Sweet Popcorn Branding Assignment Sample

Managing the Growth Tradeoff

Introduction to Sweet Popcorn Branding

The Woolworths has largest supermarket chains in Australia engaging in sweet and salty snacks products. The Woolworths Group engaged in retail operations for many years and provides its customers a wide range of snaking products. The sweet popcorn has several brands in the market with great level of competition (Klimchuk and Krasovec,2013). The customers are craving for unique taste so the Woolworths decided to introduce another sweet popcorn brand in its production house.

Discussion on Sweet Popcorn Branding

In recent market scenario, many company having single product line with multiple brand names as per market requirements and segmentation. The demand of the product decides the multi- brand policy for similar products with a way to secure a safer place and remaining little for other competitors in the market. Introducing new product range in existing market is a typical example of product development in competitive market. The main snacking product of Woolworths is sweet popcorn and it is sold in either way of plain salted or mix with some other sweet flavor popcorn. As a company’s category manger, a new responsibility given to create a second brand of sweet popcorn range and compete with largest competitors in the market. For that complete study of market competition, roll out new campaigns and create unique market strategy is important.

The main competitor of Woolworth’s sweet popcorn products is the market leader Kettle sweet popcorn (owned by Campbell of US) company that selling wide range of premium salty and sweet snacks in US. If Woolworth wants to introduce one more product range in sweet popcorn then it should choose substitute for Snickers popcorn as it is the best premium popcorn range in the market. If the company starts manufacturing product like Snickers popcorn then it will increase the competition in sweet popcorn product range. The following questions should be considered before launching second premium brand of sweet popcorn are-

Who is the target market?

Upon introduction of new brand in single product range, the Woolworth Company should target the specific product type which they want to introduce in the snacking market. Snickers popcorn is the premium popcorn has unique taste of nuts and caramel with mix of salty popcorn that attracts consumers (Ahmad and Rajput,2011). To promote distinctive flavor popcorn in the market Snickers popcorn is the best target to achieve the success in the snaking industry. The category manager of Woolworths should acknowledge the taste of public who prefer premium products in their daily life and prefer unique taste with no compromise in health.

Woolworth should target the segment of healthy snacks with great taste and introduce such premium sweet popcorn product that have no preservatives, 100% freshly made with high fiber and low fat (Klimchuk and Krasovec,2013). In short they should experiment with existing products in the market but create a different product to target the audience in the competitive market.

How will the product quality of other brands influence new brand?

The quality of other existing brands of popcorn provide impact on new brand of same product as the existing products capture the market with their unique specifications, taste, flavor and pricing aspect. Kettle popcorn is the well known taste maker with crunchy, sweetie and salty taste in its product (Monica and Bala?, 2014). Snickers popcorn has unique taste of caramel, nuts in bar pieces with a match of sweet and salty popcorn. Other top brands in the snacking market are Oreo popcorn, Twix popcorn and Mrs Fields Popcorn Nibblers all of them provide top quality products and leads the popcorn market. Oreo popcorn brand gives a great deal for moviegoers with a taste of Oreo cookies in the salty popcorn (Bilgili and Ozkul,2015). On the other hand Mrs Fields Popcorn Nibblers provide very chocolaty flavour in the popcorn that defiantly attracts small children group and Twix popcorn brand gives unique fluffy with real Twix pieces in the popcorn. So it will not easy to introduce new sweet popcorn brand in such competitive market for Woolworths Company but the category manger of v the Company may suggests some product based decisions that target the consumer’s taste and minimizes the competition (Keller,2017). 

How will the lack of brand awareness be overcome?

Brand awareness is the most important aspect in marketing strategy by which consumer recognized the product in the competitive market. On launching new brand product first thing the company should do is the branding of sweet popcorn in much unique way(Suki and Sasmita,2015). Lack of brand awareness causes major issue of failure the new product in the snacking market and so to overcome such issues basic steps must be taken by the Woolworths Company (Monica and Bala?, 2014). Some of them are-

• Maximum usage of native advertisement
• Runs ads on social media platform
• Influence the target audience with factor of healthy snacks
• Think and act promptly on brand awareness
• Implement sharable info graphics i
• Start new referral programs
• Improve SEO related activities to promote the brand in online platform
• Build voice for snaking brand in the market
• Start podcasting and brand partnership with other mature brands in popcorn industry

Where should the brand position in snacking category?

The brand positioning increase customer relevancy and maximize brand value in the market. In popcorn industry where already top brands capture the snacking market in such situation brand positioning identify competitors(Monica and Bala?, 2014). It develops distinct value base idea to understand the popcorn market in better way. Brand positioning also identifies the right competitor of the same product and act accordingly. Quality based brand positioning is most import in popcorn industry. To identify in sweet popcorn category Woolworths must focus on quality brand positioning and target the consumer on that factor(Suki and Sasmita,2015).

When should the product introduced in the market?

At first the new brand of sweet popcorn introduced in local market then spread through the marketing to other states. The Sydney metro stores is selected by the Woolworths company to first launch the product with through market research and strong responsibility control over quality. After through quality check and proper brand positioning the new brand of sweet popcorn may be introduce in Sydney metro stores.

References for Sweet Popcorn Branding

Ahmad, M.S. and Rajput, A., 2011. DOES BRAND EXTENSION IMPACT PARENT BRAND: A CASE OF JOHNSON, UK. Management & Marketing Journal, 9(1).

Bilgili, B. and Ozkul, E., 2015. Brand awareness, brand personality, brand loyalty and consumer satisfaction relations in brand positioning strategies (A Torku brand sample). Journal of Global Strategic Management| Volume, 9(2).

Keller, K.L., 2017. Managing the growth tradeoff: Challenges and opportunities in luxury branding. In Advances in luxury brand management (pp. 179-198). Palgrave Macmillan, Cham.

Klimchuk, M.R. and Krasovec, S.A., 2013. Packaging design: Successful product branding from concept to shelf. John Wiley & Sons.

Monica, B. and Bala?, R., 2014. Social media marketing to increase brand awareness. Journal of Economics and Business Research, 20(2), pp.155-164.

Suki, J.S.N.M. and Sasmita, J., 2015. Young consumers’ insights on brand equity: Effects of brand association, brand loyalty, brand awareness, and brand image. International Journal of Retail & Distribution Management, 43(3), pp.276-292.

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