Category: Product Management
Brands are like personalities for a physical product. They have value built over time. Even when they fade from stores and consumers think the brand is dead, they live on.
Acquiring Trademarks
There are companies that hold the trademark to these brands. Additionally, there are companies that believe they can revive faded icons.
Coca-Cola has introduced a new bottle partially derived from plants. It is ironic since the soda giants who are accused of using so much sugar are now utilizing sugar to make the bottle.
Innovative new products are sometimes hard to describe to the business or consumer purchaser. Naming the product or category is key to communicating your message.
Category Examples
For years we have “Xeroxed” when we photocopied or listened to our “Walkman” when we meant a portable CD player or asked for a “Kleenex” when we want a tissue. Letters have come to be shorthand for whole categories such as “e” in “e-commerce” or “e-zine” and “i” as seen in “iPod” or “iMac.”
I recently read an article in the Wall Street Journal that described Heinz, the “King of Ketchup” making a move into Mexico.
Ketchup Versus Salsa
Salsa bypassed ketchup in the US as the most popular tomato-based condiment in 1992 according to the New York Times and National Public Radio.
Salsa actively moved into the home of Heinz and “conquered” American’s taste buds. Since salsa overtook ketchup, Heinz had not retaliated in Mexico until 2008 and 2009. A market that is not growing at home should be expanded overseas by an international firm. Heinz focused on emerging markets in other parts of the world like China, Russia, and Indonesia while ignoring an obvious, large country south of its US headquarters.
What is most interesting is that Mexicans use ketchup on foods like chicken, pasta, eggs, and pizza. These are not typical practices in the US but could increase sales volume.
So what were the Product Managers and Category Managers thinking?