BRAND MANAGEMENT – Case Analysis Reinventing Officer's Choice Whisky: Spoiled for Choice Q1. Analyze the competitive environment using 3C (Company, Customer, and Competition) analysis. Company Analysis: Bagpiper Their advertisement featured top Bollywood celebrities for decades, which indicated stature and imagery to the brand. Compared to the competitors, the execution in terms of visibility and availability is good. The five sister brands which the company has can be leveraged easily. Imperial Blue This brand has been widely appreciated as well as adopted by different customers. “Men will be men” campaign has been positioned so well that it has pulled many new customers to their way. Officer’s Choice There was not much activity around this product. No new communication observed, which portrayed the brand as unexciting. The positioning of this brand was losing ground as the position statement used by Officer’s Choice was very generic and not in line with the modern thinking. Customer Analysis: Bagpiper Energetic customers. Aggressive, but simple with a contemporary outlook. Middle to old age target audience. Imperial Blue Youthful, upper class customers who keep up with changing times. Stance is fashionable, well-groomed, and international. Suitable for all age groups. Officer’s Choice Mature audience. Disciplined, refined and gentlemanly. Respectable job with a friendly demeanour. Could not connect with younger customers. Competition analysis: USL’s Bagpiper Over 32% market share in the “regular” segment. Growing at CAGR of 12%. Celebrity led marketing advertising strategies. Five other sister brands that can be leveraged. Positioned strongly in the market on the platform of bonding. Seagram’s Imperial Blue Growing at a CAGR of 28%. Positioned “Men will be men” campaign well. Packaging is of international standards. Huge share of voice in regular whisky, driven by regular TVC ads. Q2. What was the need for rebranding OCW? Officer’s Choice Whisky (OCW) was the flagship brand of Allied Blenders and Distillers (ABD). OCW was selling 6.6 million cases per year with only a 15 percent share of the regular whisky segment. Bagpiper Whisky from United Spirits Ltd. Was the market leader selling over 6.63 million cases more than OCW annually. OCW’s goal was to become the leading placer in the alcoholic beverages industry. 99% of the volume and value contribution of ABD comes from OCW, so the entire marketing mix had to be looked over for OCW to attain its goal. The market leader Bagpiper Whisky advertising strategy was celebrity endorsements. The rapidly growing Imperial Blue brand was weaning away younger users from Bagpiper and OCW with its smart packaging and innovative advertising. Therefore, OCW needed to change track and appeal to the under 30 market (nearly 60% of India was under the age of 30). According to the market research conducted, OCW was low on salience and was unable to connect to consumers at an emotional level. OCW’s communication was not differentiated enough and its packaging lacked a contemporary feel. The price-value perception of the brand was low as compared to competing brands. Hence, rebranding was required by the brand. Q3. Compare and contrast the MARCOM, and positioning strategies employed by OCW, Bagpiper and Imperial Blue. Whiskey was strongly associated with fun and togetherness. So brands need to position themselves in a way that they enter into consumer’s mind. The emotional associations of whisky included success, fun and togetherness. OCW, Bagpiper and Imperial Blue are in the regular whisky segment and having a market share of 15.32%, 32.22 and 7.41, respectively. Bagpiper is the best performing out of all. Officer’s choice whisky: OCW was positioned on the platform of “Dare to do things” and expressed as “Challenge Yourself” which signifies qualities of an officer as the tagline communicated, it was done so that consumers could see as their alter ego fighting their own insecurities and fears. But still the brand was low on salience and communication was not very differentiated also very basic. OCW remained very monotonous in its packaging and communication due to which brand became vulnerable. It was not able to connect with consumers emotionally as it didn’t focus on emotional aspects like fun, togetherness and success. Bagpiper: Bagpiper was positioned on the platform of “bonding” which was a key emotional aspect for association. It used the tagline “life will be colourful when three friends sit down together” targeting the minds of consumer in a way that they consider Bagpiper as a brand which can be enjoyed with friends. It was good in salience and connected with people on emotional level, Bagpiper have a strong association with movies as the brand was endorsed by Bollywood actors in its advertising campaigns over the years and focussed on brand personality like strong, masculine and rugged