The way of Marketing and Management of Nestle Coffee

In fact, many people in the industry are also familiar with one of its classic anecdotes, that is, at the beginning of its birth, Nestle Coffee once caused a sales crisis by overemphasizing the convenience (instant) brought about by its technological breakthrough. The reason is that many housewives are reluctant to accept products that make people feel like they are "lazy". It was April 1, 1938, and the spray-drying coffee powder process developed by Nestl é was officially put into production in Switzerland, and the world's earliest instant coffee was born. Soon, Nestle coffee was sold in France, the United States, the United Kingdom and other countries.

Today, Nestle coffee is sold in more than 100 countries around the world, consuming 1.7 billion cups a year. Although nearly 24% of the company's turnover and 11 billion Swiss francs comes from drinks, Nestl é is not just a manufacturer of instant coffee, fruit juices and mineral water. In 1990, Nestle's turnover was 46 billion Swiss francs, while in 1997, the turnover in the first 10 months was as high as 56.9 billion Swiss francs, an increase of 217.5% over the same period last year. At the end of 1994, Nestl é was selected as the third most valuable brand in the world by Financial World magazine, with a value of 11.549 billion US dollars, second only to Coca-Cola and Marlboro. Its turnover distribution in various business areas is as follows: drinks (23.6%), cereal, milk and nutrition (20%), chocolate and confectionery (16%), cooking products (12.7%), frozen food and ice cream (10.1%), frozen food (8.9%), pet food (4.5%), drugs and cosmetics (3%), other products and businesses (1.1%). It is regarded as one of the most successful operators in the consumer packaged food and beverage industry in the world today.

In China, Nestl é started producing milk powder and baby food in 1990. Production soared from 316 tons in 1990 to 10,000 tons in 1994, with sales of 200 million US dollars and is expected to reach 700 million US dollars by the year 2000.

This article mainly discusses the communication strategy of Nestle Coffee, the most important brand of Nestl é, which accounts for 15% of the company's turnover. And in the end, summarize the successful market leadership strategy of Nestle Coffee Company as a whole.

International dissemination principles of Nestle Coffee

From the consumer's point of view, an international brand should mean that a traveler can find the same product composition and type in every country. This raises a question: is Nestle Coffee a truly international brand? In fact, the brand of Nestle Coffee is the same everywhere, and the pattern on the label may be the same, but the type, actual composition and taste of the product vary from country to country. There are more than 100 varieties of Nestle coffee, and their tastes vary according to the tastes of consumers in various countries, making it difficult for travelers to identify the product. Therefore, it may be more appropriate to regard Nestle coffee as an international concept than as an international brand, because the standards for all its basic elements are the same.

As far as food is concerned, the strategy of producing products according to local tastes and preferences has been a great success, and it is often not feasible to follow a unified international strategy. Nestle Coffee is the most convincing example. As Nestle's business philosophy reflects, it follows the principle of "complete decentralization of authority" in structure and organization. This is also the expression of Nestle's "market mind (Market Head)"-that is, ideas should be linked to market facts, and the actions and means taken should be in line with local needs and requirements. Mr. Helmut Maucher, chairman and CEO of Nestl é, feels strongly that companies around Nestl é are in the best position to analyze how the company's food products adapt to local tastes and preferences, taking into account national food-related regulations.

However, for a brand to become a market leader, as Ramon Masip, Nestl é's executive vice president in Europe, holds, it must be a "low-cost manufacturer". If a company wants to achieve higher efficiency in marketing and advertising, it should make the way of information communication between its products and consumers more consistent and simplified. In Europe, for example, one way is to develop a new product for the whole of Europe under this positioning, and make it packaged and labeled exactly the same in all countries.

According to the trend of more integrated European market in the future, Nestl é has adopted such a new strategy: while trying to achieve greater consistency of new products, Nestl é also accepts the nuances of the brand in different places.

In recent years, Nestl é has taken a large number of measures, which is reflected in the company's long-term plan. The objectives of the plan are: to develop a basic communication strategy for Nestle's most important strategic brands, such as Nestle Coffee, and to develop guidelines on packaging and logos for these strategic brands in order to achieve greater consistency; improve the efficiency and effectiveness of communication with consumers by reducing the number of advertising agencies working for each brand.

More than 300 Nestl é products (not just coffee) are produced in 421 factories in 61 countries. The company's headquarters in Vevey, a small city on the banks of Lake Geneva, Switzerland, has made strict regulations on production process, brand, quality control and main raw materials. On the other hand, the administrative power basically belongs to the directors of the branches of various countries. They have the right to decide the final formation of each product according to the requirements of each country. This means that the company should maintain the policy of overall decentralization. To pursue greater consistency, in order to achieve such a dual purpose, it is necessary to maintain a delicate balance. This is the balance between international operation and local national operation, as well as the balance between international communication and local national communication. If it is not implemented in accordance with the same basic approach, the same goal, and all the factors related to it are not taken into account, then this balance can easily be undermined.

