i.justrealized

Here’s an example of rebranding failing – Tropicana. Tropicana made an attempt to rebrand its package only to result in a 20% drop in sales. What I suspect being the cause of the plunge is consumers feel too attached to the existing brand and it becomes representative of the taste. When you look at the Tropicana package, it triggers your senses in your brain that has been associated with drinking the orange juice. The change in design fails to trigger the same senses and results in unfamiliarity. So if you do rebrand, do consider that.

Tropicana rebranding before and after

Tropicana Line’s Sales Plunge 20% Post-Rebranding

NEW YORK (AdAge.com) — Tropicana’s rebranding debacle did more than create a customer-relations fiasco. It hit the brand in the wallet.

After its package redesign, sales of the Tropicana Pure Premium line plummeted 20% between Jan. 1 and Feb. 22, costing the brand tens of millions of dollars. On Feb. 23, the company announced it would bow to consumer demand and scrap the new packaging, designed by Peter Arnell. It had been on the market less than two months.

Now that the numbers are out, it’s clear why PepsiCo’s Tropicana moved as fast as it did. According to Information Resources Inc., unit sales dropped 20%, while dollar sales decreased 19%, or roughly $33 million, to $137 million between Jan. 1 and Feb. 22. Moreover, several of Tropicana’s competitors appear to have benefited from the misstep, notably Minute Maid, Florida’s Natural and Tree Ripe. Varieties within each of those brands posted double-digit unit sales increases during the period. Private-label products also saw an increase during the period, in keeping with broader trends in the food and beverage space. (Source: Adage)

Tropicana is scrapping the rebranded packaging.

To remind people that Pizza Hut also has pasta, Pizza Hut is temporarily changing its name to Pasta Hut.

Pizza Hut rebrands to Pasta Hut

Fifty-year-old restaurant chain Pizza Hut is temporarily changing its name to Pasta Hut in a radical £100m relaunch.

Although it plans to keep the same number of pizzas on the menu, from this week Pizza Hut will introduce eight pasta dishes across its 700 restaurants to support its new positioning. Nine restaurants will change their signage immediately.

Pizza Hut marketing director Claudia Nicholls-Magielsen said it was making the change because research showed that consumers wanted more variety when eating out, and that, on average, the British public ate more pasta than pizza. ‘We want to be as famous for our pastas as we are for our pizzas,’ she explained.

Nicholls-Magielsen admitted that the move was a ‘bit of a shock tactic’ designed to ‘get people to feel differently about Pizza Hut’. (Source: Brand Rebublic)

That, by the way, is the problem of choosing a name that is too specialized like Kentucky Fried Chicken or Pizza Hut (both have same management). Every one knows you make chicken, that’s great but once they feel like eating something like fish or beef, they most certainly won’t think of you. Same goes with Pizza Hut, if I am going to have pasta, I probably go to Pastamania or something. Just because they remind me of pasta. Pastamania sells pizzas too but I always forget they do.