John Boot established a chemist shop in 1849 that was later run by his son Jesse Boot as an herbal medicine shop. In 1920, the company was sold to an American firm but repurchased by British owners in 1933. Known originally for health and beauty products, Boots expanded into hair care, retail, and self-medication. It analyzed promotion strategies to gain market share from competitors in the UK hair care market like P&G, Alberto Culver, and L'Oreal. The document evaluates three promotion options - a "3 for 2" buy two get one free deal, free product samples, and on-pack coupons. It concludes the "3 for 2" strategy would be most effective at

3. 1849: John Boot establishes a
chemist shop
1860: Father dies, son, Jesse
Boots, along with mother runs
herbal medicine shop in
Northingham
1920: Sold the company to
American United Drug company
1933: Sold back in British hands

4. Boots deals with
1. Health and beauty, hair acre
products
2. Retailing
3. Self Medication

5. It did not OWN the market

6. COMPETITORS
1. P&G: held a 8.4 % share of
the U.K. hair care market
2. Alberto Culver: 2,000 store
locations
3. L’oreal: held a 5% share of
the U.K. hair care market

7. Problem: Boots is trying to establish a
market share in the U.K. They are
faced with the struggle of having to
promote and gain brand equity
amongst customers with its new line
of premium hair care products, and
gain a market share from their

10. Customers would be able to buy two hair-
care items and get a third, at equal or lesser
value, at no cost. It is called the“3 for 2”.
Boots is the only company that could
implement this promotion regardless if
prices were the same or not.
This strategy will increase sales by 300
percent, and 60 percent of sales would be to
new customers, who would not buy them at
first. Implementing this strategy would not
only increase sales, but also increase profit.

11. DISADVANTAGES OF ‘3 FOR 2’
1. This will be an indication of stock
clearing strategy which could impact
potential customers from buying
the products.
2. Premium products would lose their
brand equity and may sound as cheap
promotion.
3. Product partners (Hair dressers) may
oppose this strategy for the dilution of
their brand equity.

13. A Product sample would be given free
along with a regular purchase. This
scheme is known as GWP.
Additional packing would be used to
pack the free sample along with the
existing one.
40 % of the customers would be just
promotional buyers
Estimated sales would increase by
170% of the pre-promotional sales

14. DISADVANTAGES OF GWP
Adding the sample would cost
approx. 90p per unit for the
product plus 3p per unit extract
secure the sample to the featured
product
This is a very common strategy
used by most of the retailers and
can be easily imitated.

16. Customers would be able to
redeem their coupons during their
current store visit. This is On-pack
coupon worth 50p.
50 % of the customers would be
just promotional buyers.
Coupons would enable multiple
visits for a single customer.
Sales are estimated to increase by
150% of the pre-promotional sales.

17. Disadvantages of On-pack coupon
worth 50p. :
This is a very common strategy and
can be easily imitated.
This one of the form of discounting
which can dilute the brand equity.
This is more of a conservative
approach.
This option has less estimated sales
growth as per market research.

20. CONCLUSION
From the above analysis and
calculation, ‘3 for 2’ is the best
strategy to proceed with and it
may reap best market share
without tampering brand equity.
This offer would, thus, boost
their sales volumes and increase
their brand consumption.

21. Created By: Amodini Agarwal,
IGDTUW, during a marketing
internship under Prof Sameer
Mathur, IIM Lucknow.