New wellness trends in drinksConsumers spent more than $25 billion on wellness drinks in 2005, making up 12% of all soft drink spending in the U.S. and Europe. The market represents a major opportunity for drinks marketers, as consumers become aware of the link between diet and lifestyle. Drinks offer consumers a convenient way of maximizing nutrition and "feel-good" benefits while living increasingly hectic lifestyles. Learn how to exploit this trend with Datamonitor’s new report.
The Game of the Name: Product naming best practices
It may be Project QAQ-4502 in-house. Lock the doors and keep it there. Out in the world, it’ll be toast. When customers can’t remember a product name, attach a mind-picture to it, or even pronounce it, they’re not likely to be talking about it either.
Of course, we can all name the exceptions. Ever hear of Xerox? But it takes serious advertising dollars to turn a less-than-familiar collection of letters into an industry colossus. Consider the resources Nike expended to teach the world’s runners that it didn’t rhyme with “hike.”
For both business-to-business and consumer marketers, a good product name is like a mover on the sales team; the alpha-mover, in fact. Your attitude, personality and differentiation are fronted by it. In food inspection, Sorter Model 3000-A wouldn’t say “hi-tech vision” the way Optyx® does. And a generic juice is hard pressed to cut it in the cooler beside Tropical Tornado®, Baha® Red or Naked®.
Coming up with a concise, powerful, trademarkable name is being handed more and more to linguistic specialists, market researchers and psychographic mappers, not to mention creative professionals who live for the “aha moment.” Landing on a winning name — whether straightforward, clever, fun to say or a buzz to the tongue (a high-scoring communication attribute, by the way) — is both science and art.
To gain name selection strategies on the importance of and strategy behind the name game, download the full article here.
Adfinity Marketing Group provides other marketing strategies besides product naming tips. Find out more at www.adfinitymarketing.com. Worldwide thinking. No limits.
February Editorial Previews
Food Processing
Annual Readers Choice Awards
Who are the best suppliers of equipment, ingredients and services for the food industry? Only the members of the food industry can say. That’s why we went directly to our 65,000 readers to name the best in more than 40 categories. To find out if you won and how you stack up against the competition, send a quick e-mail to your sales rep or publisher Kay Ross-Baker. To showcase your status as a top supplier, we can put on your ad (free of charge) gold, silver or bronze medallions indicating the categories in which you won.
February is packed with great editorial:
• Trans fats: One year after the deadline
• The year of protein awareness
• Keeping brand recognition in foodservice
• A preview of the Research Chefs Assn. annual meeting
• Processing considerations for fiber
• Package and label psychology
• Product Round-Ups: Ingredients—Colors and Plant Ops—Packaging equipment
Wellness Foods Healthy Hearts February is packed with great editorial: Toops' Scoops Food industry bolsters economy The clock is ticking Skinny is … » Have news you'd like to share? Send it to dtoops@putman.net. Contact Us To contact your Salesperson, visit www.putmanmedia.com for contact information.
Fourth Annual Readers Choice Awards
The Readers Choice Awards for Wellness Foods will be announced in the February issue of Wellness Foods. To find out if you won and how you stack up against the competition, send a quick e-mail to your sales rep or publisher Kay Ross-Baker. To showcase your status as a top supplier, we can put on your ad (free of charge) gold, silver or bronze medallions indicating the categories in which you won.
Heart disease is still one of the top killers of Americans. But heart disease involves the whole cardiovascular system, and a number of on-trend food and beverage ingredients have come to the fore with solid evidence for their ability to keep the lines open. Antioxidants will figure large in this story, especially the naturally derived ones from the newly popular superfruits açai and pomegranate, as well as the latest in the old guard such as omega-3s, folate and calcium.
• Vitamins & Minerals: Phosphorous Makes Good
• Beverages: Super Smoothies
• Nutraceuticals: Plant Ops — Botanical Extracts
• Nutrition Beyond the Trends: South Africa’s Red Rocker
• Fourth Annual Readers’ Choice Awards
The 10th annual Grocery Manufacturers Association/Food Products Association (GMA/FPA) “Financial Performance Report,” conducted by PricewaterhouseCoopers (PwC) for GMA, demonstrates that the consumer packaged goods (CPG) industry makes a significant contribution to the U.S. economy of an estimated $2.1 trillion in revenues and more than $1 trillion worth of value added to the overall economy. PwC found that overall CPG industry growth remains above 5 percent and overall productivity is on the rise. In 2004, CPG manufacturers employed 14.7 million Americans and contributed $2.1 trillion to the economy. In turn, employees were compensated $569 billion and manufacturers paid $242 billion in tax revenue.