In order to correctly implement the new policy and inform the branch how to implement it, Nestl é has put forward three important documents. The content involves the marketing strategy of the company's strategic brand and the details of product presentation-□ tagging Standard (Labelling Standards) is only a guiding document, which clearly defines the various elements of label design. Such as the logo, font and color of Nestle Coffee, as well as the proportional relationship between the details. The document also lists label legends for various products and recommends that branches use these labels as early as possible.

The Packaging Design Manual (Package Design Manual) is a more flexible document that proposes a variety of different ways to use standards. For example, the materials used in packaging and the form of packaging.

The most important document is the branding strategy (Branding Strategy). It includes some details of the marketing principles, background and main characteristics of the strategic brand of Nestle products. These key features include: brand personality; expected image; companies associated with the brand; visual features covered in the other two documents; and development of brand use.

Advertising and agents of Nestle Coffee

In order to better achieve the consistency of brand communication, Nestl é has decided to significantly reduce its advertising agencies around the world. Today, the number of agencies working closely with the company has been reduced to five, namely McCann, JWT, PubilisFCB, Ogilvy and Ling Lion, which form an international network of advertising agencies. The headquarters of Nestl é designated priority advertising agencies for each strategic brand. The preferred companies for Nestle Coffee are McCann and JWT. Local branches can make their own choices from these institutions. Practice shows that if a more centralized advertising service is adopted, the effect will be more satisfactory.

From a historical point of view, the advertising of Nestle Coffee has gone through three stages:

1. At the beginning, Nestl é was pleased with the revolution brought about by the breakthrough in technology to the traditional way of drinking coffee. The advertisement naturally wanted to emphasize the convenience brought by instant solution, but it did not expect that this was contrary to the purchasing psychology of many housewives. Does it show that you are not virtuous enough? This is not the image of a man's wife. Because at that time, in the 1930s and 1940s, women lacked self-confidence and took care of their husbands and children as an important task in their lives. With the progress of the times and the liberation of women, instant coffee, which is convenient and can maintain the original flavor, has finally shone brilliantly. Entering the Japanese market in the 1960s, it was immediately welcomed by the majority of housewives, especially for families without bean grinding props at home.

Later, when this advantage is weakened by the gradual promotion of time-saving and labor-saving machines, it is clear that too much emphasis on this convenience will not be effective.

two。 As a result, the focus of advertising turns to the purity, good taste and strong aroma of the product. Therefore, branches in various countries have adopted product-oriented advertisements, emphasizing that Nestle coffee is "real coffee". This is also consistent with the background of the widespread popularity of product-oriented advertising in the 1950s and 1960s.

3. When people gradually recognized that "coffee is Nestle coffee", the focus of Nestle coffee advertising changed to lifestyle-oriented, especially in line with the lifestyle of local young people. For example, in British advertisements, Nestle Gold Coffee plays a role in promoting the development of a couple's romantic love story.

When Nestle Coffee entered the Japanese market in 1961, it adopted a product-oriented advertising strategy. TV commercials first put out "I am Nestle Coffee" as the slogan, simple and clear, appeared repeatedly on TV for a time, and quickly won popularity. Then, in 1962, according to Japanese consumers' habit of how many coffee beans to make a cup of coffee to show the coffee concentration, the advertising campaign of "43 beans" was launched, which is a typical USP (unique sales proposition) strategy. The commercial sings "Nestle Coffee, set 43 coffee beans in one spoonful, mellow Nestle coffee, everyone's Nestle coffee". Because of its beautiful melody, it has become a children's song in the streets.

The name Nestle Coffee (Nescafe) gives people a clear impression in different languages of the world, and is combined with the image of eliminating tension and stress (while in Chinese, "Nestle" gives people a warm feeling and has a strong correlation with "home"). In the 1970s in Japan, the advertising campaign for "Men who understand differences" expressed the concept that "the high-style image of Nestl é Gold Coffee is created by honed 'men who understand differences'." The advertisement creates an atmosphere of "Nestle coffee gives Japanese men who are busy with their work a sense of instant richness", which has so far impressed many Japanese.

The advertising strategy of Nestle Coffee in China can be divided into two stages. In the early 1980s, it was first introduced to the market with the simple slogan "delicious" to persuade people to taste the western "tea ceremony". At that time, for many young people, they were not so much tasting Nestle coffee as quietly experiencing a growing popularity of Western culture. The "delicious" campaign lasted for many years. Although the advertising film has been refurbished many times during this period, the slogan has not changed. It has become a successful example that almost every advertiser likes to talk about in the 1980s.