Inside Kettle's Crunch Zone

Salem, Ore. -- Kettle Foods is banking on the power of its loyal following with a summer promotion that zeroes in on two of the brand's key attributes -- crunch and flavor, says Julie Dunmire, brand director at Kettle, which is now owned by San Francisco-based Diamond Foods. The message is carried by a gimmicky Loud Food Club website tied to in-store merchandising and social networking. The promotion runs from Memorial Day through Labor Day.The Loud Food Club is geared around crunching and engagement. "You've never seen this kind of fan love," says Dunmire. "We get all sorts of e-mails and handwritten notes. One person wanted us to build a salt and vinegar plant next to his house. Then we had a guy who baked a cake that looked like a Kettle Brand bag. Another made a jigsaw puzzle. Why not harness this excitement with some sort of club?"Developed by Denver-based Cultivator Advertising, the campaign targets two types of chip consumers: Natural Noshers, who are concerned about healthy ingredients, and Gourmet Foodie Families, who enjoy chips that are not mass produced. Prior to launching the campaign, Kettle conducted a segmentation study. It also examined fan correspondence.LoudFoodClub.com opens with a video of a "super fan" expounding the benefits of loud crunching via a bull horn. Three links, which the "fan" points out, take the viewer to:A fan page where consumers can pledge to "crunch chips with noisy abandon." They can also download and print signs and crunch flag cutouts. There are links to Twitter and Facebook as well as a personal crunch statement that can be copied and inserted into one's e-mail.A video starring the super fan explains how kettle chips are made. The chips are batch-cooked and hand-stirred in kettles. They do not contain trans fat, MSG or other ingredients that could be unhealthy or impede taste. The chips' all-natural aspects contribute to their crunchiness and golden-brown color. Consumers who download a dollar-off coupon are automatically entered into a sweepstakes to win free chips for a year.In-store, a shipper carton display uses the same graphics as the website. The display tells consumers about the "club," informs them that they can obtain a coupon online and provides the LoudFoodClub.com Web address. "The shipper was designed to appeal to the impulse shopper and to drive people online so they can interact with the brand," says Dunmire.The freestanding shipper can be used in all channels. It is not pre-packed, hence, it can be filled with the retailer's choice of flavors and reused when product runs out. Shippers holding different flavors can be placed side by side. Kettle offers several dozen flavors. "A pre-packed shipper is often used once and thrown away," says Dunmire. "This can live on through multiple cases. Usually, we see a mix of four or five flavors in one shipper." The shipper can be placed in the salty snack aisle, beer or soft drink section or in a seasonal area devoted to summer entertaining. Kettle is also conducting in-store sampling in Walmart stores and some supermarkets.As of late July, the Loud Food Club had generated more than 13,000 Facebook fans and 1,400 Twitter followers (who encourage others to join the club and crunch). "When you get the consumer to participate in a dialog, you get some rich insights," says Dunmire. Kettle is using Nielsen data and in-store reports to track the campaign's effectiveness. The campaign replaces a summer initiative titled, "People's Choice, Make Your Own Flavor." People's Choice, which had run since 2002, focused on creating different chip varieties. Dunmire say the cost of the Loud Food Club promotion is "on par" or slightly above the cost of previous promotions.

Inside Kettle's Crunch Zone

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