ADVERTISING; Kellogg Strategy Change Is Hinted
PHILIP H. DOUGHERTY
Published: April 1, 1981

On the surface it seems a small matter: Kellogg assigning a ''new cereal product under development'' to the J. Walter Thompson Company in Chicago. But think, the Leo Burnett Company, Chicago, traditionally handles all cereal assignments in the United States for the country's leading marketer of dry cereals, while Thompson has been doing most of it overseas.
Is this a portent?
The Kellogg Company spends about $100 million in advertising at home and most of that backs its cereals. Thomp@son, domestically, has been handling its Salada line of teas, deserts and fudge. Small potatoes.
Kellogg has assigned Burnett to handle LeShake Yogurt, which it acquired late last year from the Elmhurst (Queens) Milk and Cream Company and has since moved out of the New York market and into all of the East Coast.

First LeShake advertising was done by Gerald Schoenfeld, then by Mathieu, Gerfen & Bresner and then in-house by Elmhurst.

"Other"wise?: The Selling of Global Cultural Difference

by Sangeeta Rao

The era of globalization is here and with it a new concept - global culture. For those of us who see our task as one of responding to this phenomena of globalization, it is critical to unpack the meanings that surround the concept of a global culture. I understand globalization as a term used to describe the transformative activities characterising contemporary politics, the current world economy and the peoples and cultures of the world. The new global culture is the expression of deterritorialisation and a borderless world. Operating through the logic of late capitalism, it can be seen as the creation of powerful media empires and transnational companies with a culture of consumption or the capitalist agenda as one of the primary signifiers of the era of globalization.
In as much as "the new global" culture owes its existence to powerful media empires and transnational companies promoting a culture of consumption that announces the arrival of the era of "boundarylessness," advertising can be read as a global cultural signifier. But then advertising of commodities sold around the globe specializes in emphasizing boundaries, caters to a demand for difference and exploits "otherness" through its attempt to resurrect universalism under the aegis of global consumption. In other words, global culture seen through advertising signals a desire for the dissolution of boundaries in order that personal freedom and free trade be facilitated and at the very same moment articulates distinct cultural characteristics that are "innate markers of difference." The Coca Cola advertisement that features common every day folk from "exotic" countries across the globe - Black, White, Middle Eastern, East and South Asian - beating their own respective indigenous/local version of drums to the beat of the Coca Cola jingle "always Coca Cola" comes to mind immediately as the most compact example of this contradiction between "an universal" and "a particular" being the basis for selling a product. It is my contention that in understanding this contradiction we take our first steps in grappling with the phenomena of global culture.
Barthes (1973, Myhtologies, Paladin) explores the ideology of universalism and analyses the mythology at work in the conjuring of a universal human community out of examples of cultural diversity:
This myth functions in two stages: first the difference between human morphologies is asserted, exoticism is insistently stressed, the infinite variations of the species, the diversity in skins, skulls and customs are made manifest, the image of Babel is complacently projected over that of the world. Then, from this pluralism, a type of unity is magically produced: man is born, works , laughs and dies everywhere in the same way :and if there still remains in these actions some ethnic peculiarity, at least one hints that there is underlying each one an identical 'nature'.
The sentimentality of the notion that we are all brothers and sisters `under the skin' disguises the historical facts not just of cultural difference, but of domination and inequality - that it is under conditions of inequality that people experience birth, death, work and laughter and not some blissful "natural" condition. The questions that remain unasked, of course, are: Whose nature? and What is this Natural? At a broad level the answer is clear. It is the values of Western Enlightenment that are being universalised as natural, the notions of modernization and industralisation as the only "civilized" path to follow. Radhakrishnan (1992, in Nationalisms and Sexualities, Routledge) points to this as:
Third World nationalisms are forced to choose between `being themselves' and `becoming modern nations' as though the universal standards of reason and progress were natural and intrinsic to the West .....this divide perpetrates the ideology of a common dominant world where the West leads naturally and the East follows in an eternal game of catch-up where its identity is always in dissonance with itself.
And here the boundaries of this new "global" culture become more visible, for the question that needs to be asked is "Who really catches up?" or rather "Who is in a position to catch up?" While, invoking difference and pushing universality, global advertising, at its most common denominator is aimed at not the general mass, but at specific people. The model example is again Coke. Armed with essentially the same universal packaging, logo, taste and advertising, Coke has carried its carbonated beverages to over 160 countries and accounts for almost 50% of all soda pop consumed worldwide. It works primarily through the concept of global market segmentation. This form of segmentation involves defining markets in multiple countries based not on national boundaries, but on some other basis- most often, a life style or value system. Thus while the term global culture seems to suggest a politics of inclusion, we find that a great deal of commonality is actually found amongst certain classes of people across national boundaries rather than classes of people within any one country. The elite and upper middle class in India share similar values and lifestyles with similar social classes in the United States than with the working class or poor in India. There has emerged, thus, a new breed of identities based on mobility. This new breed popularly known as possessing the "hotel culture " are the cosmopolitan business people, bureaucrats and intellectuals. They are "the new class," people with credentials, "decontextualised cultural capital..." that "can be quickly and shiftingly recontextualised in a different setting" (Hannerz, 1990; Cosmopolitans & Locals in World Culture, TCS, 7). These are the sets of people that global capital works for and who global marketing segment-ation pertains to. This creation and mutation of classes fosters and reprod-uces the mobility of transnational capital.
We can at this point add a little more specificity to how exactly this transformation occurs - the "keeping in place" of difference but the simultaneous marking of a universal. One notion that transnational advertising draws heavily from in their attempts to penetrate third world markets is imagery that reflects the age old traditions and cultures of the nation they are marketing to. By appealing to sentiments of a glorious cultural, national and spiritual heritage, advertising tries to define for India its civilizational identity and great worth in the global context. It is possible to discern here that one of the major tasks at hand for transnational advertising is to reconcile two identities - the favored identity of "authentic cultural plenums" (Buell, 1994; National Culture and the New Global system, JHU, MD) or tradition has to be reconciled with a culture of consumption. Transnational advertising therefore makes strategic use of aspects of a selective Indian collective conscious, so that they might further their own ends. For all other purposes of course the cultural plenums of the Third World are kept behind tight conceptual and geographic boundaries. They are restrained definitionally as premodern, particularistic and firmly bounded primordialist cultures.
Let us take the example of the advertisement for Walls Ice cream. The advertisement works as a good example of a transnational commodity being marketed in India through what might be a global campaign. While the advertisement begins with a laughing Mona Lisa and the Eiffel Tower , and savvy executives going to work in France the advertisement within its allotted space of 30 seconds features an elephant in ceremonial attire, the Taj Mahal, kids playing cricket on a sunny day, a parrot (associated with good fortune in India), a regional south Indian costume dance Kathakali and the yuppie urban elite of India.
Locked in the advertisement are the dichotomous discourses of tradition and modernity striving to reconcile dissonant identities. The use of tradition as an operating concept is strategic and clearly these "essential" identities which have been so arbitrarily assigned are invidious. Just as the West has always looked to the East where the East is assigned the role of authenticating itself to the West, now in the form of transnational advertising comes along another oppressive force that decides and then defines what the Third world's authentic nature in its essence is and isn't. The advertisement is also representative of a popular orientalist tendency. The desire to "freeze" the "native culture" in the trappings of its own making is but a familiar hierarchial strategy for "othering" the third world. While this particular advertisement concedes to India's bow in the direction of modernity - the yuppie - this is acknowledged/accepted only after a necessary detour through its culture/traditions. In other words one can comprehend India's participation in the modernist project, or the emergence of the "Indian" yuppie only through a "freeze dried" national identity - a revitalisation of the idea of nationhood, but a nationhood over which a majority of Indians have no control.
At this point, it is necessary that I correct any impression that I may have given that this is all to do with multi-nationals only. Indian national capital, in as much as it is part of that "new global class" to whom "global" culture pertains, also reproduces this very same discourse. Here it is interesting to look at the case of Thums Up in India. Thums Up is a popular aerated beverage that has revamped its advertising strategy since the entry of Coke and Pepsi in the Indian market. Since the "masses" of India have always found this cola far out of their reach the Thums Up advertising campaigns had always targeted the urban youth with the "Taste the Thunder" slogan usually set to Western Rock Music and elitist sports such as billiards and so forth. The interesting development has been the response of this national campaign in the face of the invasion of transnational advertising. Thums Up ran a fresh new campaign using the theme song "Sare Jahan Se Achcha Hindustan Hamara" - loosely translated it reads as "The finest land in the world, our India." Here we see how the themes embodied in the rhetoric of nationalism have been appropriated by a national firm in the face of the threat posed by transnational companies. The discourses of nationalism and transnationalism therefore work back and forth and play off against each other to ultimately further the capitalist enterprise.
The conjecture then is defined, as we noted above, by a culture of consumption that lies at its very base - commodities that traverse across nations - their appeal worked out through the idea of a `privileged' West/White-ness existing coevally and non-hierarchically with the underprivileged, but simultaneously specifically nationalist (the golden age) Other, all in the context of pleasure. The critical task therefore is to question all of the parameters that define the conjecture and their interconnections - the culture of consumption (thus capitalism), the modes of Othering within universalisms (and thus imperialism) and the essentialist heritages (thus nationalism). Paying attention to any one parameter exclusively could just as successfully subvert a progressive agenda as ignoring them all.

