Louise Marsland (@Louise_Marsland)’s pick of new product, packaging and design launches this week:
- Caring for moms and tots — Mommy Care launches in South Africa;
- Pyrotec has the on-pack label market zipped up;
- Dove mirrors positive reinforcement for women; and
- Hungry Lion hunts with Moving Tactics.
Mommy Care launches in SA
In addition, the Mommy Care products only contain fragrances and additives found in nature. “Skin safety is of key concern, so our products are free from any doubtful ingredients such as parabens, petroleum-based ingredients, phthalates, SLS, or any other ingredient for which safety has not yet been established,” emphasises Innike Rajput, Mommy Care South Africa MD.
The products are aimed at addressing the specific skincare needs of pregnant and post-pregnant women’s changing bodies, and the sensitive skin of babies and toddlers.
The product will be on shelves in Checkers and Baby City stores towards the end of November.
Zip-a-Dee-Doo-Dah!
A zipper-type perforated closure has been incorporated into Fix-a-Form’s range of leaflet-labels. Timothy Beattie, GM of Pyrotec PackMedia, explains that this new product innovation is a first in the SA market.
“This new type of convenient resealable leaflet-label is aimed at improving product usage through consumer information and education, and therefore consumer safety. It is also a premium product aimed at enhancing brand image for our customers. The production lead time has also been shortened because of eliminating one of the processes previously involved, thus simplifying the overall production process.”
Manufactured exclusively by Pyrotec in SA, Fix-a-Form is a leaflet-label that includes extensive information in the space of a standard label, making it particularly useful for pharmaceutical and agrochemical products that need to include copious amounts of information in a small area of space.
The new zipper perforation means that the booklet on the label can be easily opened and resealed. Beattie says the new on-pack technology allows customers to repeatedly refer to the product information, which ultimately results in better usage of the product.
One of the major challenges faced by the pharmaceutical industries is patient compliance. Millions are spent each year on the research and development of pharmaceuticals, yet an estimated 40% of prescriptions are not taken as directed.
Mirror, mirror, on the wall…
We’ve all seen the moving Dove ‘Real Beauty’ campaign at every single conference or industry workshop we’ve been at in the last year, which demonstrates graphically that only 4% of women consider themselves beautiful.
Some of you may even have seen the parody ‘Real Men’ counter video, claiming that only 4% of men view themselves as average, which naturally is one of the funniest things we’ve ever seen!
The official Dove campaign has also been taken through to below-the-line media through TLC in SA (PrimediaUnlimited’s washroom-advertising platform). Mirror decals, applied in women’s washrooms in five upper LSM shopping malls, greet customers with the messages ‘Hello Beautiful’; ‘Love the Skin you’re in’; and ‘Show off your beautiful smile!’.
“Dove [is] building a movement in which women everywhere have the tools to take action and inspire each other and other women in their lives,” says TLC Unlimited’s Brett Tucker. “The purpose of Dove’s campaign is to encourage women to embrace their own beauty. When looking in the washroom mirror, they’re surrounded with positive words.”
Dove’s payoff line for this campaign is ‘Together we can change how women see beauty’.
Web-controlled menu boards
We carried the story of fast-food chain Hungry Lion’s rebrand and rapid expansion into SA and Africa a couple of months ago on Shelf Life and it has now partnered with Moving Tactics, the digital-signage-solutions company, to implement a dynamic digital signage solution within its stores in SA and Africa.
Hungry Lion, part of the Shoprite Holdings Ltd Group, has had a presence in Africa for some time and is continuing to grow its footprint on the continent with the first phase of new stores opening in Zambia. It is one of the fastest growing quick-service restaurants (QSR) in SA and Africa, with over 150 stores already, and the new in-store digital media platform will be implemented in its new stores, as well as included as part of existing store upgrades.
Chris Day, Moving Tactics MD, explains that menu boards are no longer just a simple list of food items available for sale. Digital menu boards are changing the way in which consumers perceive value, affecting what they order and generating an immediate response to an in-store promotion at the point-of-sale. The X2O digital menu boards provide franchise organisations with the ability to effectively manage the uniformity of design across all their stores, while maintaining integrity of brand and product information at any of their stores. The digital menu-board system can be managed from any secure web device in the world.
Moving Tactics is implementing this system at 49 of Hungry Lion’s stores in SA and at all 22 Hungry Lion stores across Africa, with the first four stores in Zambia due for completion in November 2013.
Shelf Life by Louise Marsland is a weekly column on MarkLives. Tweet new product, packaging and design launches to @louise_marsland or email her at louise.marsland at gmail.com. Want to sponsor Shelf Life? Contact us here.
Louise has written about the FMCG, media, marketing and advertising industry for 18 years of her 25-year media career as a former editor of magazines AdVantage, Marketing Mix and Progressive Retailing, as well as websites Bizcommunity.com and FMCGFiles. She currently edits the weekly Wednesday Media & Marketing Page for The New Age newspaper; and is the co-founder and publishing editor of South Africa’s industry trendwatching portal, TREND. at www.trendlives.info, in partnership with MarkLives.com.