The Board of Directors of Altria Group Inc. intends to finalize its decision, including the precise timing, on the distribution of all Kraft Foods Inc. shares owned by Altria to shareholders at its regularly scheduled meeting on Jan. 31, 2007. As of Sept. 30, Altria Group Inc. owned approximately 88.6 percent of the outstanding common shares of Kraft Foods Inc. The announcement “brings us a step closer to a fully independent Kraft,” says Louis C. Camilleri, chairman and CEO of Altria. “It recognizes our conviction that, having first publicly discussed the restructuring of the company two years ago, this is the right time to move forward."
Surveying 30,000 people globally to rate the reputations of the biggest companies in the world, The Reputation Institute, a New York consulting firm, found Barilla Holding, the Italian pasta maker, with annual revenue over $5 billion, was No. 1, with a reputation score of 87.79 out of a possible 100. Chocolate products maker Ferrero came in eighth. Kraft Foods was the only American firm to make it into the Top 10, with a score of 81.82 … Switzerland's Givaudan agreed to buy the Quest flavors and fragrance unit of Imperial Chemical Industries PLC for $2.28 billion to become the world's largest maker of scents used in perfume … Australian food company Burns, Philp & Co. reports that a $1 billion takeover bid from private company Rank Group received over 90 percent acceptance, paving the way for the company to acquire full control of the Australian group … Wal-Mart made over its Web site, trading in its familiar smiley-face logo and low-prices motto for a more sophisticated design to appeal to trend-conscious shoppers, reports the Arizona Republic. The world's largest retailer spent a year overhauling Walmart.com with bigger pictures, more product descriptions, a quicker checkout process and a cleaner look overall that will make shopping online easier but also drive traffic at its bricks-and-mortar stores … H. J. Heinz Co. chairman, president and CEO William R. Johnson received the Marco Polo Award, considered to be the highest honor bestowed by the Chinese government on a foreign business leader, and announced that the H. J. Heinz Co. Foundation plans to contribute more than $1 million to introduce its global non-profit micronutrient supplement program to improve nutrition and combat anemia among infants and children in isolated Chinese communities. The Marco Polo Award was created to recognize people, who like Marco Polo — a friendship ambassador — made significant contributions to the friendly exchange of knowledge and expertise between China and the West … ABB, San Antonio, Texas, earned the Frost & Sullivan Growth Excellence in Market and Product Leadership of the Year Award, for 2006 Low Voltage Drives. Technological innovation, customer service and strategic product development were contingencies Frost & Sullivan included in its evaluation, noting that ABB's global Low Voltage Drives business unit has excelled across them all … New York-based International Flavors & Fragrances Inc. will be organized into two business units effective January 1 2007. Hernan Vaisman has been elected by the board to the newly created position of Group President, Flavors and Nicolas Mirzayantz to the newly created position of Group President, Fragrances … Coca-Cola embraced the Diet Coke-Mentos phenomenon, inking a marketing deal with Fritz Grobe and Stephen Voltz, the makers of the first exploding soda video, reports MediaPost Communications. Coke will host a "Poetry in Motion" challenge, calling for consumers to submit interesting videos using household products … National Starch Food Innovation will raise prices (from 7 to 10 percent) across its food ingredients portfolio in North America, effective December 4th. The increase ranges from 7 percent to 10 percent on specialty products. Price increases for unmodified corn starch products will be considerably larger, reflecting the higher base cost of corn in these products … DSM Nutritional Products announces that the worldwide price of all vitamins and premixes used in food & pharma applications and citric acid products will be increased by 10 percent. This adjustment is due to cost increases in raw materials, energy and logistics … Kraft Foods Inc. said David S. Johnson, former president of the Kraft North America Commercial unit, would receive a $1.88 million severance, reports Associated Press. Kraft said in a press release last month that Johnson was leaving "to pursue his own career aspirations." … From French royalty to American hip-hop stars, discriminating drinkers can be found sipping Courvoisier cognac, reports Reuters. Next year, they'll also be able to wear it — in the form a men's cologne, Courvoisier L'edition Imperiale. Next spring Fortune Brand Inc.’s Beam Global Spirits & Wine and privately held fragrance company Kraft International Marketing will make the first major leap into luxury fragrance by a spirits brand, according to Beam's vice-president of global spirits, Larry Plawsky. Beam believes there is a correlation between the people who drink Courvoisier — mainly 25- to 35-year-old men with a taste for "the finer things" — and those who will buy the cologne, Plawsky said … Seventy five years ago, a sales executive named Carl Smith stumbled onto a train porter's mixture for biscuits that could be prepared at a moment's notice. Bisquick, this "marvelous new food invention," as it was called, would soon allow just about anyone to easily and quickly make recipes like pancakes. It seems outdated today, but back in 1941, the slogan was "so simple, even a husband can do it."
