- Hawaiian Punch was created in 1934 in California and was originally called "Leo's Hawaiian Punch". It was sold to restaurants and soda fountains. - In 1946, investors purchased the company and renamed it Pacific Hawaiian Products Company. They began selling Hawaiian Punch concentrate and ready-to-drink cans, leading to increased sales in the 1950s. - In the 1960s, the company created the "Punchy" mascot and tagline "How About a Nice Hawaiian Punch?" to represent the brand's fun, tropical image. The mascot boosted advertising success. - Over the decades, Hawaiian Punch was acquired by different parent companies, including RJ Reynolds, Del Monte, Procter & Gamble,

1. Sade Adelakun
Adv. Marketing Problems
Dr. Fraccastoro
11/28/2016
Hawaiian Punch Case Study
Hawaiian Punch started off in a garage in 1934 Fullerton California, that is where
A.W. Leo, Tom Yates, and Ralph Harrison developed the first hawaiian punch recipe. It
was a blend of natural fruits including pineapple, passionfruit, papaya, and guava. They
wanted to add to their line of ice cream toppings a tropical-tasting syrup under the
Pacific Citrus Products name. At the time “Leo’s Hawaiian Punch”, is what the brand
was called. It was sold to restaurants, soda fountains, and ice cream manufacturers and
eventually “Leo’s” was dropped from the name years later.
In 1946 a group of investors purchased the company and renamed it the Pacific
Hawaiian Products Company. Consumers discovered that when Leo’s Hawaiian punch
is mixed with water it's just as good, but they could not find a way to purchase it directly.
Pacific Hawaiian products then began introducing quart bottles of the concentrate
everybody loved for sale in retail grocery stores and later began offering a 46-ounce
ready-to-serve can of red hawaiian punch products 1950. In the 1950s, sales began to
skyrocket for the Hawaiian Punch brand and other fruit juice products. This in return
made the Pacific Hawaiian Punch products shoot to the middle ranks of the U.S.
beverage corporations. Hawaiian Punch became a national brand due to its widespread
distribution later in the year.
In December 1961 in order to take advantage and represent the fun tropical
image of the brand, the company's advertising agency created the “Punchy” mascot.
Punchy made its television debut in 1962 and became an instant advertising success;
eventually becoming the brands identifier. Puchy’s “How About A Nice Hawaiian
Punch?” tagline gave a personal feel for the brands image and advertising. The mascot
and tagline remained in use throughout the 1990s.
In 1963, RJ Reynolds company bought hawaiian punch for about 40 million; in
the time being the company was transferred to Del Monte in 1981. Del Monte
introduced several new innovative products, such as the powder version of the drink, a
new soft drink, other new flavors, and expanded the brand to work with new distribution
channels.
In 1990 Procter & Gamble Co. purchased hawaiian punch from Del Monte for
150 million. P&G established the innovative gallon bottle by doubling the size of the of
the package. P&G also created smaller packages as convenience benefits to its
customers for food and convenience store delivery. They were also devoted in featuring
punchy the mascot in brand advertising. Cadbury Schweppes bought hawaiian punch

2. from P&G for 203 million in 1999. With that being said hawaiian punch has established
a growing revenue of 133.33 million.
Within the industry eight companies represent the most well-known brands in the
fruit juice and juice drink category. They consist of Coca Cola Co, Pepsico Inc, Kraft
Food inc, Ocean Spray Cranberries Inc, Sunny Delight Beverage Company, Cadbury
Schweppes Americas Beverages, Welch Inc, and Nestle Usa. These companies
represent around 55 percent of the markets sales with private brands accounting for 20
percent of category sales. Competitors seek to differentiate their brands through flavor
and package innovation by adding new flavors that hispanic households are more
attracted to and growing their single service packages line because both represented a
growing opportunity. Some companies have even repositioned their brand in order to
focus more on the health benefits the 100 percent juice can offer to customers of all
ages.
Fruit juice and juice drinks come in four varieties based on the amount of fruit is
actually in the beverage. 100 percent juice, nectars which uses a base of puree of fruit
pulp, juice drinks which is made of fresh juice or concentrate , and fruit flavored drinks
that have no juice, fruit, or pulp content. The beverages consumed has changed over
the years with carbonated soft drinks being the most liked consumer beverage. Bottled
water and sports drinks at the highest rate of consumption and powdered drinks had the
largest consumption decline. The largest selling variety is 100 percent juice with a 54.9
percent of the fruit juice category, second is juice drinks with 33.7 percent of the
category, and nectars and fruit flavored drinks accounting for 6.1 percent and 5.3
percent of the category. Shelf stable beverages account for about 60 percent of the
categories volume. Nectars, juice drinks, and fruit flavored drinks do not require any
refrigeration and is shelf stable. Meaning they can sit on a shelf and still be healthy and
drinkable for the customers. Most of the time 100 percent juice is refrigerated and often
sold as a frozen concentrate.
Some of the strengths that Hawaiian Punch have internally and externally that
could have an affect on the company is Hawaiian Punch has a high product awareness.
They are among the top most well-known brands in the US fruit juice and juice drink
category. Brand awareness is a measure of how well your brand is known within its
target markets, because of Hawaiian Punch's unique and memorable brand a long-term
position in the marketplace was created. Hawaiian punch is the number one selling fruit
punch in the U.S. Some of the weaknesses that Hawaiian Punch have internally and
externally that could have an affect on the company is new flavors extensions lacked
positive consumer feedback compared to the original red flavor. There is also unclear
positioning. Following the acquisition of hawaiian punch from p&g aspects of the
traditional child-centered focus had been played down. The Punchy mascot no longer
occupied a prominent role in media advertising, even though the punchy mascot
remained on the packaging.