[Sangeeta Rao is a graduate student of Communications at the University of Massachusetts at Amherst]

PUMA launches new marketing strategy with national ad campaign aimed at alternative youth...

Advanced CELL technology basis for retro-futuristic campaign developed by Gyro Worldwide and award-winning music video producers PUMA, the fourth largest sporting brand in the world, makes a bold marketing move this week with the launch of the brand's first nationally advertised campaign in more than a decade.
The television campaign -- a retro-futuristic perspective on PUMA's revolutionary advanced CELL technology -- was developed over the past two months by Gyro Worldwide, the highly acclaimed Philadelphia-based advertising agency that specializes in marketing to the alternative youth culture, and was produced as the first commercial endeavor by Jonathan Dayton and Valerie Faris, producers of the 1996 MTV music video of the year, "Tonight Tonight" by the Smashing Pumpkins. PUMA named Gyro Worldwide its advertising agency of record in September 1996.
The advertising campaign sets the stage for a major turnaround of the PUMA brand in the United States, and comes on the heels of PUMA AG's announcement last month of its strategic partnership with Monarchy/Regency Enterprises, a leading Hollywood film producer or co-producer of such blockbuster hits as "Pretty Woman," "A Time To Kill," "JFK" and "Free Willy." Monarchy/Regency's standing in the entertainment business enables PUMA to further step up its marketing efforts in the United States.
"PUMA enjoys 68 percent brand awareness in the United States, and with this ad campaign and other strategic marketing initiatives we are now focused on shortening the gap between our strong brand awareness and 1 percent market share of American consumers," said Herbert Elliott, president of PUMA North America, which is based in Brockton, Mass. "We will leverage PUMA's distinctive identity as a superior performance sport brand that also is perceived as confident and rebellious -- a personality that appeals to young Americans, who as a group purchase between 70 and 80 percent of all athletic footwear in the United States."
To help build its brand positioning, PUMA turned to Gyro Worldwide, an advertising agency that has gained both notoriety and praise for its own brand of unabashedly "hip" advertising that is decidedly different from traditional Madison Avenue campaigns. The agency, founded in 1990 by Steve Grasse, 31, has distinguished itself for an ability to tap into the psyche of a generation of American consumers who refuse to be "demographic targets" and who do not respond to the same marketing messages that have appealed to generations before them.
The PUMA advertising campaign reinforces PUMA's heritage as a performance sports brand whose product excellence is derived from highly advanced technology. PUMA, which has a long history of leading-edge technical advancements, revolutionized the sporting goods industry earlier this year when it launched CELL technology and became the first athletic footwear manufacturer in the world to introduce a "foamless" midsole running shoe. Using sophisticated computer analysis, PUMA developed a mid-sole made of interlocking polymer cells that are differentiated in size, thickness, firmness and height to create a running shoe that provides better support, motion control and cushioning and lasts 50 percent longer than foam-based running shoes.
To highlight that PUMA is technologically ahead of its time without being "too technical," Gyro developed a series of fast-paced :15 and :30 commercials, shot on location at the Rockwell Defense Center in Seal Beach, Calif. The commercials dramatize the futuristic laboratory creation of PUMA's CELL technology coming to life as if in a Petri dish, and intersperses a sci-fi chase scene with "Bionic Man" type images.
Gyro's Grasse also reached out to Dayton and Faris, producers of music videos for R.E.M., the Beastie Boys and Smashing Pumpkins, winner of seven MTV music awards in 1996. The PUMA ads are the first time Dayton and Faris lent their music video expertise to commercial production.

