Promoting Brand Simplicity in Food and Drinks: Reducing product claims, brand dilution and private label threat

Promoting Brand Simplicity in Food and Drinks
Reducing product claims, brand dilution and private label threat

The proliferation and diversification of brands has meant that there are many, sometimes conflicting, brand messages for the consumer to absorb. To counteract the many complexities that consumers have to deal with during the in shopping trips, manufacturers need to make purchasing decisions easier for consumers. This can be achieved by marketing simplicity as a premium benefit. Refining brand values, going back to original packaging and making packaging clearer are all ways that manufacturers are using simplicity in product and packaging formulation.

Promoting Brand Simplicity in Food and Drinks is a new report by Business Insights that analyzes the consumer demand for simplicity and how manufacturers can make the most of this opportunity through the production and marketing of food and drinks.

Enhance your strategies for building and maintaining brand simplicity using the actionable recommendations provided by this new report...

This new report will enable you to
• Implement the best-practice brand strategies of leading innovators in the food and drinks market using this report’s analysis of food and drinks companies including ‘Innocent’ and ‘Green & Black’s’.

• Improve the effectiveness of your product marketing with this report’s analysis of claims on 15,000 food and drinks product launches between 2005 and 2008.

• Understand the threat of private label based on this report’s private label data in Europe and the US between 2006-2011, highlighting ways manufacturers can minimize threat by promoting simplicity.

• Identify the key drivers of consumer complexity in the food and drinks market and quantify the new opportunities that emerge for manufacturers and retailers.


Key issues examined by this report
• Complex food and drinks packaging. Product packaging is becoming more complicated and confusing for consumers to understand due to the increasing amount of claims and more scientific labelling on packaging.

• Concern over artificial colors and flavors. Consumers are becoming more concerned about the effect of artificial colorings and flavorings. This is driving the increased demand for natural and organic food and drinks.

• Brand extensions diluting core values. The increasing amount of brand extensions has meant that the core product message reaching the consumers is often weak and the product’s brand values are diluted.

• Promoting simplicity in store. Retailers are promoting simplicity in store, by developing market place formats to replicate farmers and local markets to instill trust in consumers.

Your questions answered
• How are retailers promoting simplicity in store?
• What is driving the need for simplicity?
• How can manufacturers promote simplicity as a premium product attribute?
• How can manufacturers prevent the dilution of a product’s core brand values?
• Who are the key players leading the way in brand simplicity in food and drinks?
• How do private label brands add to consumer complexity?

Some key findings from this report
• In 2007 5.9% of products launched in Europe and the US made at least one product claim, whereas 3.9% of products had at least six claims. This highlights the added complexities consumers are facing in terms of labelling when they choose a product.

• Private label sales in Germany are set to rise by a CAGR of 4.8% by 2011; this is linked to the growth of discounters in Germany and the acceptance of private label. Private label brands are growing in popularity in the UK.

• The amount of employed females in the US has risen from 69m in 2002 to 75m in 2008. The total figure for Europe has also risen from 178m in 2002 to 186m in 2008.

• Natural was the second most popular product claim in 2008 with 7.8% share. Manufacturers can utilize the growing popularity of natural food and drinks by using the back to nature theme of simplicity to develop products that have a simplistic positioning.