3. There is opportunities in the future due to growth of the hispanic population. More
Hispanic influenced flavors are being demanded in the juice drink category. The
company has the opportunity to reinforce brand image and relationships. A threat to the
company would be it is now mature in the market industry meaning the growth has
begun to slow down and is now steady.
Some minor issues the company may have faced is Hawaiian Punch bottlers
often faced capacity and distribution constraints in producing and shelving a greater
variety of of flavors and package sizes. Another minor issue consisted of the new
flavors not having much of an effect on sales because it lacked customer awareness so
customers were not as interested in their line extensions.
Cadbury Schweppes Americas Beverages relied on two distinct and separate
manufacturing, sales, and distribution networks for Hawaiian Punch to serve super
markets and other retail customers. One is called finished goods which have
incremental case sales of 1,420,837 and direct store delivery which have 1,772,949 in
incremental case sales. Kate Hoedebeck assembled a brand team to alert the team to
issues that require attention and decisions needed to be made prior to 2005 marketing
plan. They came up with three major problems they wanted to address. First they
wanted to clarify the positioning because it differed between Finished Goods and DSD
Networks. Positioning in the finished goods focused on “mom”, with mom being the
purchaser or gatekeeper of the family. Hawaiian Punch positioning in dsd network
focused on urban, multicultural teens and featured flavor variety. Second was a matter
of consideration for innovation. The brand team believed that Hawaiian Punch brand
would benefit from Hispanic inspired flavors, which would also appeal to non-hispanic
household. Hoedebeck wanted to brand team to consider flavor innovation in the
concern of the finished goods and DSD networks. The third topic for consideration dealt
with product placement allowances in the finished goods network. Wanted team to
address the allowances relative to innovation in both finished goods, DSD and to media
advertising. Wanted to know which method would give the company the biggest bang
for the buck in terms of incrementing sales and equity enrichment.
I believe the company should keep the same positioning so there will be no
confusion. It is better to clarify to customers that their is only one positioning statement
for DSD networks and Finished Goods network. Instead of making them different
because they're on different aisles. I believe the position they should stick with for both
departments is a position of “ a cool fun and exciting juice for all ages” so we won't miss
out on connecting with any potential customers. 56.7 percent of customer exclusively
shops on Finished goods aisle and 18.1 shop only DSD, and 25.2 shop on both aisles.
Even Though Finished Goods deliver at the highest volume we still don't want to miss
out on any potential sales and would want consumers to be confused if they shop both
aisles. When it comes to innovating there are many pros and cons in Finished Goods
which is $0.80 per unit and DSD networks which is $0.96 per unit. Adding a new flavor

4. with reduced sugar can be a positive move, it will give health conscious customers more
initiative to buy. Adding new exotic flavors could be positive because it will cover both
hispanic and non-hispanic customers and in the end take some market share from the
competition. Some Cons would be losing out on potential customers if the company
does not start offering more innovative products. Another con would be new flavors are
not being sold In DSD by bottlers and product cannibalization. We would not want the
new flavors we add to start cannibalizing the already existing flavors. The company is
going to support this innovation primarily by media advertising which is prominent in
DSD network and secondarily by product placement. Competition spend about .24
cents each case on media advertising. By dividing our 2.2 million advertising budget by
77,291,366 give us .028 cents each case spent on media advertising. Which is why I
believe media advertising would be the best way to support this innovation because it is
cheaper for us along with some product placement.
For the future I recommend the company focus on making sure the positioning is
set in stone with their customers and use Punchy as a more friendly character for all
ages instead of just for kids. I also recommend that the company should get into
creating the new exotic flavors to attract Hispanic and African American consumers.