pack aussi rapidement (voir mon post du 22 mars dernier):

After its package redesign, sales of the Tropicana Pure Premium line plummeted 20% between Jan. 1 and Feb. 22, costing the brand tens of millions of dollars. On Feb. 23, the company announced it would bow to consumer demand and scrap the new packaging, designed by Peter Arnell. It had been on the market less than two months.

“Now that the numbers are out, it’s clear why PepsiCo’s Tropicana moved as fast as it did. According to Information Resources Inc., unit sales dropped 20%, while dollar sales decreased 19%, or roughly $33 million, to $137 million between Jan. 1 and Feb. 22. Moreover, several of Tropicana’s competitors appear to have benefited from the misstep, notably Minute Maid, Florida’s Natural and Tree Ripe. Varieties within each of those brands posted double-digit unit sales increases during the period. Private-label products also saw an increase during the period, in keeping with broader trends in the food and beverage space.”

I can still see Arnell at the press conference so carefully twisting off the contoured orange cap of his carton that was sculpted to mimic the skin of an orange. When I was in the stores, though, what I found was that the caps hadn’t yet made the production line. So, what you found was the new carton with the old plain cap. That must have been what undercut the whole philosophical and cosmic reason for why the washed out graphics and generic-brand-looking package failed to make consumers think of refreshing juice. Yeah…that must have been the reason.

137 millions de dollars perdus suite à un changement de packaging: qui peut encore douter de l'importance du pack dans l'image d'une marque? Mon expérience ces dernières années à la tête d'une agence de design packaging m'a prouvé que les marques sous-estiment souvent ce media (contrairement aux MDD dont c'est le seul moyen de communication). Le packaging est un media stratégique essentiel d'image de la marque et doit donc être traité comme tel: puis je ainsi suggérer que les Directeurs Marketing s'en préoccupent directement et ne le confient plus aux seuls chefs de produits? Bon bien sûr s'occuper de la pub est tellement plus sexy....