Louise Marsland (@Louise_Marsland)’s pick of new product, packaging and design launches this week:
- international sporting brand Erke launches in South Africa;
- Natural Spice spices up its packaging;
- a new distributor for Essie in SA;
- and another deals portal launches.
A sporting chance
Erke managing director Jeffrey Li explained that the SA store opening marked Erke’s “first step” onto the African continent.
“South Africa is significantly remarkable for it announces Erke’s first step onto the African continent. Since 2008, with initial overseas stores opening in Lebanon, Erke has successfully expanded markets in Europe, South America and Asia. At this time of challenging market conditions, we’ll keep moving on to enhance the brand wherever the market is accessible.”
The Erke brand, based in China, was established in 2000 and is now spread across 40 territories with a distribution network in over 30 countries. It specialises in the manufacture, R&D, marketing and sales of apparel, shoes and accessories.
The star product is an ultra–light sports/leisure shoe in bright fashion colours, weighing only 120g.
The brand is also a sponsor of the Olympics and tennis tournaments and is China’s top tennis brand.
Erke means ‘To be number 1” and this is central to its branding campaign and the Olympic marketing strategy it launched in 2007.
Spice up your cupboard
Local brand Natural Herbs and Spices has undergone a packaging revamp and embarked upon a consumer-awareness campaign.
The new packaging, by Fab Design in Cape Town, will be on shelf by end-January.
Kiki Neill, group marketing manager for Natural Herbs and Spices, explains: “The basic idea behind it is that we wanted to pull the brand together… have a synergistic look and feel. We explored numerous concepts, from bringing in the artisanal look and feel to a more organic one, and then decided to go with a look which is clean, contemporary and lasting.
“The most important lesson we learnt was that what works in design doesn’t always translate to an effective on-shelf product.”
Natural Herbs and Spices provides a range of 100% natural, steam-pasteurised, preservative- and GMO-free range of herbs and spices; and also exports to Australia, Japan, US, Canada, Europe, the Middle East and rest of Africa.
The range consists of 29 grinders, six salt seasonings, 12 sachet seasonings (including pestos and bread dippers), 27 herbs and blended spices, and ceramic grinder options. Consumers are able to track Natural’s offerings, from source to table.
It is available through all major retail outlets, including Pick ’n Pay, Spar and Dis-Chem.
L’Oréal to distribute Essie
The L’Oréal Group has acquired American professional nail brand Essie internationally, so L’Oréal South Africa will take over the distribution of Essie to all retail businesses: Edgars, Dischem, Clicks, Stuttafords and others from 1 April 2014.
Sparkle Cosmetics, the existing distributor of Essie in SA, will continue to service the professional element of the Essie business, such as the beauty salons, including the Sorbet Group, spas and nail bars.
L’Oréal SA and its new partnership with Sparkle aim to strengthen and grow the brand’s professional footprint in South Africa.
Festive deals
Another new discounts-and-deals portal for online shoppers in SA has launched with festive season deals. Hypertext Media launched deals.htxt this week– a SA collection of local and international discounted deals on a wide range of products — just in time for the festive season.
The deals site is being launched off the back of htxt.africa, Hypertext’s tech news site which began publishing daily news, features and reviews six months ago. deals.htxt will feature a minimum of 10 hot deals a day.
Says Hypertext founder Brett Haggard: “[D]uring the festive season in 2012, many large retailers experienced year-on-year growth of between 30-90%, with even bigger numbers expected for 2013 as more people are online. Google, for example, is predicting at least 25% growth in online sales for the whole year.”
So it makes perfect sense to cash in! Ka-ching!
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.
— MarkLives’ round-up of top ad and media industry news and opinion in your mailbox every three work days. Sign up here!