3. EXECUTIVE SUMMARY
Firstly, we are thankful to Allah Almighty, for giving us courage at
each and every step of our lives, and especially in making this
report.
We, the group, have been given topic “Marketing Management of
the Walls Ice cream company towards its Product” as by our
subject teacher Sir. Sheikh Imran. During tour assignment, we
have conducted an understanding of the existing Marketing
concepts, procedures; plan of Walls Company of launching their
Products and detailed Marketing plan and process is submitted as
under.
We have performed our research on the Wall’s Product launching,
Marketing and distribution processes with the objective of
evaluating the overall process for various functions and performed
procedures as communicated by and in accordance with the
guidance provided by our teacher.
This report contains detail of marketing process that we have
identified while performing research along with their effects and
belongings. The report has been discussed and agreed with the
respective Group members. We analyzed the existing process to
obtain a better understanding of the company’s marketing
process for a better understating of our subject.
INTRODUCTION:
4. Unilever is the world’s largest manufacture of ice cream; in fact
Unilever holds almost 18% of the global market share. Unilever is
moving towards making ice creams even healthier treats, by
reducing fat content, introducing lower calorie ice creams and
beefing up other treats with calcium and other nutrients. Wall's is
the brand name of Unilever's Heartbrand ice cream business it is
the name of the company that for many years, as an independent
and then as a Unilever subsidiary, made and marketed the Wall's
brand of ice cream.
Unilever Pakistan Limited is a Pakistan-based company. The
Company manufactures and markets home and personal care
products, beverages, ice cream and spreads .the Unilever
Pakistan Limited (UPL) was established in Pakistan in 1958.
Unilever Pakistan is the largest FMCG Company in Pakistan, as
well as one of the largest multinationals operating in the country.
Also in Pakistan the Heartbrand is called Wall’s and it is one of
the most active players in the market and is striving to offer
lighter, healthier products as well as providing old favorites, hence
catering to a variety of diverse tastes. Secondly it is the largest
player in the Pakistan ice cream market and holds the lion’s share
of the market.
The Wall’s factory in Pakistan is located on Multan Road in
Lahore. The factory was constructed in 1994, and its production
started in the year 1995.It is fully equipped with a state of the art
innovation pilot plant. This makes Pakistan one of the few
countries in the region to have their own innovation pilot plant,
making it possible for Wall’s to launch exciting new products
every year. In the first year of there operations the total production
of ice cream was 4 million liters.
In 1994 Lever Brothers Pakistan tried to acquire Polka Ice Cream
for Rs 600 million. Polka refused the bid, demanding instead Rs 1
billion. One year after the launch of Wall's Ice Cream by Lever
5. Brothers in 1996, Polka approached Wall's with an offer to merge
the two companies. So they merged in 1996 and now it is called
wall's not Polka.
Mention ice cream and most people in Pakistan think ‘Walls’,
Pakistan’s leading ice cream brand. Throughout the years Walls
brand has brought to Pakistanis a number of much loved classics
from the seduction of magnum, sharing of Cornetto with your
loved ones to the refreshing taste of paddle pop. The Wall’s brand
stands for a good time. From affordable treats to premium
indulgence, to hanging out with friends and sharing precious
family moments; Wall’s adds to the simple pleasures in daily life.
REASON FOR INTRODUCING PADDLE POP
MAGILIKA:
According to the marketing department at Walls, ice cream lovers
are categorized into four basic categories, and the categories are
made according to the different age groups and choices of people
falling in that category. These categories include, firstly the kids of
age group 4-7 who love eating ice cream in cups, then comes the
age of 7-10 kids in this category are more inclined towards eating
ice lollies, then comes the category where the children are aged
between 10-15, this is the category where kids are converting
from ice lollies to light chocolate coated and milk ice creams on
sticks. Finally then there are those who prefer stronger flavors of
ice creams like bitter and dark chocolate, white chocolate, and
have a preference for ice creams such as Cornetto, magnum, and
death by chocolate.
Catered especially for the kids aged between10 to 15 Paddle Pop
is a major hit. The Paddle Pop’s Lion is the friendly face of fun
6. and adventure and this ice cream rates among the fastest selling
and most popular ice-cream among the children.
Wall’s re launched its Paddle Pop brand with a new name
Magilika in January 2007 under this brand there were three
different Paddle Pop categories of ice creams which were
launched, namely they were;
• Magic Star
• Rainbow Spell
• Choc Lava
We have conducted a research on Choc lava. Choc lava was
made is such a way that the lower half is made up of light
chocolate while the upper half was made up of with the coating of
milky hard chocolate with an inner filling of light chocolate which
has viscous condensed milk.
