The news that one of the more famous names in the sweetie market – Chewits – is set to expand its range with the introduction of three new variants was met with some interest here at Hotcow.
As you by now know, we like to play around with concepts and hypothetical proposals – it tends to keep the mind fresh – and this broadening of Chewits’ market has had us thinking through an idea for a campaign.
First the basics; Chewits Truly will take the brand squarely into the family arena by “appealing to adults as well as kids”. In an attempt to capitalise on the brand’s huge popularity three new Chewits variants designed to be appealing to adult sweet-lovers “who are ingredient-savvy and concerned about the integrity of what they and their children consume.”
The new sweets being introduced are; Chewits Truly Juicy, CHewits Truly Smoothy – Crazy Animals and Chewits Truly Smoothy – Berry Whites.
The three new types all have an on-pack flash indicating that they contain “real fruit juice”, “30% less sugar” and that they are “coloured by nature”.
So…where would we begin in promoting this?
Well, it’s clear that Chewits are reaching out to an already existing market rather than attempting to create an entirely new user-base. It’s also clear that the Chewits brand is well established and exceedingly well known. This should, in many ways, make things easier for any campaign.
We’d start things rolling with a buzz marketing campaign designed to get people to identify with the new flavours. Moreover this kind of campaign would provide vital customer feedback and opinion with which to further analyse and plan later campaign efforts.
Concurrently with this buzz marketing campaign we would run a series of events aimed at adults and children alike (perhaps called Chewits Chewoffs) wherein we would organise non-competitive fun events with the purpose of encouraging the participants/audience to taste the product and communicate their experience of it through the medium of colour or music or any one of a number of hands-on ideas. We would, in essence, be building a sensory roadshow (or series of stationary installations) that would be intended, on one level, to arouse interest throughout the target market – which is a very large range – and local and national media and, on another level, to encourage a growing emotional identification with the product in all participants.
Of course, as well as being fun, these events would provide more highly important market research for the later part of the campaign.
This kind of event lends itself very well to the promotion of the healthy nature of the new Chewits varities and we would also seek a tie-in there.
The results of the market research from both the buzz marketing campaign and latterly the roadshow/installation could then be analysed and used in full campaign implementation.
It would be at this point, after a concentrated period of ground level work, that we would release a full print campaign. At this point we’d also be keen on entering a second round of experiential work to supplement the advertising campaign. Various ideas have been put forward for this aspect of the campaign but one which has proved very popular is the idea of ice cream vans in Chewits livery distributing samples, information on the healthy aspects of Chewits and the chance to enter a major competition (and a suggested competition prize would be a family holiday – or multiples thereof – to further promote Chewits as a family confection and to make the prize desirable to the entirety of the target audience).
It should also be noted that this summer marks the 40th birthday of Chewits as a brand name and we at Hotcow would be advising Chewits as a client to make something of this…though what would perhaps take some planning!
So, there you have it – a broad campaign outline utilising experiential, installation and roadshow marketing both to support a print campaign and lead market research and a second phase push. We’re waiting to see what really happens!