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The Smooth Way to Build a Brand

Published on May 24th, 2011 by Katia

“Mmmm, this smoothie tastes really nice”, I thought.  The label on the bottle read:

22 pressed red & white grapes

1/2 a mashed banana

1/2 a squeezed orange

32 crushed blueberries

double-decker bus*

a squeeze of lemon

* Hold very tight please, ting, ting!

“A double-decker bus?!”  It made me smile… “But who’s this company?”, I wondered. “Innocent Drinks…? Never heard of them before… but I like them!”. That was it. I had become, not only a loyal customer, but also very fond of Innocent Drinks. And so did many other people. Founded in 1998 by three college friends, Innocent Drinks has become the UK’s fastest growing food and drink business. Brand awareness has grown by 28 per cent in a year – reaching 41 per cent national awareness and market share has grown from 14 per cent to over 30 per cent in four years. Innocent Drinks are now available in over 4,000 outlets, including all Sainsburys and Waitrose stores, Starbucks, Boots, Eat and many other independent retailers.  Either through necessity or intent, they’vre created an image and brand values based on straightforward, slightly irreverent communications style that soon became the company’s trademark.  Their fun, easy going, no-nonsense approach helped them to gain 71 percent share of the £169 million UK smoothie market, selling 2 million smoothies per week, and yet maintain the integrity of their brand values, retaining the trust and support of their employees, customers and retail partners.

As a small start-up, they realised that they could utilise a space that was essentially a free advert: the packaging of their products. It was an inexpensive channel, and an opportunity to talk about the drink, the business and others things they wanted to communicate. And by constantly changing the words and keeping them interesting, it meant people started actually reading the labels and telling others about them.  So they used their packaging to channel relevant and timely messages at a time when they have their consumers’ undivided attention.  Their brand’s “tone of voice” – or their “verbal identity” even – did not only help differentiate it from competitors but also create bonds of affection and loyalty with different audiences.  With warm and humorous words, they convinced enough people to give it a try and to keep on going back for more. People laughed with them, liked them and wanted them to succeed. They bought into the idea of the Innocent brand.

Customers were invited to “call the banana phone or pop in to visit Fruit Towers, if feeling bored or if there’s nothing on TV”, and Innocent Drinks listened to them: they’ve created a banana-free smoothie (one of their biggest business requests) and eliminated honey from their Veg Pots (as a result of a reaction from a vocal group of people on their blog).  They’ve also coped well with a tricky situation that could have easily damaged their brand:  the news that they would be selling their shares, giving Coca-Cola a 58% stake, triggered immediate comments in their blog where the company was immediately accused of selling out their values to a very profit-orientated company.  But Innocent Drinks managed to keep their image intact by being very open with their customers and reassuring them that the mission and values of the company remained unchanged.

I went to their Annual General Meeting last year and I must say it’s very hard not to believe on what they say.  Being at the Fruit Towers, their headquarters, one does feel all the positive and creative vibes that you see on their product labels; it does seem that they do care or at least try very hard to.  Whereas they might not be as innocent as we originally thought them to be (after all, they are a for profit organisation), it is undeniable that they’ve managed to create a very solid company image.  They showed how an appealing tone and engaging words that are communicated creatively and consistently and that are “lived” in all customer interactions – whether that is sending warm messages on product labels, talking to consumers on the phone or encouraging customers to visit their offices – can deliver high market impact at relatively inexpensive marketing cost and be the basis for a successful brand.

 

About the Author

Katia

Research Executive

Katia was born in São Paulo, Brazil, and has a quite mixed ethnic background: her grandparents were Portuguese, Hungarian, Chinese and Brazilian!
She moved to London in 2000 where she studied for an honours bachelor's degree in Management at Birkbeck (University of London).
Katia started her working life as a Business Process Analyst for Serasa Experian, where she was responsible for mapping and optimising internal processes. For the last nine years she has worked as a Bid Co-ordinator Analyst for UK Structured Finance, managing tender processes and providing financial modelling for key projects.
However, she’s always felt very passionate about human behaviour analysis and was determined to make a career change into Market Research. In September 2010, this wish came to true and she joined Northstar. Katia now supports the team in running global brand and ad tracking studies for Volvo, and feels very fulfilled.
Her interests include learning how to play her acoustic guitar, beach volleyball and handcrafting.