From Three Breads to One Brand

Design Management Review, Summer 2004 by Kinsley, Pat

With regional acquisitions, the Irish Pride bread brand was working hard to strengthen its national presence. But size alone would not assure success. Pat Kinsley examines design's important role in this transformation. The story moves from analysis and concept development to strategy and realization-a saga that repositioned a low-involvement purchase into a contemporary, high-impact, high-profit brand.

As one of life's necessities, bread has inevitably become a major business. And as a market, it is no different from any other sector. Competition grows, new products are developed, and product offerings change regularly. As a result, the brand becomes the differentiating factor.

The Irish Pride company has been in business for 11 years. It is one of the largest bakeries in Ireland, supplying major retailers and independent stores through its nationwide bakeries and its large distribution hubs. As part of its long-term strategy, it had been acquiring smaller family-run bakeries across Ireland. For instance, Lydon House, of County Mayo, and Kiellys, of County Cork, were strong regional bakery brands, with their own corporate cultures, that are now part of Irish Pride.

Consolidating these regional brands into the Irish Pride family would require some work. Devising and implementing a strategy that would build a strong national brand, one the regional brands would want to be part of, was the first and most crucial step.

Bread is not rocket science. But building a dynamic, cohesive new brand from companies with different histories, attitudes, and approaches goes beyond package design and corporate identity. This is especially true when the challenge is to take a low-involvement purchase, and turn it into a high-impact, high-profit brand.

Having successfully worked in partnership with Irish Pride over the past seven years, Neworld has developed a close working relationship with Irish Pride and an innate understanding of the nuances of the Irish bread sector.

Background

With a population of only 3.5 million, Ireland is a relatively small country. Within that small population, however, lives a surprising diversity of cultures.

As a visitor to Ireland, you could travel the length and breadth of the country in a few days, but you would experience quite a range of environments: from urban sprawl to thatched cottages, from the rough-hewn stone valleys of the West to the lush green pastures of the Midlands. Cultures, too, would differ.

The one word that repeatedly comes to mind when trying to describe the Irish is pride-pride in being Irish and, as a people, welcoming to all people. Locals are proud of their upbringing and heritage: their friends, their pubs, their teams, and their companies.

They are also proud of their food suppliers. The Irish perception is that produce created in their county is fresher and better than food that comes from elsewhere. Not necessarily factualbut that is the perception!

Despite all this, however, it must be said that Irish culture has experienced massive changes in recent years, the most profound of which is an increasingly affluent consumer economy. The Irish have seized the opportunity to travel abroad more frequently, and consequently they have adopted a taste for a variety of cuisines. This acceptance has in turn driven consumer demand for a wider choice of food products, and suppliers have had to respond accordingly by extending their product ranges. This applies just as much to bread as to other food products.

The point being: to understand a national brand, you must first understand the nation!

Dilemma

By not evolving with the times, Irish Pride had reached its plateau (figure 1). The advantages associated with a progressive brand, such as awareness, profile, and brand equity were gradually becoming idle in the Irish Pride brand. It was not connecting meaningfully with today's consumers and was starting to lose individuality. As a result, the brand was failing to effectively engage the market. It was therefore essential to first get the proposition right, then develop a strong personality to engage and build an emotional relationship with the consumer. Neworld's long-standing relationship with Irish Pride as a strategic brand and design partner made it a natural in the move to explore the brand and secure the most effective repositioning. At the same time, Neworld's position as an outside consultant would guarantee that the findings would be free of any inherent prejudices and preconceptions.

Objectives

The objectives initially outlined were:

* Re-brand the company.

* Re-position the brand.

* Own the white sliced bread market. Further to a close examination of Irish Pride's brief and a detailed consultation regarding their requirements, Neworld created a concise fourpart roadmap outlining the required steps needed to secure future growth and pave the way for Irish Pride to legitimately aim for the position of No. 1 brand in the marketplace.

1. Brand awareness. Repositioning the Irish Pride brand to create an emotional relationship with consumers would help improve consumer awareness.