Final Project: Marketing Mix (Product, Distribution, Promotion, & Price)

Product

Food has traditionally been at the center of all formal and informal gatherings. For generations, mankind has often used it to facilitate bonding with friends and family or during the observance of important events such as birthdays, weddings, job promotions and even for the annual the Super Bowl. Warm nostalgic feelings are evoked, just as Sunday dinners often allowed time for communication and bonding with family, friends and loved ones. A meal shared during a first date or even a grandfather bonding with this granddaughter by sharing a chocolate cookie, all have the potential to be a memorable experience. 

"The company’s marketing strategy outlines which customers the company will serve and how it will create value for these customers."Marketing: An Introduction, pg.13, Armstrong & Kotler.   Treats & Eats will market their product, BuddieBites, not by selling simply a stand alone treat, but rather an experience, a means for an owner to share a special moment with his/her canine companion. BuddieBites will promote a positive bonding experience. "A new product must have the required functional features and also convey the intended psychological characteristics."-Marketing:An Introduction, pg.19, Armstrong & Kotler The treat itself is a tasty, circular, peanut butter wafer/cookie, dipped in canine safe white chocolate, as a delicious coating. Each wafer is approximately the size of a silver dollar.

Promotion

The Treats & Eats product logo will use a simple red, white and black color scheme for instant recognition on the shelves. "Why do so many new products fail? There are several reasons. Although an idea may be good, the company may overestimate market size. The actual product may be poorly designed. Or it might be incorrectly positioned, launched at the wrong time, priced too high, or poorly advertised."-Marketing: An Introduction, pg.245, Armstrong & Kotler To avoid such problems packaging colors will consist of red, white and black which will help let the BuddieBites box stand out from other dog treats.  Red studies have shown evokes hunger, white to reflect the white chocolate coating of the treats, and black represents the chocolate.  The official mascot, “Buddie”, will be represented as a cartoon dog, always wearing a smile and a tie dyed shirt. These will be featured on every box cover and advertisement.

Any creative visuals for BuddieBites will always depict an owner and their pet having a fun, lighthearted time, while enjoying an incredibly tasty treat together. Treats&Eats, has casted the perfect actor as its spokesperson, Carlos Cardoza. Carlos is a classically trained actor who did a brief stint on Broadway from 2008-2010. His character for this product will be an overtly friendly and energetic salesman, who uses humor in his intense sales pursuit. The salesman will rightfully be named “Buddie.”

The humor behind the commercial and its star will consist of poking fun at crazy late night infomercials and their hosts, in an exaggerated manner. The human actor will be featured in every commercial, appearing out of nowhere, to save the day and help create the bonding experience lacking between a pet owner and his/her dog. The application of the catchy tagline “Share together” and the BuddieBites slogan, “For Everybody who has a Buddie!” will also be consistently included in each commercial. “Buddie” the salesman, will always be featured wearing quirky outfits reflecting BuddieBites packaging colors.  

 "Clearly, sales promotion plays an important role in the total promotion mix. To use it well, the marketer must define the sales promotion objectives, select the best tools, design the sales promotion program, implement the program, and evaluate the results. "-Marketing: An Introduction, pg.44, Armstrong & Kotler The first commercial for Treats&Eats will be viewed on major channels such as Fox, NBC, CBS and TBS, as well as being featured on ESPN, the Food Network and in all major markets. Treats & Eats have received favorable results in their test audience with their pilot commercial.  The following is the pilot commercial for BuddieBites.

"the importance of the media-planning function. The decision about which media to use for an ad campaign—television, magazines, cell phones, a Web site, or e-mail—is now sometimes more critical to the elements of the campaign."-Marketing: An Introduction, pg.360, Armstrong & Kotler After viewing the commercial you can see this will be linked to YouTube for future viewing for customers along with every other future commercial for BuddieBites.  Along with YouTube, BuddieBites will use social media by finding "Buddies", people who love the product that are open to blogging, facebooking, and tweeting about the products.  These "Buddies" will be essential to the success of the product; they meet twice a year for proper product consulting and be given bonus checks for specific blogging activity as well as free merchandise and prizes. "As consumers spend more and more time on the Internet, companies are shifting more of their marketing dollars to online advertising to build their brands or to attract visitors to their Web sites."-Marketing: An Introduction, pg.466, Armstrong & Kotler

Distribution

Treats & Eats will use intensive distribution of BuddieBites will be made up of popular grocery stores throughout the country. "Intensive distribution, stocking the product in as many outlets as possible."-Marketing:An Introduction, pg.324, Armstrong & Kotler You will be able to find it in any Wal-Mart, Target, Smith’s, Albertsons, Jewels, WinCo, WholeFoods and Trader Joe’s grocery stores.  Although it is a human snack made to share with dogs, it will be located in the pet aisle, more specifically the canine aisle of these grocery stores."Companies often pay too little attention to their distribution channels, sometimes with damaging results. In contrast, many companies have used imaginative distribution systems to gain a competitive advantage."- Marketing: An Introduction, pg.312, Armstrong & Kotler.  Treats & Eats has a fleet trucks for ground transportation, to save costs, with temperature controlled storage areas so that the white chocolate does not melt.  

Price

"Business analysis involves a review of the sales, costs, and profit projections for a new product to find out whether they satisfy the company’s objectives." Marketing:An Introduction, pg.251, Armstrong& Kotler  Understanding this, we realize there are many things to consider while pricing a product you have to consider many variables; labor, distribution, costs of materials, packaging, profit, etc.  "Most companies try to measure their demand curves by estimating demand at different prices. "-Marketing:An Introduction, pg.248, Armstron & Kotler. Listing the basic costs helped me with the analysis of pricing BuddieBites.

BuddieBites basic cost + profit list:

·         $0.85 per box (red, chineese take-out)

·         $0.99 for vacuum sealed packaging

·         $2.50 for the amount of 50 peanut butter wafers per box

·         $1.50 white chocolate used in each box

·         $0.75 for label

The sum of these items are $6.59, equaling the basic cost of one box of BuddieBites.  Treats & Eats will then sell each box of BuddieBites for $11.99 for a profit of $5.40 a box(keeping in mind that a percentage of their annual profit will then be donated to the Humane Society in efforts to help stop the cruelty of puppy mills)."The strategy for setting a product’s price often has to be changed when the product is part of a product mix."-Marketing: An Introduction, pg.287, Armstrong & Kotler