COMPANY ORIENTATION TOWARDS THE
MARKET PLACE:
According to the marketing team at Wall’s for choc lava they used
the production concept to conduct their marketing activities. The
concept states that those products that are widely available and
inexpensive are preferred. The company mass produced the ice
cream at low costs.
The managers of production oriented business concentrate on
achieving high production efficiency, low cost and mass
distribution. But from our analysis the company should have made
use of the product concept as it focuses on those products that
offer the most quality or innovative features. This is because of
7. the fact that choc lava did have innovative feature in it. The liquid
condensed milk in the ice cream bar was a concept that was
totally unique and not known before. The product would have
been more successful if it was priced and advertised and sold
properly.
MARKETING ENVIRONMENT:
Successful companies recognize and respond profitably to unmet
needs and trends. Companies could make a fortune if they are
able to deal with the environment efficiently.
• Demographics
The demographic environment is of major interest to marketers
because it involves people, and people make up the markets. The
firms have to closely analyze customer’s age, gender, occupation,
income and other statistics in order to set the perfect target
market for their product. As far as demographics of choc lava are
concerned it especially caters to children, both male and female
following between the age group of 10-15 years. As it is catering
specifically to children so it is low priced, this shows that it is for
kids belonging to all income brackets.
• Economic Environment
Markets require purchasing power as well as people. The
available purchasing power in an economy depends on current
income, prices, savings, and debt and credit availability.
Marketers must pay careful attention to tends affecting the
purchasing power because they have a strong impact on
business. As in this case the scenario is different because the
product is not price sensitive and caters to all income classes.
8. • Socio cultural Environment
The cultural environment is made up of institutions and other
forces that affect our society basic values perceptions,
preferences and behaviors. People grow up in a particular society
that shapes their basic beliefs and values. Mostly children
belonging to all societies and culture have same behaviors. Little
kids love eating ice creams and usually chocolate are their
favorite flavor. So the culture in which Wall’s operates is not very
complexed rather it is quite favorable.
• Political & legal Environment
Marketing decisions are strongly affected by development in the
political and legal environment. This environment is composed of
laws, government agencies and pressure groups that influences
and limit various organizations and individuals. There are certain
legislations and government agency enforcement which compile
firms to show socially responsible behavior. Wall’s also does not
face any threats from these conditions as it follows and fulfils all
food laws and legal requirement imposed by the state authorities.
• Technological Environment
One of the most dramatic forces shaping peoples life is
technology. It is force that creates new product and new market
opportunities. Like all other businesses technology also affects
the operations of Wall’s directly. As Walls’s owns and operates a
highly automated production plant and as most of its machinery
and equipments is imported the company has to be on its toes
when it comes to adapting to new and advance technological
changes. The machine used for filling condensed milk in the
upper layer of choc lava was also very technologically advance
9. and unique as previously no other company had used such a
technique before.
STRATEGIC COMPANY PLANNING, MISSION &
MARKETING OBJECTIVES:
10. Strategic planning is a plan used to guide the decisions and
actions of everyone in the organizations. For any product to
sustain itself in the market it is very important that the company
owing the product does extensive and detail strategic planning
before the launch of the product in order to get hold of the
competitive advantage. The marketing executives search
continuously to find such an opportunities. Competitive advantage
is a unique strength relative to its competitors. It is mostly based
on quality, time, cost or innovation. Having identified this
competitive advantage the company must allocate its resources to
exploit it. Choc lava no doubt was a completely innovative product
consisting of three flavors in one ice cream, light chocolate, milky
chocolate and condensed milk. It was a unique product which no
company had offered before but the ice cream failed terribly due
to its bad launching timings. The timings of the product and
marketing actions directly influence the magnitude and duration of
a firm’s competitive advantage. Choc lava failed firstly because it
was launched in the start of January 2007. Choc lava was
launched in winter which is not an appropriate time to launch such
a product because obviously parents won’t allow their kids to buy
ice creams in winters. Secondly, its sales dropped considerably in
the summer season due to the problem of extreme weather
conditions.
The mission of Wall’s was to re launch Paddle pop by a new
series of ice cream named Magilika, as depicted by the name
Magilika has something to do with magic and the main theme
behind this re launch was to attract children by magical fantasy.