makes a bold marketing move this week with the launch of the brand's first nationally advertised campaign in more than a decade.
The television campaign -- a retro-futuristic perspective on PUMA's revolutionary advanced CELL technology -- was developed over the past two months by Gyro Worldwide, the highly acclaimed Philadelphia-based advertising agency that specializes in marketing to the alternative youth culture, and was produced as the first commercial endeavor by Jonathan Dayton and Valerie Faris, producers of the 1996 MTV music video of the year, "Tonight Tonight" by the Smashing Pumpkins. PUMA named Gyro Worldwide its advertising agency of record in September 1996.
The advertising campaign sets the stage for a major turnaround of the PUMA brand in the United States, and comes on the heels of PUMA AG's announcement last month of its strategic partnership with Monarchy/Regency Enterprises, a leading Hollywood film producer or co-producer of such blockbuster hits as "Pretty Woman," "A Time To Kill," "JFK" and "Free Willy." Monarchy/Regency's standing in the entertainment business enables PUMA to further step up its marketing efforts in the United States.
"PUMA enjoys 68 percent brand awareness in the United States, and with this ad campaign and other strategic marketing initiatives we are now focused on shortening the gap between our strong brand awareness and 1 percent market share of American consumers," said Herbert Elliott, president of PUMA North America, which is based in Brockton, Mass. "We will leverage PUMA's distinctive identity as a superior performance sport brand that also is perceived as confident and rebellious -- a personality that appeals to young Americans, who as a group purchase between 70 and 80 percent of all athletic footwear in the United States."
To help build its brand positioning, PUMA turned to Gyro Worldwide, an advertising agency that has gained both notoriety and praise for its own brand of unabashedly "hip" advertising that is decidedly different from traditional Madison Avenue campaigns. The agency, founded in 1990 by Steve Grasse, 31, has distinguished itself for an ability to tap into the psyche of a generation of American consumers who refuse to be "demographic targets" and who do not respond to the same marketing messages that have appealed to generations before them.
The PUMA advertising campaign reinforces PUMA's heritage as a performance sports brand whose product excellence is derived from highly advanced technology. PUMA, which has a long history of leading-edge technical advancements, revolutionized the sporting goods industry earlier this year when it launched CELL technology and became the first athletic footwear manufacturer in the world to introduce a "foamless" midsole running shoe. Using sophisticated computer analysis, PUMA developed a mid-sole made of interlocking polymer cells that are differentiated in size, thickness, firmness and height to create a running shoe that provides better support, motion control and cushioning and lasts 50 percent longer than foam-based running shoes.
To highlight that PUMA is technologically ahead of its time without being "too technical," Gyro developed a series of fast-paced :15 and :30 commercials, shot on location at the Rockwell Defense Center in Seal Beach, Calif. The commercials dramatize the futuristic laboratory creation of PUMA's CELL technology coming to life as if in a Petri dish, and intersperses a sci-fi chase scene with "Bionic Man" type images.
Gyro's Grasse also reached out to Dayton and Faris, producers of music videos for R.E.M., the Beastie Boys and Smashing Pumpkins, winner of seven MTV music awards in 1996. The PUMA ads are the first time Dayton and Faris lent their music video expertise to commercial production.
The nationally televised PUMA ads initially are airing exclusively on MTV. In addition, PUMA launched a national print campaign that includes alternative youth culture publications such as Spin, Details and Ray Gun in addition to running publications such as Runner's World. Both the television and print campaigns feature the PUMA running shoes CELL Speed and CELL Venom, the cross training shoe CELL Gator and the revolutionary CELL Pro and CELL Top soccer shoes to be introduced in mid-year 1997.
Since introducing the CELL technology in 1996, PUMA has substantially increased its penetration into U.S. specialty sports stores. This week, PUMA introduced a line of shoes with more advanced CELL technology that extends across the full-length of the mid-sole rather than limited to the heel-to-instep section of the mid-sole. The PUMA CELL is now incorporated into a broader product line, including men's and women's running, soccer and cross-training footwear.
"To make it in today's competitive athletic footwear marketplace, it is imperative to first establish credibility for performance," added Elliott. "We believe we have done that, and PUMA is now in a position to extend our appeal to a wider general audience and to capture a substantially larger share of the U.S. footwear market."
PUMA's history dates back to 1924 and includes relationships with generations of championship competitors and sports enthusiasts who have endorsed PUMA products for their innovation, quality and performance, including U.S. stars Roger Clemens, Isiah Thomas, Evelyn Ashford, Bill Rogers, Thomas Smith and Walt Frazier, as well as international stars Martina Navratilova, Linford Christie, Merlene Ottey and Boris Becker.
PUMA products include footwear, apparel and accessories and are manufactured for a wide range of sports categories, including soccer, running, cross-training, sports lifestyle, basketball and tennis for professional and recreational athletes.
PUMA AG is headquartered in Herzogenaurach, Germany and the company's North American operations are based in Brockton, Mass.

Publication: Business Wire Date: Wednesday, December 4 1996

ADVERTISING : Kellogg Strategy Change Is Hinted

by PHILIP H. DOUGHERTY

On the surface it seems a small matter: Kellogg assigning a ''new cereal product under development'' to the J. Walter Thompson Company in Chicago. But think, the Leo Burnett Company, Chicago, traditionally handles all cereal assignments in the United States for the country's leading marketer of dry cereals, while Thompson has been doing most of it overseas.
Is this a portent?
The Kellogg Company spends about $100 million in advertising at home and most of that backs its cereals. Thomp@son, domestically, has been handling its Salada line of teas, deserts and fudge. Small potatoes.
Kellogg has assigned Burnett to handle LeShake Yogurt, which it acquired late last year from the Elmhurst (Queens) Milk and Cream Company and has since moved out of the New York market and into all of the East Coast.
First LeShake advertising was done by Gerald Schoenfeld, then by Mathieu, Gerfen & Bresner and then in-house by Elmhurst.

Published: April 1, 1981 in Newyork Times
Monday, September 14, 2009

Big, mean, power-packed, Yamaha’s new bikes cost a bomb


New Delhi: If you’re the kind who enjoys the more than occasional rush of adrenalin that comes with negotiating sharp turns and hairpin bends at top speed, then your bouquet of strong speed machines has just grown a bit wider. Provided your pocket is just as loaded as your attitude. Leading Japanese bike producer Yamaha introduced two power-packed sports bikes — the 998cc YZF–R1 and the 1,680cc MT01 — here on Tuesday, targeting a niche class of avid bikers.

