The CEO of Pepsico admitted this week that they made a major mistake with their rebranding of Gatorade. In just the first quarter of 2009, sales of Gatorade fell by a whopping 13.7% and have continued to plummet.
When the rebranded Gatorade appeared on the shelves, it was a true head-scratcher. Was this the same old Gatorade? Was it a new kind of Gatorade? Or, maybe it wasn’t even Gatorade. It was near impossible to tell. It’s amazing to me that, in their desperation to appeal to the “hip” consumers, the marketing people at Pepsi would come up with this horrible design. It’s maybe even more amazing that the powers that be at Pepsi would sign off on it.
Gatorade had always been the first name in sports beverages. And even as they faced much new competition, they were still in the position of being the brand most associated with the sports beverage category. So, it’s amazing that Pepsi would take their brand and simply flush it down the toilet. And make no mistake about it, that’s exactly what they did. From the new look on the bottle to the horrible ad campaigns (what, exactly, was going on in those ads?), they destroyed it. You would have sworn that their goal was to make choosing and buying a Gatorade the most confusing task in the world.
In the ultra-competitive beverage market, mistakes like this shouldn’t be made. It shows bad judgement on everyone’s part who had anything to do with it. Pepsico now has the task of rebuilding the brand in the midst of a sports drink war, and they’ve got no one to blame but themselves.
Tags: brand, branding, drink, gatorade, mistake, pepsi, pepsico, rebranding, sports beverage
I just tried the new low calorie G2 fruit punch. It taste just like cough syrup! Its almost drinkable if its ice cold, but otherwise yuck! I tried to find an on-line address where I could apply for a refund, but the Gatorade website as me going in circles. Help!!!!!
I have to admit, when I first saw the Tropicana re-design, I thought it was simply boring, though I could sort of understand what they were shooting for. I was suprised at the vocal displeasure from the Tropicana faithful. Over the last few years, many companies have done away with the homespun design of consumer products in favor of the sleek or hip and not experienced this kind of uproar.
It’s interesting to note that in troubled times like the US is currently experiencing, people will hold on to tradition in a more steadfast way. I don’t know if this has anything to do with that or not.
This is really third brand makeover blunder by PepsiCo in the last year. Their attempt to rebrand Tropicana orange juice failed miserably, making the product appear like a generic brand. They actually had to scrap all the new packaging (except for the new molded “orange half” caps) and go back to the previous version. And the new Pepsi soft drinks logo and graphics, while I personally don’t think they’re all that bad, have had a jarring efect on many consumers.