Launch new products, not new variants!

It is very common for big companies to compensate an empty innovation pipeline with the launch of new variants.  Besides launching new formats, usually new variants will have similar consumer benefits and or consumption habits than the rest of the variants in your portfolio, and will not bring much on-top sales, but rather cannibalize them.

Let’s put an example. Lets say you are selling ice-cream cornets. If you already have vanilla flavor, launching a chocolate and a strawberry cornets will probably be a good thing. But once the main flavours are there, launching an additional new one, will probably not add much. On the contrary, if you further explore other ice-cream categories/needs where you are not present, for instance water based ice-cream, that will make a bigger impact, as you will be either creating a new need if the category is not existing, or stealing volume from a competitor!

Not only that, also new products will reinforce your proposition as a brand and create higher awareness and  more arguments for your sales force!

You can also use new products to give your brand a specific “benefit” it did not have before,  a “halo” effect. How is now for example Nescafe driving its nutrition-health-wellness agenda? Launch a new “healthier” variant, Nescafe Green Blend, a coffee with a higher degree of antioxidants than regular coffee, and even comparable to those of tea. Automatically the entire range is perceived as “healthier than before”, and the product will help not only to attract new consumers into the soluble coffee market, but also to steal consumers from tea or other “healthier” options (ie. orange juice or milk). As a consequence, the soluble market coffee grows thanks to an innovative new product with a new benefit. If Nescafe would have launched a new cappuccino variant, the impact would have been much smaller.

Here an interesting article about the benefits of Nescafe Green Blend.

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/home/adfeatures/article-1248772/Nescafe-Green-Blend.html

If you are interested in growth potential launch new products, not new variants!

Posted by Ignacio Molins