Easy rider: Tomotaka Ishikawa, CEO & M, Yamaha Motor India, poses with the newly launched Torque Sports MT01 bike in New Delhi. Reuters / Vijay Mathur

Both are six-gear road machines and share the same ex-showroom price at Rs10.5 lakh each. The bikes are available in New Delhi, Chennai, Bangalore and Ahmedabad initially. While Bangalore has two dealers, each of the other cities would offer the bikes through a single dealer.

“We are also planning to market these bikes in Mumbai, Pune and Chandigarh in the near future. In fact, we plan to sell these bikes in 10 cities within six months,” said P. Sam, Yamaha Group head, marketing & sales, on the sidelines of the launch. “We have a network plan to distribute these bikes through 50 outlets across the country by 2010,” he added.

Tomotaka Ishikawa, CEO & MD, Yamaha Motor India, highlighted the technical superiority of the new bikes, which many “Indian manufacturers may not have”. Responding to a question on falling sales of Yamaha bikes in India, Ishikawa said: “Unfortunately, customers do not appreciate our technology today.”

Hit by the sharp downfall in sales of the existing 100cc and 125cc categories, from 35,000 last year to 18,000 in the current fiscal year, Yamaha has bet upon its flagship big bikes to revamp its sales graph in India. The company currently has a 3% market share in the country.
“This is not a volume-generating exercise but a brand-building experience. We would prefer event-based marketing,” Sam told this correspondent. The company has a n annual target of selling 400 to 500 units of the newly launched machines.
Yamaha would go for niche magazines and lifestyle publications to advertise the YZF–R1 and MT01, instead of mass media advertising, the Group head said regarding the advertising strategy of the new bikes. The comapny would also use rock music as a platform to popularise the new products.

Yamaha would eventually enter the 150cc and scooter segments of the Indian two-wheeler industry, Sam said.

Does he foresee stiff competition from Harley Davidson, which is also into the premium brand segment? Not really, feels Sam, adding that both brands have their loyal set of customers. “You wont find a Yamaha guy buying a Harley and vice versa,” he quips.

Yes, but Harley is an older brand. “So? So are Harley riders!”

That says it all.

ADVERTISING STRATEGY OF GOLDFLAKE

Background:

Despite a recent surge in tobacco advertising and the recent advertising ban (pending enforcement at the time of this study), there are few studies describing current cigarette marketing in India. This study sought to assess cigarette companies’ marketing strategies in Mumbai, India.

Methods:

A two week field study was conducted in Mumbai in September 2003, observing, documenting, and collecting cigarette advertising on billboards, storefronts and at point of sale along two major thoroughfares, and performing a content analysis of news, film industry, and women’s magazines and three newspapers.
Results: Cigarette advertising was ubiquitous in the environment, present in news and in film magazines, but not in women’s magazines or the newspapers. The four major advertising campaigns all associated smoking with aspiration; the premium brands targeting the higher socioeconomic status market utilised tangible images of westernisation and affluence whereas the "bingo" (low priced) segment advertisements invited smokers to belong to a league of their own and "rise to the taste" using intangible images. Women were not depicted smoking, but were present in cigarette advertisements—for example, a woman almost always accompanied a man in "the man with the smooth edge" Four Square campaign. Advertisements and product placements at low heights and next to candies at point of sale were easily accessible by children. In view of the iminent enforcement of the ban on tobacco advertisements, cigarette companies are increasing advertising for the existing brand images, launching brand extensions, and brand stretching.

Conclusion:

Cigarette companies have developed sophisticated campaigns targeting men, women, and children in different socioeconomic groups. Many of these strategies circumvent the Indian tobacco advertising ban. Understanding these marketing strategies is critical to mimimise the exploitation of loopholes in tobacco control legislation.

Abbreviations:

BAT, British American Tobacco; GPI, Godfrey Phillips India; GTC, Golden Tobacco Company; GYTS, Global Youth Tobacco Survey; ITC, Indian Tobacco Company; SES, socioeconomic status; VST, Vazir Sultan Tobacco.

"Axe and the Bom Chic A Wah Wah ",

A new campaign for Axe body spray which replaces the “Axe Effect.” The spots in this campaign again show women taken out of their normal routine by the effects of Axe body spray. In one execution, a woman is preparing for a date with her man but when she arrives at the restaurant she is distracted by a waiter carrying bread. She bursts out with the phrase “Bom Chic A Wah Wah” while undulating. Then she catches herself and looks embarrassed. A second execution has a woman teaching English to a group of foreign students when a teenager enters and she repeats the Bom Chic A Wah Wah and shimmy which the foreign students repeat.
What Works:Unilever has gone to some lengths to ensure that this new campaign for Axe - the proverbial golden goose - is memorable. They have certainly put together spots that are unique on television and should be highly memorable.
As with most Unilever advertising, this campaign does focus on the unique selling proposition of Axe and the advertising strategy has good continuity with the old campaign. This adds credibility to the effort.
What Doesn’t:This campaign features the most cringe-worthy advertising produced thus far this year and puts this advertising blog in the odd position of feeling considerable sympathy for the actress/models who have to utter the “Bom Chic A Wah Wah” in front of millions of their fellow Americans.
It is always possible for the story to work against the brand in spots like this and it happens here. Frequently, the problem is that the story is memorable, but the brand is not. That is not the case here. Unfortunately, while both the brand and the store are memorable, the connection is neither pleasant nor motivating. In five syllables, Axe crosses the boundary from uncontrollable attraction to creepy stalking behavior.
Of course, we are not the target for this advertising, but we very much doubt that 13-year old boys will find this campaign compelling, either.
Branding Bottom Line:Axe goes from hero to zero. Lose this campaign before we lose our minds.
"Axe and the Bom Chic A Wah Wah ",