Table of Contents
Promoting Brand Simplicity in Food and Drinks
Executive Summary 8
Introduction 8
Drivers of complexity 8
Consumer need for simplicity 9
Promoting simple brand values 9
Simplicity in retailing 10
Conclusions 10
Chapter 1 Introduction 12
Summary 12
Introduction 12
Definition of simplicity 13
Simplicity in the purchase to consumption chain 15
Simplicity over time 16
Themes in simplicity 19
The scope of the report 20
Chapter 2 Drivers of complexity 24
Summary 24
Introduction 24
Private label 25
Private label sales 26
Brand extensions 30
Packaging 35
GDA and traffic lights food labeling 37
Chapter 3 Consumer need for simplicity 44
Summary 44
Introduction 44
Consumer time complexities 45
Number of hours worked per week 45
Increase of women workers 46
Demand for natural and organic 47
Regaining consumer trust 49
Simplicity by age 53
Chapter 4 Promoting simple brand values 56
Summary 56
Introduction 56
Simple brand values 57
Going back to simplicity 61
Taglines 61
Packaging 62
Making packaging clearer 64
Reducing claims 64
Making claims easier to understand 66
Chapter 5 Simplicity in retailing 70
Summary 70
Introduction 70
Retail propositions 71
Market place format 73
Carrefour 73
Morrisons 75
Farmers markets 76
Local sourcing 78
Private label brand values 81
Chapter 6 Conclusions 84
Summary 84
Introduction 84
Manufacturers 85
Promoting simple brand values 86
Labeling complexity 87
Retailers 88
Store layout 89
Longevity of the simplicity trend 89
Index 91
List of Figures
Figure 1.1: Definitions of simplicity 14
Figure 1.2: Simplicity in the purchase to consumption chain 15
Figure 1.3: Evolution of the Weetabix brand 18
Figure 1.4: Themes of simplicity 20
Figure 2.5: Private label, share of sales, by category, in Europe (%), 2006-2011 28
Figure 2.6: Private label, share of sales, by category, in US (%), 2006-2011 29
Figure 2.7: Examples of Coca-Cola’s brand extensions 31
Figure 2.8: Heartfield Food Soy Crunchies 36
Figure 2.9: GDA and traffic lights food labeling 39
Figure 2.10: Cadburys ‘Be treatwise’ labelling 40
Figure 3.11: Good Nature All Natural Antibiotic Free Pork 49
Figure 3.12: Level of consumer concern about potential risks related to food and drinks, 2006 51
Figure 3.13: Arizona Diet Green Tea - Blueberry 52
Figure 3.14: Simplicity for different age categories 53
Figure 4.15: Marmite 58
Figure 4.16: How Innocent promotes simplicity 60
Figure 4.17: Pot Noodle brand lifecycle 63
Figure 5.18: Wal-Mart’s Marketside Logo 72
Figure 5.19: Simple store layout at Carrefour Market Banner store 74
Figure 5.20: Market Street at Morrisons 75
Figure 5.21: Number of operating farmers markets in the US, 1994-2008 77
Figure 5.22: Reflets de France 78
Figure 5.23: Example of a Whole Foods Market store 80
Figure 5.24: Example of Tesco Value private label brand 81
Figure 6.25: Green & Black's Organic Chocolate Bar - Dark 85% Cocoa 87
Figure 6.26: The cyclical nature of simplicity 90
List of Tables
Table 1.1: Simplicity for consumers, manufacturers and retailers 21
Table 2.2: Private label food and drink brands of 5 leading retailers 26
Table 2.3: Private label sales in Europe and US ($m), 2006-2011 27
Table 2.4: Number of brand extensions of the top 10 leading global food and drinks brands, 2007-2008 30
Table 2.5: Number of brand extensions of the top 10 leading global food and drinks brands, by type, 2007-2008 33
Table 2.6: Claims on food and drinks packaging 37
Table 3.7: Average number of hours worked per week in Europe, 2001-2007 45
Table 3.8: Number of women in full time employment, in Europe and US (m), 2002-2008 46
Table 3.9: Natural and organic food and drinks market value in Europe and US, by category ($m), 2000-2010 48
Table 3.10: The level of trust consumers have in various claims made by packaged goods manufacturers, 2004 50
Table 4.11: Beer brand share in the US, by volume, (%), 2002-2006, 61
Table 4.12: Share of products launched with 1, 6 and 10 claims on packaging in Europe and US (%), 2005-2008 65
Table 4.13: Average number of claims on packaging, Europe and US, 2005-2008 65
Table 4.14: Top 20 claims on food and drinks packaging, Europe and US, 2005-2008 67
Table 5.15: How top 10 grocery retailers are using simplicity in store 71