Insight
THERMOS Cuisinart Marketing Associate Ms. Cecilia Hung: Rebranding Helps Enhance Market Competitiveness
Originally from Germany, THERMOS Cuisinart is the world's oldest vacuum insulation brand and the world's No. 1 brand in vacuum insulation cup and bottle sales. 1989, Crown Metal Industrial Co., Ltd. introduced THERMOS Cuisinart to Taiwan and developed a series of pots and pans suitable for Chinese cooking, which caused a sensation. Currently, there are 30 department store counters, 2 image stores and one Cuisinart Eco Café in Taiwan, totaling 33 points of sales.
When Tricia Hung joined the Crown Metal marketing team in 2016, she realized that as times change, so does consumer behavior. THERMOS Cuisinart, a century-old brand, needed to accurately communicate its core values and keep its products young. At that time, THERMOS Cuisinart did not yet have a complete brand identity system and product display management standards, she led the new team to start from scratch to start the brand reengineering project. After conducting a brand market research survey, evaluating the results of the analysis, and sharing the resources from the China Cuisinart rebranding project, she partnered with Process in 2017 to develop the foundation of THERMOS Cuisinart's brand strategy, combing and optimizing the brand identity, as well as the design of the insulated bottle pattern, among other projects.
THERMOS Cuisinart marketing office assistant Hong Tsui Hsia said, after joining in 2016, led the new team to start from scratch, to start the brand reengineering project, so that this century-old brand can still accurately convey the core values of the brand, to maintain the commodities young, in response to the changes of the digital era.
Rebranding Each facet is intertwined and requires careful planning.
In the process of rebranding, one must go through various challenges, and failures and setbacks are inevitable. Ms. Hung provides her own experience and shares the challenges faced at different stages of the process. For example, before implementation, the company needs to understand the purpose and benefits of the re-branding process and reach a consensus to invest human and material resources; during implementation, the company needs to change the vertical visual identity, horizontal cross-departmental cooperation and support, in-house training, and external communication schedule planning, as well as even revamping the brand management system, which includes the package design, visual image of the advertising products, and merchandise and display management, etc. Whether or not there is a complete supporting and implementation plan is crucial to the timely completion of the process. Even the transformation of brand management system, including packaging design, advertising production and visual image, as well as merchandise and display management, whether there is a complete supporting and implementation plan, and whether it can be completed on schedule, are all interlinked and need to be carefully laid out; after the implementation of the more directly to face the acceptance and goodwill of the consumer test, and whether to realize the short-term and medium-term gains and benefits to the enterprise as scheduled.
Marketing managers are like locomotives, leading their teams along the way, so they need to have the foresight to see market trends three to five years in advance," said Hung. Enterprises that lack foresight are unable to create brand differentiation and competitiveness. In the face of digitalization, if they fail to communicate the core values of their brand to the consumer base, they will soon lose market share. "Rebranding is an optimization project that involves repositioning and product innovation, which can only be accomplished with the help of professional talents." She was very positive about the assistance provided by Process:
"In addition to providing counseling with patience, care, and dedication, the Pro Brand is also able to identify the blind spots of our clients from an objective standpoint, and to resolve problems with professionalism."
Mr. Lee Kuo-rong, Honorary Advisor of Process Brand Taiwan Branch, pointed out that every cooperation with corporate partners is a co-creation, and we lead our corporate partners step by step to make a strategic sorting out. Just like the cooperation experience with THERMOS Cuisinart, Process is like a market researcher at the beginning, helping the company to find out various information, and then in the execution stage, it is transformed into a lot of different roles, and sometimes we need to act as a leader to lead the team to move in the right direction. Mr. Lee believes that successful re-branding cases have one thing in common, that is, the team of corporate partners have their own ideas, rather than passively waiting for the consultant to provide answers, and because of this, more creativity can be stimulated from each other.
Probrand guided the THERMOS team through a branding workshop to identify core values.
The first line counter assistants felt the sharp increase in sales.
One of the most important aspects of brand re-branding is to simplify the complexity. After the rebranding, the new store counters have enhanced brand recognition, repackaged classic products, combined with brand stories and probing sales techniques, which have given the counter assistants more confidence in selling their own products, and the turnover rate has increased dramatically. In the summer of 2017, for example, sales of the cold water bottle series grew by 345% compared to 2016; the annual growth of 40% has been maintained so far in 2018.
The new coronavirus pneumonia epidemic at the beginning of the year had a severe impact on many industries, and THERMOS Cuisinart's department store counters and stores were also indirectly affected by the decrease in the number of customers. Hong Chui Hsia said that although the sales of the store counters were affected, consumers went out to play and dine less, which made the economic value of the "home economy" expand even more. 2015, THERMOS Cuisinart has already set up the e-commerce market, and the e-commerce platform has continued to grow steadily by a multiple of its sales in the past three years. In the near future, THERMOS will expand the e-commerce market through live broadcasting and online activities.
"The post-Y generation of young consumers is very quick to adopt new ideas, so it is important to get a good grasp of how consumers feel about a brand."
Hong Chui Hsia said that the "view" is to make the visual recognition more clear, "feeling" is to let consumers really feel, and consumers to maintain good interaction and communication, in order to captivate their hearts; different times should be used in different ways to keep pace with the times, the brand in order to sustainable business.