Polo hopes to make a mint with radio revamp

If KitKat dumping its 47-year-old slogan was not shocking enough, here comes the next news flash involving one of the nation's favourite sweets - the recipe for Polo, the mint with the hole, is changing.
The iconic Polo mint is altering its ingredients to give the sweet a mintier flavour, and will be selling the changes to consumers with a new radio advertising campaign.
The brand's owner, Nestle Rowntree, is remaining coy about whether the flavour change was the most radical in the 56-year-old brand's history.
Last week the company dumped the KitKat slogan "have a break, have a KitKat" after five decades in favour of "make the most of your break".
In another bold move, the sweet that sold itself into the nation's affections by advertising itself as "the mint with the hole" has abandoned visual media for the first time.
It is telling consumers about the new mintier flavour solely by using radio in a £400,000 campaign by the advertising agency, J Walter Thompson.
Polo had taken a different path than rivals which claim to have a super-strong flavour or to be able to clean people's teeth, said Will Browne-Swinburne, an account director at J Walter Thompson.
"It's a considered reaction from a great brand to the way the world is going," Mr Browne-Swinburne said.
"In a world getting more extreme, Polo has made a token gesture," he said.
Nestle Rowntree said it could sell the changes using radio alone because the brand was iconic enough to be able to dispense with the visual media.
The six radio advertisements say that Polo mints have become 13.063% mintier.
"We've updated Polo in line with consumer trends and palates, and we wanted to tell the story the way Polo would. We felt that radio was the best medium to do this," said Mike O'Reilly, the head of consumer communications at Nestle.
Polo and J Walter Thompson will hope that the recipe change does not invite comparisons with Coca-Cola's disastrous decision in the 1980s to alter the flavour of its classic Coke.
After unprecedented consumer anger and lost sales, Coke had to revert to its original recipe.
Polo has always previously relied on visual advertising. At one time the brand even ran poems on train posters proclaiming its mints in parodies of poets such as Shakespeare.
Last month Nestle Rowntree lost an appeal case to expand its Polo trademark to include the familiar shape of the mint in any size or colour and without the word Polo embossed on it.
Lord Justice Mummery threw out a complex application in the appeal court and said: "This is an appeal concerning Polos, the mint with the hole in the middle. This is an appeal with a hole in the middle. It is dismissed."
· To contact the MediaGuardian news desk email editor@mediaguardian.co.uk or phone 020 7239 9857

Stephen Brook, advertising correspondent
MediaGuardian, Tuesday 10 August 2004 07.25 BST

Advertising Strategy of Lehar kurkure

Kurkure is one of the premier brands in the light snack industry in India. It is manufactured by the Frito Lay's Indian division and is marketed by Hirani Industries Corporation. Kurkure is named after the Hindi word 'crunchy' and is one of the popular food products in India. The product comes in 4 flavors to suit the tastes and styles of the consumers. Kurkure has also devised wonderful advertisement and marketing strategies to increase their reach to their target market. In order to increase their sales revenue, the brand has devised upon various advertising strategies. They have roped in various popular super stars to endorse their products. Endorsements by Bollywood Stars have been successful for a lot of brands and in this case too, it has helped increase the revenue of Kurkure. The latest endorsement of Kurkure is the leading actress, Juhi Chawla. The product is using the actress as their brand ambassador. The advertisement of Kurkure is based on funny sequences. Juhi Chawla has been endorsing the brand for a year.
The advertisement of the product comes up with plots of popular serials and films like Kyunki Saas Bhi Kabhi bahu thi, Jassi Jaisi koi Nahin and Mughal-e-Azam. The smart and funny tagline "masti bole to Kurkure" also adds color to the advertisement. The chirpy and charming personality of Juhi Chawla goes well with the name and taste of the brand. In addition to the charming advertisements, the taste of Kurkure has also led to its popularity. The snacks come in 4 flavors namely:
Green Chutney Rajasthani Style
Masala Munch
Red Chilli Chatka
Tamatar Hydrabadi A special flavor named Jaljhalo Hit was launched during Durga Puja in the year 2007. The market of Kurkure has increased to a great extent. The brand contributes around 40 % of the total revenue of Frito Lay India. Due to the immense popularity of the brand, the company has decided to introduce Kurkure overseas. The product has been introduced in United Kingdom, South Africa, Middle East and Australia. The product is available in small, middle and bumper packs. The endorsement by Juhi Chawla has really led to the popularity of the brand. It has made the brand more exciting and tempting. In addition to this, special offers are made to the consumers All these make Kurkure give the competitors a run for their money.

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Panasonic vs. LG: Who Delivered the Sharper Image in Media?
Optimedia's Antony Young on Who Was Better Prepped for Digital TV Switch
by Antony Young Published: June 11, 2009

TV's equivalent to Y2K, will see broadcasters throughout the country switch off their analog TV transmitters to broadcast entirely in digital. In the past year, households have had to get themselves digital-ready -- one bright spark for a consumer-electronics industry hammered by the recession. Unit sales in 2009 of digital TV sets will reach nearly 35 million, up about 8% from 2008. The category is flooded by a multitude of Japanese, Korean, European and Chinese brands. While consumers are all too ready to compare side-by-side price, technology and design, we like to think that marketing and promotion still helps influence brand choice. Panasonic and LG, two brands battling to pull out in front of the pack and compete with established market leaders Sony and Samsung, employed different media strategies. Let's see how they did.";

Antony YoungJune 12, 2009, TV's equivalent to Y2K, will see broadcasters throughout the country switch off their analog TV transmitters to broadcast entirely in digital. In the past year, households have had to get themselves digital-ready -- one bright spark for a consumer-electronics industry hammered by the recession. Unit sales of digital TV sets in 2009 will reach nearly 35 million, up about 8% from 2008. The category is flooded by a multitude of Japanese, Korean, European and Chinese brands. While consumers are all too ready to compare side-by-side prices, technology and design, we like to think that marketing and promotion still helps influence brand choice. Panasonic and LG, two brands battling to pull out in front of the pack and compete with established market leaders Sony and Samsung, employed different media strategies. Let's see how they did.

Communication strategies

The two consumer-electronics marketers had similar advertising budgets but didn't deploy them the same way.
Panasonic promoted its HDTV line Viera through a branded "Living in High Definition" marketing campaign that used TV, newspapers and online social media. It also capitalized on its global status as official consumer-electronics sponsor of the 2008 Summer Olympics and, domestically, of Major League Soccer. Its media mix in the past 12 months heavily skewed toward national newspapers (44%, according to TNS Media Intelligence), cable TV (17%) and online display (14%).
LG's advertising strategy is developed globally and then localized for domestic markets. For many years "Life's good" has dominated LG's messaging for all its various product offerings. In January 2009, LG partnered with Conde Nast Media Group and introduced a slightly different catchphrase -- "Life looks good" -- into the creative global messaging of LG's TV line. Its media mix in the U.S. skewed more heavily to magazines (49%) and national TV (35%).

Brand Speak on Electrolux Kelvinator

by Anand Bharadwaj Executive Vice President (Marketing and Marketing Services), Electrolux Kelvinator

Q. How long have you been in the Indian market? What plans do you have for the Indian market? Being one of the front-runners in white goods segment, what is your marketing strategy built around?

