Author Archive

Plum Organics

Asha Datta, Associate Brand Manager; Benjamin Mand, Director of Marketing 

• 5-6 years ago the baby food category had very little innovation; there was very little healthy food (with an excitement factor) for kids.  Everything was in glass jars.
• Plum broke the mold, paving the way with the “premium spouted pouch” that has revolutionized the category.
• There are so many myths about the right way to feed a baby (e.g. white rice cereal) – Plum considers education about this nutrition an important part of its mission.
• Revolution Foods merged into Plum Organics with the success of Plum.
  • The destination in a grocery store for baby, tots, and kids products is different, so brand equity and strength across categories is especially important.
    • Some retailers are evolving (Target has a lunchbox section) in terms of shelving and location within channel.
• The different categories of products have different characteristics:
  • Babies will eat what you give them, so branding is to mom.
  • Kids are more receptive to branding and want product to be cool.
    • There are important packaging and branding implications as a result.
• Marketing strategy:
  • Do not use agency (mostly in house).
  • Gut, intuitive approach that until recently did not include much paid media.
  • Key emphasis on partnerships with other “food” oriented causes.
  • Also strategically have used PR throughout growth phases.
  • Social: #3 liked baby food brand on FB, #1 on Twitter.
  • Use grassroots campaigns (each day feature a “mom’s” picture of a funny moment or image).
• Innovation:
  • Constant focus area (Neil, the CEO, was from IDEO).
  • Recent innovation led products include little yums (teething biscuits) and international flavors food.
  • Time to market for new products: 6-12 months.

Q&A Highlights:

• How do you deal with so many SKUs?
  It’s obviously tough to manage from the manufacturing side, but also enables us to really test innovation and see what works.  Our small company size allows us to be nimble and quick to market. 
• How do you think about threat from Private Label?
  We have to deal with it more and more as the category matures.  When we can, we try to establish exclusivity with retailers for as long as we can.

Williams-Sonoma

Pat Connolly, Chief Marketing Officer; SVP Brand Marketing; VP e-commerce; Director of Online; VP Customer Analysis

• WSM recently gave a 3-year earnings forecast, which is a longer time horizon than normal. CEO is emphasizing the customer experience across all channels.
• Most of the brands were generated internally (Pottery Barn, West Elm).
• WSM is increasingly facing competition from branded products that they carry in their Williams-Sonoma stores, since these brands are focusing on building out their own direct ecommerce businesses. They’re working on developing exclusive product lines with their branded vendors to avoid competition.
• Company is very analytics-driven, considering themselves at the intersection of lifestyle merchandising and analytics. 
• They are focused on growing their direct-to-consumer channel because they think they are currently a profitable direct retailer in the US.
• The company is able to find new customers through ecommerce, and develop repeat customers through their retail channels. 
• Increasing focus on customer satisfaction, measuring Net Promotor Scores, opt-outs, return rates and reviews.
• Most purchases are currently through PCs. Phones are not a big channel, but they’re looking closely at optimizing their online shopping experience for tablets. 
• They maintain retail, online and catalog channels. They’re agnostic about where customers make purchases, but they do think that the stores must be very experiential. They hosted an Etsy event at their West Elm store in PA, for example, to drive traffic.
• Local is an increasing focus for them — localizing the store experience.