Every once in a while something new comes along that has never been tried before or is a brand that takes a new category on its shoulders and accelerates its growth into a popular new industry that attracted other new brands. Pioneer brands, as their name states, create a path into a category or segment that either has not existed or has not been successfully explored before.
All of these brands have had initially success but some were unable to sustain that success. There are a variety of reasons and they are worth exploring.
In the beverage industry the latest pioneer brand is Red Bull – being the first energy drink and opening up a new segment while remaining the leader. Many years ago Miller did it with Lite Beer which broke open an untraditional beer segment to appeal to people watching their weight and women. Another notable pioneer beverage brand was Absolut vodka.
What was common among all these brands was that they were new, different, and took the risk to invest heavily into a segment where no one knew if there would be acceptance and how much. But in some of those cases they made mistakes as pioneer brands.
Lite Beer
The beer industry was targeted heavily toward men and was dominated by national and regional lager beers like Budweiser and Miller High Life. With the new trend toward lower calorie content as well as the growing position of women’s independence, their position in the work force, as well as their spending power, Miller relaunched Meister Brau Lite (a lower calorie beer) as Lite Beer from Miller.
The product was an overnight success in sales and its appeal to a broad range of consumers. The ad campaigns were legendary with famous sports heroes and Rodney Dangerfield.
It launched in 1973 and by 1977 was the number two domestic beer brand. They quickly dominated the segment until Budweiser introduced their version in 1982 followed by Coors. Budweiser did a basic brand line extension with Bud Light and Coors did Coors Light. Both brands experience dramatic sales trends and Bud Light blew past Lite Beer in 1994 which by now was rebranded Miller Lite.
The answer here was that consumers knew Budweiser and Coors and the “Light” was an easy extension of their drinking habits. The connection of a generic name like Lite to Miller was never made clear and consumer loyalty was to a brand name the subcategory – not Miller.
Absolut
While Stolichnaya initially pioneered the premium vodka category the tragic event of the USSR shooting down Korean Airline 007 event in 1983 suddenly changed the fortunes of the category. Bars and restaurants immediately pulled off bottled of Stolichnaya and replaced it with an unknown brand Absolut. The new President of Carillon Importers proactively sent his sales force out to inform bartenders that his vodka was not from Eastern Europe and encouraged them to replace Stoli with Absolut. Sales at that time were still relatively small.
It is what President Michel Roux did following that event that catapulted Absolut into the iconic brand that it became. Roux out spent all other spirits brand in advertising media and created a campaign that focused on building the Absolut bottle into one of the most memorable cultural icons in America. Absolut quickly pioneered and dominated the premium vodka segment.
But while Roux did not do everything he could to protect the business he was developing. In particular Absolut did not focus efforts on the growing on-premise sector where a new generation of younger drinkers was experiencing new kinds of drinks. It was an effective avenue for new brands of premium vodka to gain access to consumers without competing in advertising arenas.
They had left themselves open in the increasing clubs, bars, and restaurants where a growing array of new vodka brands focused their efforts to attract an audience. It is where brands from Ketel One to Grey Goose found a consumer base seeking something new. Although still the number one premium vodka in sales, Absolut had lost enormous market share and went from the Statement to the Standard in premium vodka.
Red Bull
Who would have thought that an 8.3 oz. can that contains a significant level of caffeine would become an iconic brand among very young consumers? Red Bull came to the United States with a brand in an unknown category and reportedly invested initially $56 million in 1997. The brand launched in California and expanded to Texas, Oregon, and Colorado.
The brand targeted young people who were deeply involved in the popularity of winter and summer extreme sports. They committed to advertising, sports sponsorships, and sampling. They took no chances with traditional distribution and created their own fleet of Red Bull vehicles. They even introduced a proven vehicle for consumption by popularizing Red Bull and vodka into bars and clubs.
Red Bull not only pioneered the energy drink category, they continue to dominate even with competitive brands from PepsiCo and Coca-Cola.
The key for Red Bull is that they never assumed complete success at any stage and have continued to plow more and more money into the brand. They continue to sponsor a wide range of events and even own a major league soccer team. Their efforts have been to continually try to integrate and align Red Bull with their consumers’ lives as they grow older and cultivate a new crop of younger consumers.
The Red Bull success illustrates what a pioneer brand needs to do which is to make sure they have a strong proprietary brand name, address all channels of their business, and continue to maintain a strong relationship with their current consumers while cultivating new ones.