I think we have come to the market place last in the segment of white goods / consumer electronic goods & home appliances company operating in India. All though we came into this business in 1995, we really started our thrust in the Indian vital market in 1997, when we re-launched the Kelvinator brand in India. Prior to that, the Kelvinator was marketed by Whirlpool for 2 yrs. Only in January 1997 we re-launched the Kelvinator brand under our management. So, we have been in the market place for the last 5yrs or so. In that range of time we have made significant inroads in the refrigerator market.
If we go back in history then last yr we were the largest company in terms of shares in refrigerator market. In washing machines we have not really made the same kind of inroads as we made in refrigerators. But obviously our long-term plans are "to become significant players in the washing machine market as well". We have recently developed a revolutionary washing machine, which we call the Washy Talky & are launching it soon. I am confident that it will make our presence felt in the washing machine market as well.

Q. How are your brands positioned? What kind of differentiating strategy do you use?

Right now we are in the middle of developing different brand strategy. Let me just go back to history, In India we acquired a number of brands - Kelvinator was already there when we came. In 1995 we launched Electrolux in the front door washing machine segment. In 1998 we acquired two different brands-Voltas and Allwyn. And if you look at early 1999, we were there in the market space with four different brands- Electrolux, Kelvinator, Voltas and Allwyn.
But we have clear and distinct strategies for each brand. For e.g., if you look at Kelvinator, it is a brand inthe refrigerator segment only and is positioned as 'the coolest one'. Allwyn was positioned around durability -built for the long run- 'Allwyn chalta hi jaye, rukna iska kaam nahin'. Last year, we introduced a new range of Allwyn refrigerators called Sensor with the same theme 'Allwyn Sensor goes on and on and on...ruk na iska kaam nahin'. Electrolux is positioned on freshness plank with a tag line saying -'enjoy the freshness'. On the other hand Electrolux Maxclean was positioned around effective dirt removal and that's why advertising was around dirty children. So, just to summarize we are following a multiple brand strategy and each brand had a very clear position and a very clear focus. What we are doing now is consolidating our brand portfolios as the market place has been very sluggish & there is intense competition in the marketplace.

Q. Indian customers are willing to have world-class products at an affordable price. Comment.

First of all, let me say that consumer is the king. Whatever the consumer wants you have to give him. If you don't give him, the competition will give him and he will go to your competitor. Every company should understand what the consumer wants & that's the first thing! Secondly, every company must give international quality products. However, companies are there to make money, nobody wants to loose. You can't give a Mercedes Benz at the price of Maruti 800! Each company has to figure out what is the right balance between quality and price. If you want to give something, which is really of outstanding quality, then you will have to charge the price for it. On a larger scale you really can't afford to give a 500L refrigerator at the price of 300L refrigerator, because cost has been taken into account. To summarize what I'm saying
You must obviously give the consumer what they want. If you don't give it to them they will go to the next competition for the product they want.
In any category you must offer the best product at the right price. Certainly, all the products should be of international quality because Indian consumers are getting a good exposure through media, they travel abroad & get to see what kind of appliances is available!

Q. What do you think is the best possible communication-mix for any consumer durable category? You in the recent passed have sponsored IIFA awards, what do you think, whether more emphasis should be on above the line activities or below the line activities?

Every company must see that they have a proper mix between above the line activities and below theline activities. And it is very difficult to have a strict formula for what really we need to do. The role of both the activities is to communicate to consumers & to communicate effectively with dealers as well, because, in white goods unlikely in FMCG, dealers are also very important receivers of communication as they also play a very important role in brand choice, telling consumers which brand you should go for.In above the line, there is a debate on whether you should put money on television or on print. I really feel that again there should be judicious mix between television and print. Of course if you look at sheer nos. TV will always outscore press. That is why we and lot more companies tend to pool a lot of money on television but we back it up with certain amount of press advertising which really allows us to give the names of the dealers and if the consumer picks up the newspaper today and is going to buy a refrigerator then it becomes far more easy to see the print ad and go to the market place. Similarly, there has to be judicious mix of above the line advertising and below the line advertising. IIFA awards you were mentioning was really to create excitement around our brand Electrolux Kelvinator and we hope that it has been achieved.

Q. In the last few years promotions have increased and some professionals seen to suggest that above the line advertising has lost some of its effectiveness. Do you agree? If yes, why are the companies looking for newer and innovative ways to reach the customers?

No, it's not totally true. In-fact you will find more companies spending more money on above the line advertising. Yes, last year there have been a bit of pressure because of a sluggish market growth and recession in the Indian economy. During this period companies drastically cut down their ad budget and were looking at newer and innovative ways to reach their target customer. But, this year, we and many other companies have invested heavily on above the line advertising 'mainly in TV'. I feel TV has far more reach than any other medium as it provides both hearing and visual effects. Promotion is there but up the line advertising has not lost its effectiveness. We have invested in both up the line and below the line advertising for our brand. As, we had sponsored the IIFA awards; we have similar plans in future too.

Q. What is your advertising strategy for refrigerator segment this summer?

It's going to be a mix of TV and press. If I have to give you a cut off, it would be 70% TV and 30% press and you will notice that most of the companies like Samsung, Whirlpool, Godrej are spending a lot of money on TV & there you have Electrolux Kelvnator as well.

Q. How was your last year's performance?

For last year, the only way of judging performance is ORG figures vis-à-vis competition, understanding how industry did, how did we do relative to competition. ORG is the only tracking device that we have today. And if we look at the ORG figures for the last year we have gained market share both our major Electrolux brands - Kelvinator and Allwyn. So, to that extent we have done well vis-à-vis competition.
Q. Has the rise in number of media buying and planning agencies affected you? Has it helped your brand to grow as they get best possible rate in the market?

No, it doesn't matter whether it is a media department of an ad agency or it is an independent media planning and buying house like Mindshare or Carat, the client would expect to get the best rate possible, especially, if you are a large spender with them. Our entire evaluation on any agency that buys for us depends on what kind of values they have given us both qualitatively and quantitatively. If we find they are not been able to offer the value that we demand and somebody else is offering then obviously we have to re-look at our relationship with the agency. We expect our agency to give us best value for money.

Q. Are you more inclined towards consumer research?

As I mentioned earlier-'Consumer is the King' and therefore it is important to have the pulse of the consumer for every element of marketing mix. That is, before introducing a new product in the market, we try and figure out with consumers whether he likes that product or not. For example, if I am introducing a new color or a new advertising campaign, then I would first like to know whether the consumer likes the particular color or appreciate the advertising or not! So, we are very consumer oriented to that extent, for every element of the marketing mix we try and figure out or trace the reactions of consumers. And if we find the consumer rejecting a particular product or particular piece of communication or any thing in the market mix, then we go back and try more. We are also firm believers in terms of tracking consumer reactions on a regular basis.
Q. Do you have separate target groups for all the four different brands?

