retail

Sunny D Brings Peel 'n Taste To The Grocery

Sunny D Peel and TasteSunny D Beverages is launching what it terms a "sensory marketing" experience, sort of the oral equivalent of "scratch and sniff" that puts the flavor of SunnyD Smoothies on Peel 'n Taste flavor samplers.

The parent Beverages Holdings, LLC, used First Flavor -- which invented and holds the patent (pending) on Peel 'n Taste -- to put flavor strips in a thousand Food Lion markets.

The company is touting SunnyD Smoothies as a way to get people their righteous dose of calcium and vitamin D. The line extension launched in April with Orange Whirl and Strawberry Swirl flavors.

The Orange Whirl-flavored Peel 'n Taste edible film strips are currently available in shelf-edge dispensers in Food Lion supermarkets -- a major regional grocery store chain with locations across 11 Southeast and Mid-Atlantic states.

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Jay Minkoff, president and CEO of First Flavor, says that while sampling programs -- or "try-vertising" -- are critical for brands faced with saturated markets and a proliferation of flavors, mass sampling and sampling by mail isn't practical for some products, for obvious reasons.

"They might be frozen or they are beverages. You can't put beverages in direct mail or print, and you can't sample in-store something frozen," he says -- adding that about 80% of the products using Peel 'n Taste have been beverages, and most have been spirits because of the obvious difficulties in taste testing for that market.

Peel 'n Taste strips have been used by a number of spirits companies like Brown-Forman's Finlandia for its tangerine-flavored vodka; Bacardi; Diageo for its Captain Morgan's Parrot Bay key-lime flavored rum; Beam Global Spirits for Hornitos Tequila; and Skyy for its Infusions passion fruit-flavored vodka.

Among non-alcoholic beverages, Welch's used the product for a national in-print promotion last year, and the company has done programs with Campbell Soup for V-Fusion, per Minkoff. "But," says Minkoff, "this is the first time we are launching at grocery."

Sunny Delight actually used Peel 'n Taste for a 2007 direct-mail promo for its Elations nutraceutical beverage for joint pain and bone strength.

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