The color of the ice cream is brown (chocolate) which represents
mountain and inner filling of condense milk which represents lava
hence the name Choc Lava Power.
MARKETING RESEARCH:
11. Marketing research is the process of defining marketing problem
and opportunity, systematically collecting and analyzing
information and recommending actions to improve the
organizations marketing activities. An effective marketing
research involves six steps which are defining the problem and
research objectives, development of the research plan collection
of the information, analysis of the information, presentation of the
findings and decision making.
Marketing research attempts to identify and define both marketing
problems and opportunities and to generate and evaluate
marketing actions. Hence it is a means of reducing risk and
uncertainty.
Wall’s is one of those companies which do not launch any of its
products with out extensively carrying out marketing research.
Same was the case with Choc lava but the only problem was that
the research done for the particular product did not work because
of the following reasons;
a. When they conducted the children’s tasting test they give
fully frozen ice creams to kids who liked the ice cream
immediately as the frozen ice cream depicted no problem in
the product.
b. Secondly when they offered the ice cream to the kids they
readily accepted it as no kid ever refuses an ice cream no
matter what the taste it.
c. When the ice cream was in fully frozen the condensed milk
was in its proper place inside the ice cream. However due to
improper freeze temperature management by the retail
outlets the condense milk leaked out of the wrapper giving
an untidy and unpleasant look. As condensed milk is very
sweet and it was dripping it touch the throat and as a result
gave an overly sweet taste which disliked by the children’s.
12. These problems occurred in the later stages which were not
depicted by simple children ice cream tasting tests.
TARGET MARKET & BASIS OF SEGMENTATION:
A target market is group of people or organization whose needs
the marketers’ products are specifically designed to satisfy.
Target marketing narrows the organization’s focus to an
appropriate set of potential consumers whose needs can be
profitably met. So the target market for Choc lava is kids
belonging to the age group of 10-15 years.
Market segmentation on the other hand identifies the separate
group of people or organization within the broad target market,
each with similar needs, characteristics or behaviors. Market
segmentation for walls is categorized into four basic categories.
These categories include, firstly the kids of age group 4-7 who
love eating ice cream in cups, then comes the age of 7-10 kids in
this category are more inclined towards eating ice lollies, then
comes the category where the children are aged between 10-15,
this is the category where kids are converting from ice lollies to
light chocolate coated and milk ice creams on sticks. Finally then
there are those who prefer stronger flavors of ice creams like
bitter and dark chocolate, white chocolate.
MARKET SEGMENTATION STRATEGIES USED:
Wall’s segments its market on the basis of demographics. The
market is divided into groups on the basis of variables such as
age and income. While Wall’s segments Paddle Pop Magilika on
the basis of age only.
PRODUCT DEVELOPMENT PROCESS:
13. The product development process is the sequence of activities a
marketer uses to transform product ideas into marketable goods
and services. In the course of developing new product, marketers
scans the environment and generate ideas, screen them, develop
and test product concept, analyze the business concept, design
and develop the product, test it in the market, and then
commercialize the product as illustrated in the figure;
ACTIVITY
PURPOSE
Environmental scan & idea Re launch Paddle pop with a new
generation
brand name
“Magilika” which
included three products, Magic
Star, Rainbow Spell & Choc Lava
Screening out inappropriate Various lollies & other Paddle pop
ideas
products were eliminated.
Concept
testing
development
Business Analysis
Product
Design
Development
& Using
marketing
research
techniques such as conducting
tasting sessions and noting the
expressions,
impressions
and
feedback of children.
Wall’s made future projections
before the launch of “Magilika” that
its products would sell like hot
cakes as there was no other ice
cream brand currently in the
market
catering
to
children
specifically.
& Friendly “Lion” character with
magical powers is used to attract
children.
The
concept
of
condensed milk “lava” inside the
ice cream was meant to be a
14. surprise for kids.
Product & Market Testing
This stage was skipped by Wall’s,
which eventually led to product
failure.
Commercialization
Choc lava launched in January
2007
PRODUCT POSITIONING:
Positioning is the use of marketing to encourage people in a
product’s target market to form a particular mental image of the
product relative to competing products. “Magilika” has been
positioned in the minds of children as something which would take
them into the fantasy world and the lion represents strength as
children would start to think that eating Choc Lava would make
them strong.