We have different target groups as we have a multiple brand strategy. But, let's take a look at lavish brand today, which is Kelvinator. It is a brand which cuts the upper strata. If you look at the refrigerator market today, 70% of the market is below 200l refrigerators-they are the bulk consumers to you. So, they become the core audience. Yes, you really cannot create communication that talks to the lower end of the market because then there you may eliminate the top layer of the market place. You have to strike a proper balance in your overall strategy so that you can appeal to the entire spectrum without eliminating any of those people.

Advertising strategy of Onida

‘The Onida Devil'Returns

Abstract :

The caselet elaborates on the efforts taken by Mirc Electronics to promote its television brand Onida. The caselet describes how the brand mascot - ‘The Onida Devil', helped Mirc Electronics gain brand awareness for its televisions in the early years. The caselet then examines the marketing communications strategies of the company in the late 1990s after the company abandoned its popular brand mascot. Finally, the caselet provides details of how the company again re-launched ‘The Onida Devil'with the objective to further break away from the clutter and build up brand recall for its television brand.
Issues:

Brand mascot and its role in brand management » Use of advertising appeals in marketing communications campaigns » Promotion of consumer electronics brands in India » Importance of focus group study in marketing communicationsIntroductionOnida, a leading television brand, is still well known for its brand mascot ‘The Onida Devil'and its punch line “Nieghbour's Envy Owner's Pride”. In the 1980s when owning a television set was considered a luxury, Onida launched its advertising campaign on the platform of envy, to promote its television range.
A green-horned devil with a long pointed tail was the spokesperson in all its ad campaigns till the 1990s. The ‘Devil'helped Onida gain substantial market share and brand recall among the customers and become one of the top three television brands in the country. In 1998, Mirc Electronics (the owner of Onida brand) decided to abandon the “Onida Devil” in its communication campaigns as the brand mascot no longer appealed to the Indian consumer.

Source : icmrindia.org/casestudies/catalogue/marketing%20communications/CLMC038.htm

Getting into a lather
by Purvita Chatterjee

HLL is leaving no stone unturned to set its detergent brands apart in the highly competitive segment.

AVANTE-GARDE actress and erstwhile MP Shabana Azmi espouses the cause of water conservation in a Surf Excel ad and the Big B touting the virtues of the new Rin Advanced in yet another spot. With major investments in its detergent brands, FMCG major HLL, whose major share of revenue comes from detergents, is leaving no stone unturned to entice its consumers with new propositions and communication to protect its market share and provide an edge which will make it stand out in a highly competitive marketplace, made more so with an aggressive Procter & Gamble.
Notwithstanding issues such as price cuts, margin pressure and higher input costs, HLL is taking its detergent brands to a level where its consumers can expect a value-added proposition. Take the example of its Surf Excel franchise. The FMCG major has decided to support the cause of water conservation, apart from promising its consumers stain removal. Realising that consumers do not necessarily upgrade in a linear fashion, HLL has decided to straddle almost every price point and offer value-added solutions for each of its detergent brands. So while Surf Excel Quickwash now comes with a new low foam formulation requiring half the amount of water to wash clothes, Rin Advanced has had a makeover to enhance its whiteness proposition (with the B Big asking Yeh Naya Rang Kaun Sa Hai?). The Wheel franchise has also strengthened its proposition with an enhanced fragrance to differentiate itself in the discount segment.
Nitin Paranjpe, Vice-President (Laundry & Household Cleaners), HLL, claims, "With intense competition our challenge is to create differentiation and dominate every price segment."
Explains Paranjpe, "The challenge was to formulate a product which would have the capacity for outstanding cleaning with added features like water reduction and convenience for consumers." By helping consumers reduce the number of rinses while washing, Surf Excel Quick Wash was expected to reduce effort apart from saving `two buckets of water for India everyday.' Besides, roping in an activist-celebrity like Shabana Azmi is also expected to make a difference to the brand.
Surf Excel Blue also offers the added benefit of protecting colours. "People often fear that an expensive product can be harsh on removing stains. Surf Excel Blue promises great stain removal while protecting your colour," states Paranjpe.

Meanwhile, getting the Big B for its new Rin Advanced brand also indicates the steep investments made in the brand. "Having made significant changes in the quality of the product we had to signal the consumer to get appraised in terms of the investment we made in the brand. The story we were telling would benefit with a celebrity like Bachchan," says Paranjpe.
It has also unleashed a new promotion, Safedi Ka Shahenshah, whereby consumers can win guaranteed silver coins and realise their dream of meeting the Big B. Manish Agarwal, Senior Brand Manager, Rin, says, "Rin has always prided itself on its superior whiteness." The discount brand Wheel, with its two variants, Regular and Active, has also been getting a new lease of life. Wheel Regular was recently re-launched to provide enhanced sensorial effect. A new campaign is soon to be launched. To stand out from among the other discount brands such as Nirma, Ghadi and Fena, Wheel's perfume is expected to entice consumers who are looking for an expensive powder but do not have the money to buy it. Targeting the serious value-conscious consumer, Wheel is positioned as a seemingly expensive brand but one which is within the household budget. "Both the Wheel variants are centred around expensive cleaning within your budget," says Paranjpe.
While HLL continues to build new propositions around its brands, reacting to competition is an ongoing task for the FMCG behemoth. Early last year it fought a price battle with P&G when the latter suddenly decided to slash prices for its detergent brands. "Most of the price decreases were not led by us. We were clear that we would respond in a manner which was appropriate so that we do not lose our competitiveness in the market," says Paranjpe.
A senior official of P&G says that the price cuts by HLL and P&G have not led to either eating into the other's shares; rather, it is the smaller players who have been hit by the price cuts.
Industry observers feel that the detergent price wars have been a winning proposition for rivals HLL and P&G, boosting both their individual volumes and growth and growing the category. AC Nielsen estimates for February 2005 show that the detergent category is now growing at a comfortable 4 per cent.
Reacting with new launches to combat competition is also natural for the HLL. For instance, when P&G launched its Tide Bar last year, there was speculation that HLL might follow suit. While industry sources indicate that HLL has been undertaking research to launch a bar under the Surf Excel brand, there is still no sign of it in the market. While Paranjpe refrains from commenting, the company seems comfortable with its bar franchise which spans all detergent categories, including some regional brands such Sunlight and 501.
However, 2005 is going to be a difficult year for HLL with input costs rising. "Most of the detergents are linked to crude oil which is its active ingredient. With prices per barrel increasing, cost increases will be abnormal this year," observes Paranjpe.
Straddling an almost 40 per cent share of the Rs 5,000-crore detergent market, being a hardcore marketer, HLL intends unleashing differentiated offerings with adequate advertising to support its brands in spite of threatened profit margins due to the inflationary trend in raw material prices. Expect more lather to be generated in the detergent market in the months to come.