as the advertisements were done by celebrities like Akshay Kumar, Sunny Deol and Ajay Devgan who are known for their macho attitude in Bollywood industry. Imperial Blue: IB was positioned on the platform of “men will be men” (innately male) which focusses on understanding the inherent nature and habits of men. IB showed a lot of promise in terms of brand and imagery, it was known for its quality, international packaging and successful advertising as people could relate to it and empathize with it. IB was good in salience and carried the rich heritage of Seagram which won rave reviews consumers and helped in winning new customers. It focussed on brand personality like stylish and confident which helped to have a decent customer base. Q4. Frame appropriate evaluation criteria on the basis of market research data presented in the case. Comment on the criticality of the third pillar “Reconnecting with Consumers” while selecting the creative. Major findings from the Market Research data in the Case: OCW was being viewed as an individual’s brand rather than social bonding, but it is stature still high among its own/ existing users. The existing communication was also positioned around "Challenge yourself", that did not differentiate itself with other whisky brands in the segment, which depicted similar men’s daring behaviour in new situation, with advertisements revolved around success, achievement, masculinity which didn't tune with the modern thinking. Research found that for regular whisky consumers, a "sense of recognition" was a key motivator and only "right" actions and choices gave him an edge in his peer group. OCW consumer is a man of limited means, someone who has not made it big in life, pessimistic about future, but is hard working, family oriented and a believer of doing good things to earn respect and admiration. Why consumers drank OCW: Good taste, bond with "Officer" word- that gave them the sense of status, recognition and administration that lacked their life. Major Drawbacks: Static image and lack of saliency/ visibility, too mature, serious, absence of rewards and exotic campaigns by its competitors were not helping. Appropriate evaluation criteria for the suitable Campaign presentations by the marketing agencies, based on the market research data presented in the case are as follows: 1. Does the Campaign create a fresh appeal and higher emotional pay-off for the brand? 2. How Disruptive/ well differentiated is the campaign from its existing competitors? 3. How consumer oriented is the campaign, i.e., "Born out of a strong consumer Insight”? 4. How Heart share (share of heart refers to creating and maintaining emotional bond or relationship with consumers) winning is the campaign? 5. The extent to which the campaign can create an experiential and emotional connect with the customer. 6. How effective and strong is the campaign in retaining its existing customer? 7. How attractive and innovative is the campaign in generating the new modern customers? 8. How easily could the creatives of the following campaign be expressed on different platforms? 9. How profitable is the overall campaign in near future for ABD? The criticality with the third pillar “Reconnecting with Consumers” while selecting the creative were that it should all cater to form an innovative and out-of-the-box comprehensive integrated marketing communication (IMC), a 360-degree campaign around the selected positioning platform. Q5. Objectively evaluate the proposed creatives using the evaluation framework developed as an answer to Q4 and recommend the creative that should be chosen with appropriate reasons. Criteria Fresh appeal Emotional Pay off Born out of consumer insight Heart share winning Strong retention/reconnection with existing consumers Innovative/ attractive to new consumers Disruptive/Differentiated? Route 1 Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Route 2 Yes No No No No No Yes Yes No There are a few harsh calls in the above binary objective evaluation, but such is the trade-off involved in the case of OCW. We cannot create a different fresh appeal but rather the appeal has gone from “Challenge yourself” to “Awaken the officer in you” dealing a more considerable heart connect and a more emotional statement to the consumer than appealing to modern values. Route 1 reconnects with the core values that the brand stands for and speaks to the existing consumers in a much stronger way than route 2, it is well differentiated in the market with other brands standing for very different values. It does not fully communicate to the youth demographic, but the values are attractive to any man who wants to be recognised for his deeds, integrity and values. Route 1 is a relevant clear disruptive communication, born out of immense consumer insight, delivering a strong heart share winning message to the consumers. It is a clear winner.