packaged goods

Scott Naturals Offers 'Secret Swap'

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Kimberly-Clark’s Scott Naturals tissue is shifting strategies to expand the green product line from a niche brand to a mass market product for "mainstream green" consumers. The effort centers on a program to get people to do a "Secret Swap": change out your current bath tissue and paper towels with Scott Naturals products to see if your family will notice the difference.  

A Web site, www.SecretSwap.com, touts the product line and details the program via a "Mission Impossible" style video in which a woman -- a secret agent type -- urges the viewer to accept the assignment to secretly switch and then report back to Scottbrand.com with the results. The campaign is fueled by a nationwide giveaway of some 2 million Scott Natural sample rolls via in-store shopper marketing initiatives, and CRM. There are also retailer specific coupons to incentivize purchase.

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Alma Alejandro, Scott Naturals brand manager, tells Marketing Daily that the effort includes digital advertising to drive consumers to the Web site -- and that of the 2 million sampler giveaways, 1.2 million are via direct mail. "[The CRM element] is a very demographic and geographic approach centered on people living in a five-mile radius of distribution points, the rest were via hand-to-hand giveaways at stores." That, she says, includes the 1,752 Wal-Mart stores -- about half of the mega-store’s U.S. footprint -- where Scott Naturals are sold. The effort began on Earth Day. 

"I think what we saw was a huge opportunity: we did focus groups last year and found we had been approaching it the wrong way [focusing on a niche buyer]. We found that the economic downturn inspired a back-to-basics attitude, including living more sustainably -- living a more sensible lifestyle. It's a change of mindset." 

She says the company will have a leg up on the green competition because of the Scott Naturals price point. Environmentally friendly SKU’s tend to be more expensive than traditional products, and therefore remain a niche product for the ecologically energized. "People are very savvy; they look at 'sheet math' -- how many sheets they are getting for the price," she says. "We are not charging a premium per sheet [for Scott Naturals]. So you can go green without paying more."

The company is also doing a change in media strategy this year, away from traditional media -- particularly TV -- and more toward digital and experiential platforms. "More of the spend used to be TV, print, and free-standing inserts,” says Alejandro. “This year we challenged that thinking; we made a brave move and said 'no' to TV, and focused instead on trial offers and online.” 

Per Alejandro, the brand has risen from a $4 million business in 2007 to $100 million in retail sales now, although that's still niche compared to billion-dollar retail revenue for the traditional lineup of paper products like Scott 1000. 

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