Business Line a Financial Daily from THE HINDU group of publicationsThursday, Jun 09, 2005

Yellow Page Advertising strategies
By Chuck

Yellow Pages Advertising has to be a Part of an Overall Advertising Strategy
Following its invention and introduction, the telephone became an immediate success with consumers. As more and more people subscribed to telephone service, telephone companies were forced to begin using numbers, rather than people's names in order to direct calls. This use of telephone numbers gave rise to a need for directories listing people's phone numbers next to their names.

In the Beginning
The Yellow Pages began when a printer named Reuben H. Donnelley published a directory, using the same white paper as regular telephone subscriber directories, published, in 1886, a directory of classified ads for business that had telephones. The directory proved popular and soon the Donnelley publishing company and local phone companies began publishing directories of classified business ads along with their regular telephone subscriber directories. Somewhere along the line the classified ad phone directories began using yellow, rather than white, paper (there are various conflicting accounts as to how this came about) and the Yellow Pages became a branded product that proved to be highly profitable for both the Donnelley company and local phone companies for most of the next century.
Unlike the regular subscriber telephone directories in which all subscribes are listed alphabetically and usually not charged for the listing (business that want their names to stand out can, for a fee, have their name listed in boldface type and individuals who do not wish to be listed can, for a fee, have their listing omitted), Yellow Page listings are a service for which businesses are required to pay. Even if a company merely wants a simple White Pages style entry in the Yellow Page directory with just the business name and phone number, they will usually be charged. However, a business can have more than just a simple name and number as the Yellow Pages are more than a directory of local businesses. The Yellow Pages is really an organized book of ads for businesses.

Page with individual listings and small ads. Note the four columns.

Full Page Yellow Pages ad
Yellow Page Advertising Strategies
As any good Yellow Pages sales representative will tell you, Yellow Page advertising, to be effective, must be part of an overall advertising strategy. Consumers generally use the Yellow Pages in two ways. The first is to find a business by looking under the classification of the product or service they want. A couple from out of town wants to go out to dinner but doesn't know where, so they look for one nearby under the Restaurants classification in the Yellow Pages. A second way people use the Yellow Pages is to check the telephone number and/or address of a business they have heard about through other advertising. A consumer suddenly has a need for a product or service and either remembers a name from an ad she has seen or heard or knows that she will recognize the name if she sees it. So she goes to the Yellow Pages, thumbs to the section for that product or service and calls or visits the company she is looking for.
Another part of a Yellow Pages advertising strategy is positioning. In the case of a restaurant in the first example above, a Chinese restaurant would want to be listed under Restaurants in order to be seen by people, like the couple in the example above, who are simply looking for a place to eat close by. However, this Chinese restaurant might also want to be included in additional sub-sections of the Restaurants category such as Chinese Restaurants, Foreign Cuisine, Oriental Restaurants. If they also offer take-out food the owners might want to be listed under Take-out Food, Fast Food, or similar sub-classifications. When you think about it, this is basically the off line or pre-Internet version of key words for search engines. Just as web page developers seek to include key words that a consumer doing a search might use to find their product or service and include these key words in the text and/or the meta tags, people planning Yellow Page advertising have to think in terms of business classification categories in order to be certain that their company will be seen by prospective customers regardless of how the customer decides to search for them in the directory.
Because a company's competitors not only have the opportunity to advertise in the Yellow Pages, but those who elect to will also appear in alphabetical order under the same classification as your company, it is important to try to stand out. A well known and popular brand can sometimes get away with a simple listing in one or more relevant categories provided they are certain that people will use the Yellow Pages to look for their specific company. However, for companies which are not household names or whose product or services are commodity type goods which tend to be the same regardless of the firm from which they are purchased, there is a need to stand out. The first way is to use simple boldface type which, assuming their competitors opt for the less expensive standard type, will serve the purpose of drawing the consumer's eye to their ad. Of course, if competitor's do the same thing then those who wish to stand out from the crowd are forced to expand their presence by including their listing within an ad. Ads are generally sold by the column inch. Since the pages of most Yellow Page directories consist of four, 2-inch columns this works out to an ad ranging from 1 or more inches high and two inches wide. Those desiring wider ads can purchase a section of the page, generally starting at an eighth or quarter page and going up to a full page for their ad. For additional fees, graphic images (including photographs) and color can be added. Generally companies use ads to stand out from the competition and/or provide information to the customer explaining either the product/service and/or why their product/service is superior to that of the competition. Again, there are strategies that can be used to minimize the cost of these ads while maximizing the exposure. Here the strategy is to use one ad, or one large ad, in the classification where most people will be expected to look and then simply ad a phrase to the firm's listings in the other sections instructing customers to See our ad on page ---.
Finally, when planning advertising, companies should put their Yellow Page ads in place and then, when preparing advertising for other media be sure to include a phrase See our ad in the Yellow Pages under [enter classification name here]. In this way, instead of having to remember or write down the advertiser's contact information, which most people will neglect to do, the customer simply has to remember the name to look up in the Yellow Pages.

Yellow Pages Change with the Times
The deregulation of the telephone industry in the 1980s and the advent of the Internet and World Wide Web beginning in the 1990s resulted in changes in the Yellow Pages. First, courts ruled that telephone companies no longer had a monopoly on the publishing of Yellow Page directories. This brought competition in the form of multiple publisher's of Yellow Page directories. Consumers were now receiving multiple Yellow Page directories and businesses were faced with the cost of having to advertise in multiple directories as well as multiple classifications in each directory. Of course, this competition also resulted in a decline in the cost of listing and advertising in each directory. Since some vendor's directories tend to be more widely used than others, companies tend to list in the major directories and divide their purchase of the more expensive ads among directories according to price and where they will have the greatest impact.
A further challenge has come from the Internet where some vendors have been publishing both a paper version and an Internet version of their directory and often charging an additional fee for listing in the Internet version along with the paper version. Also, there are a number of Internet only directories that use the name Yellow Pages and provide the same service on the Internet as their paper based cousins provide. While growing, these enterprises have to contend with competition from both traditional paper Yellow Page directories and outfits like Google which offer similar business locater services on the Internet.