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Pink-Colored Glasses

By Peter Breen

Visit any store this week and you'll probably find at least one endcap devoted to products with pink packaging, accompanied by a brand or retailer pledge to donate money for breast cancer research. You'll probably find a couple of pink shippers, too.

October is Breast Cancer Awareness Month, and in the past few years that designation has given marketing professionals a new event on which to focus their seasonal efforts. Even candy makers, who already have a key holiday on their promotional calendar this month, are devoting at least some attention to the cause.

All this "pink" activity is a nice example of "shopper marketing," a still-evolving term that just received a new definition, courtesy of Deloitte Consulting: "Any marketing stimuli, developed based on a deep understanding of shopper behavior, designed to build brand equity, engage the shopper and lead him/her to make a purchase."

The only part of that definition which might not fit the example is the phrase, "deep understanding," because the impetus for all this pink marketing seems kind of obvious: Women do most of the shopping, and they are extremely concerned about their health. That's certainly oversimplifying the strategy behind the activity, but it also illustrates that shopper marketing doesn't always have to be "deep" to be effective.

In-store marketing has always been rooted in a simple premise, too: Make your product stand out at retail and more shoppers are likely to buy it. The practice is evolving now, achieving new levels of importance and sophistication. That's why Deloitte includes the objectives of brand-equity building and shopper engagement in its definition (which, by the way, comes from Shopper Marketing: Capturing Shopper's Mind, Heart and Wallet, a report produced in collaboration with the Grocery Manufacturers Association).

Helping marketers achieve those objectives is the goal of P.R.I.S.M., an initiative that is preparing to launch at a critical juncture in the history of consumer product marketing. Data from the P.R.I.S.M. project will provide the foundation necessary to verify the impact in-store activity has on both brand building and shopper engagement. (See the Highlights below for info on our recent P.R.I.S.M. coverage.)

P.R.I.S.M. also will validate the impact in-store marketing has on product sales. This, too, comes at a crucial moment when, according to a new report from Information Resources Inc., the number of secondary displays deployed by supermarket chains is declining -- a byproduct of these retailers' effort to build their brands and engage their shoppers. (See more about IRI's report below.)

The key to future in-store success is stronger, more intelligent partnerships between manufacturers and retailers, according to both the Deloitte and IRI reports. Data from P.R.I.S.M will help drive that collaboration.

Proof that the industry is well on its way can be found in those pink displays. As simple as their premise may be, they are collaborative attempts to engage shoppers by addressing a relevant issue, and to build brands by establishing an emotional connection with consumers.

It looks like they're pretty good at driving sales, too.

Peter Breen
Managing Director, Content
In-Store Marketing Institute



Published: October 2007

Source: In-Store Marketing Institute

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