Actual reason for failure: juice name in rebrand is vertical making it unreadable on shelf.
How did Tropicana lose $30M in a packaging redesign?
111–120 of 278 posts
Re: How did Tropicana lose $30M in a packaging redesign?
#112It is my theory, backed up by nothing but instinct and my own very fallible personal experience, that many customers simply did not “see“ the new design. That is, they would have preferred to buy Tropicana but assumed it had disappeared from the shelves.
I'm relieved this is the second-to-the-top parent comment. They literally did an eye gaze study showing that just about no one saw the logo (and even fewer read it), yet their conclusion is some emotional fugazi.
Yes - if I'm interpreting that rapidly-changing GIF correctly, where previously people were drawn to the brand name now their eyes focused on "100% Orange" ... which completely commoditizes the contents.
"I couldn't find the stuff we normally get, so I bought this one because it was cheaper".
Re: How did Tropicana lose $30M in a packaging redesign?
#113Re: How did Tropicana lose $30M in a packaging redesign?
#114What seems to be lost in these “redesigns” is the why : why are you doing it? If there isn’t a list of benefits long enough to justify the cost and possible risk, well, that’s a problem. There’s also a tendency for companies to be super proud of what they’ve done so they neglect methods like A/B testing and instead just bet the farm on their great new design. After all, it cost a lot of money and looks cool to the de…
To sort of riff off what you're saying; there might be some serious social, "whys" driving the more material, "why" of lackluster brand re-designs in the last 20 years. It seems like as companies are bought up by private equity groups (PAI Partners in Tropicana's case) quality and brand identity suffer. You really see this all over the place and another bad recession could reshuffle the board enough to let private wealth groups buy up what's left of the United States' viable domestic cultural export.
Re: How did Tropicana lose $30M in a packaging redesign?
#115Earlier quoted context omitted.
US has "not from concentrate" juice. That's the primary reason people buy Tropicana instead of store brand.
I think most Tropicana in the US is from concentrate. "Pure Premium" is their sub-brand for NFC (not-from-concentrate) at the moment; they've previously called it "Tropicana Natural" but were sued since even NFC orange juice requires significant processing to make it last more than a few days. (Which goes to the other point: most store brand orange juice comes from your local Dole, Minute Maid, or Tropicana distribut…
> the only thing that's different is the brand tax
They have different flavor bombs.
Same as branded gas that all comes from the same regional depot with vendor specific additives dumped in the trailer before delivery.
Re: How did Tropicana lose $30M in a packaging redesign?
#116Usually they change the packaging when they cheapen the ingredients of stuff and ruin it. It is a good indication that you should stop buying it (Ortega taco shells is a good recent example). But who cares what the Tropicana package looks like? Their OJ is sour so I don't buy it unless I am really craving OJ and I can't find Minute Maid. I will drive to 2-3 quickie marts first to look though. All juice is just sugar water anyway. I mostly avoid it altogether.
Re: How did Tropicana lose $30M in a packaging redesign?
#117I wonder how much this is to do with the re-design and how much is due to the fact that it changed.
Re: How did Tropicana lose $30M in a packaging redesign?
#118What seems to be lost in these “redesigns” is the why : why are you doing it? If there isn’t a list of benefits long enough to justify the cost and possible risk, well, that’s a problem. There’s also a tendency for companies to be super proud of what they’ve done so they neglect methods like A/B testing and instead just bet the farm on their great new design. After all, it cost a lot of money and looks cool to the de…
I mean, as risky and brand and logo redesigns are, there is often a need to want to modernize or revitalize your logo or mark or packaging. It’s more difficult, the larger/older/more iconic your packaging is. That’s why the best logo and branding and packaging redesigns tend to either be the most iterative or have changed early in a product/brand’s lifecycle before he could be too associated with a company. The Tropi…
One of my favorite graphics is this one detailing the evolution of the Pepsi logo vs. the Coca-Cola logo: https://flowingdata.com/2009/08/13/pepsi-and-coca-cola-logo-...
Of course it was over-dramatized for effect, and the truth emerges further down the page. But it's close enough to true that it stops and makes you think.
Re: How did Tropicana lose $30M in a packaging redesign?
#119I recall when this happened as I was actively redesigning the entire branding for a nationwide packaged food company at the time (15 different products for about $200k - a deal for them and a deal for me and my crew of two). The Tropicana blunder was a great object lesson in why too many cooks in the kitchen will ruin the soup. It's a textbook case of a corporation's marketing department's tendency to shy away from any type of bold graphic for fear of being the person blamed if it fails.
The lesson is that failure is guaranteed if you approach a brand design with fear of failure, or fear people won't "get it". If there's one thing meme culture has shown, it's that people are desperate to be talked to like adults who are in on the message. Assuming your customers can't appreciate a metaphor because they're consumer robots is a guaranteed way to lose customers. Assuming they'll get your sense of humor or aesthetics is, of course, a big risk, but that's the job.
As far as my role at that time, it worked out well, but the brand really did need a redesign. They were the second largest prepackaged sushi and salad company in the US and their packaging looked like airplane food before. I went in the complete opposite direction, filling each label with layered visual cues and references to what was inside. Sure, I was terrified it wouldn't work. But if Tropicana had approached me at that time and asked me for a redesign, I think I might have told them they didn't need one. Or I would've advocated for keeping their core "joke" because it worked. No one had the guts to tell them to stick with the brand.
Re: How did Tropicana lose $30M in a packaging redesign?
#120Earlier quoted context omitted.
Yes, I have lost, literally lost things I liked to buy at the grocery, due to changed packaging. One time I had to Google images for a 20 minutes to find old images, then write down the brand/ type. Another, the package changed, and the new package stated some strange "new" ingredient, which left me struggling to know if the flavour changed. I honestly would just prefer a package never changes for my entire life. Edi…
Likewise. My wife once sent me to the store to buy Cheerios and Honey Crisp Apples. I grabbed the Cheerios, then, still on the cereal isle, I looked everywhere for thr Honey Crisp Apples - before I realized the Apples were apples in the produce department
I don't understand your comment about the apples, why wouldn't apples be in the produce department?