BRANDING STRATEGIES:
The branding strategy for a firm reflects the number and nature of
common and distinctive brand elements applied to the different
products sold by the firm. When a firm introduces a new product,
it has three main choices:
1. It can develop new brand elements for the new product.
2. It can apply some of its existing brand elements.
3. It can use a combination of new and existing brand
elements.
Wall’s used the choice of using the combination of new and
existing brand elements. Wall’s has used the same old brand
15. name of Paddle Pop along with the same character of lion but a
magical theme was used in order to attract the children.
An existing brand that gives birth to a brand extension is referred
to as a parent brand. Here Wall’s is the parent brand whereas
“Paddle Pop Magilika” is the line extension that is the parent
brand is used to brand a new product that targets a new market
segment within a product category currently served by the parent
brand such as when Wall’s offer new flavors an added ingredients
in it.
PACKAGING STRATEGY:
Packaging and labeling help marketers communicate with
customers and provide protection, storage and convenience as
product moves through the value chain. As a result, packaging
and labeling adds value that help marketers differentiates their
product and built brand equity.
The packaging of Choc Lava ice cream indicates various
ingredients used in the ice cream, nutritional information and the
price. It also has certain symbols toward the back side like “halal”,
“keep your country clean, “bar code” and “questions and
comment” on lever rabta. Apart from all this the attractive features
of Choc lava packaging is the cartoon character visible very
clearly on the packaging. It is one of the factors that attract
children toward the ice cream as whenever a child visit the super
market and open the ice cream freezer the special packaging
immediately attracts his attention and he quickly reaches and
grabs the ice cream.
PRICING STRATEGY:
The strategy used for pricing of Choc Lava is value pricing in
which prices are held steady while improving products benefit.
16. The price of Choc lava at its launch in January 2007 was Rs 12.
This low price is especially kept to attract children who normally
have this amount of money in their pockets either they buy
chocolate or ice cream. The new product attribute added in this
ice cream is the condensed milk.
DISTRIBUTION & MARKETING CHANNELS:
Distribution channel consists of individuals and firms involved in
the process of making a product or service available for use or
consumptions by consumers.
High transport vehicles are used for transport of ice cream from
the factory to the company’s detecting freezers UTECTIC freezers
(cold storage) from where the ice creams are transported
throughout the country as well as abroad. The shopkeepers are
given same margin in each outlet throughout the country.
ADVERTISING & SALE PROMOTION STRATEGY:
ATL and BTL marketing activities
TV commercial
Magazines
KEY WEAK POINTS:
• Improper launch timings
• Excessively hot weather condition
• No proper advertisement of Choc lava as a separate product
• Fault with a product itself
17. RE LAUNCH OF CHOC LAVA:
• Promotional Mix
Product
The main problem was in the product itself, the chemical
formulation of the condensed milk is such that it cannot with stand
even a little high temperature and it leaks out of the ice cream
even before having the first bite. And it becomes very massy for
children to eat it. Also it complaints about the product being too
sweet for the children to eat it. We are also planning to change it.
We as marketing managers have changed the ingredients of the
ice cream. We have changed the light chocolate portion of the ice
cream with vanilla and replaced the condensed milk with the semi
liquid chocolate which would not prove to be as massy as the
condensed milk. Furthermore as the composition of ice cream has
changed, it is also necessary to change the name of the ice
cream, so we have changed the name of ice cream from Choc
Lava to “Vani Choc”.
Price
We have decided to change the price from Rs.12 to Rs.10. the
main reason behind this change is the added convenience for
children to purchase ice cream for ten rupees, rather than twelve
rupees as it is rather difficult to get three rupee change back. The
pricing strategy used is the even number value perception.
Promotion
18. Presently Wall’s is advertising Paddle Pop as “Magilika”, rather
than concentrating on the three products. The consumers are
confused as they do not know the individual characteristics of the
products under Paddle pop “Magilika”, as only the name
“Magilika” was highlighted in all the promotional mediums. The
print ad is attached in the appendix.
We have planned to re launch Choc Lava as “VANI CHOC” .This
new ice cream will be launched under the existing brand name
Paddle Pop Magilika but the ad campaign would be designed in
such a way that each product of Magilika brand would be
promoted separately. This means that instead of confusing the
children by simultaneously portraying the three ice creams
together in one advertisement a single ice cream would be
advertised at one time.
As it is totally a kid’s based product so we would be conducting
ice creams festivals in different schools, painting competitions
would be held
Distribution
We would be using the same distribution channel that Wall’s is
already is using.
PRINT ADVERTISEMENT OF CHOC LAVA
