Merloni Elettrodomestici, which is set on capturing fast growing CEE markets, is investing zł.15 million in an attention-seeking marketing campaign intended to carry the Italian based white-goods company from number three to number one on the local market.
The campaign, which will run all year across all media, aims to fire the imaginations and open the purses of young working couples for its economy youth brand, Indesit.
Merloni, which last Autumn began an investment worth zł.65 million on domestic factories as well as another zł.35 million in Russia, in December opened a Central European head office in Budapest. This all represents a production shift East which intends to benefit not just from cheaper production costs but also double digit growth rates in CEE which compare favourably with rates of about two percent in the West.
Spearheading the eastern advance is a new CEE marketing campaign which, entitled ‘We work you play’, is pushing hard an Ikea-style ‘world of Indesit’ which aims to associate the white goods brand in the minds of Polish consumers with youth, fitness, and the active life.
Unlikely as it may seem, this Indesit image and advertising strategy, developed in 2000 by Wolff Olins and Ogilvy & Mather respectively, has, according to Giuseppe Parma, Country Manager for Poland, already brought the brand to number one in Western Europe, and he expects similar results on CEE markets. “If we’re number one in a year, then it’s not too soon,” he says.
Throughout Europe, Indesit’s strategy is to sell its target group a set of values translated into tangible technology, such as super-quick washing programs entitled ‘time4you’; half-load programs called ‘just4you’ and a flexible can/bottle storer for fridges entitled ‘play Zone.’ In Western Europe, where Indesit is well established, marketing focuses on portraying Indesit as the leader in its segment in terms of design and technology. The domestic campaign, by contrast, is designed primarily to attract attention and establish the Indesit brand in the consumer consciousness.
Hence the appearance of Country Manager Giuseppe Parma, in red sportswear, to open Merloni’s press presentation of its Indesit line with the simplistic message,
“People who buy Indesit are people who like sport, who like to go to the cinema and spend time with their friends.”
Despite the zł.15 million going on the domestic advertising offensive, 84 percent of turn-out from Merloni’s factories is sold on foreign markets, a clear sign that Merloni, like most competitors in the business who are also starting to move factories out to labor-cheap countries, hopes to save on overall costs by shifting production to Poland. And since purchasing power on the domestic market is generally lower than in the West, many of the product lines produced in Poland, particularly top-shelf products under Merloni’s more up-market brand, Ariston, will not even be on sale in Poland.
In this country, where the lower-shelf ‘Indesit’ brand is reckoned to be much more of an earner, on the other hand, some lines are more in demand than in Western Europe,
“Space saving products like slimmer washing machines and smaller dishwashers do particularly well,” Giuseppe Parma says.
Dishwasher penetration on the domestic market, however, remains low in general, which may explain why, of the three campaigns Merloni has lined up for this year, two are particularly pushing dishwasher lines.
Neither of Merloni’s main local competitors, Amica and Whirpool, were willing to comment on the campaign.
From Warsaw Business Journal