Executed for the first time in India, Colonel & Co. created a storyline behind its packaged chip’n’ dip snack variant that reflected the brand story’s protagonist, the Colonel. Here essence of the army & war time tales come alive through its in-store campaign. The campaign was created by Brand EvoSys.
Fizzy Foodlabs recently made its debut in the burgeoning snacks category with its chip ‘n’ dip Nachos brand, Colonel & Co.. Available in three exciting flavours – Peri Peri Nachos & Salsa; Olive & Herb Nachos & Salsa and Moroccan Mint Pita & Salsa, the brand recently launched a disruptive shopper connective campaign at the in-store level.
To promote its product launch, Colonel & Co. kick-started its in-store branding campaign with HyperCITY, focusing on two cities – i.e. Mumbai and Hyderabad but rolling out to larger outlets in December.
Speaking on the campaign, Varun Jhawar, Co-Founder, Fizzy Foodlabs said, “The idea for the selective launch was to understand and validate the story telling elements for the brand, for which HyperCITY is a perfect testing ground with its evolved consumer base. Apart from HyperCITY, this is being scaled up to Big Bazaar and ABRL accounts in December for Mumbai, Delhi, Gurgaon, Bangalore, Hyderabad, Ahmedabad, Pune and Kolkata.”
As mentioned by the brand, the aim of this campaign was to bring to life the idea of Colonel, a sophisticated army personnel with a lot of travel stories to share. Using the proposition ‘Legendary Snacks’ helps sync of all of the visual elements while creating an iconic perception in the consumers mind.
On the design and execution of the project Kaushik Bhattacharjee, Founder & Managing Director of Brand EvoSys shares, “The best part of the brief was that we were given a free hand to explore all possible options to bring the brand live at multiple touch points as agreed between Fizzy Foods & HyperCITY. It was an exciting project for our design team since everything was to be done from core, starting with visualisation of each element, to selecting colours, building the theme and bring the brand live at store.We developed a very innovative 6’x 6’ activation kiosk standing on barrels with its backdrop displaying a vintage plane and imagery representation of a binocular, colonel cap and a rope. The same has been placed at HyperCITY, Malad and Hyderabad. Around the same theme, an innovative endcap has been designed to keep the connect in consumer’s mind.”
Being a new entrant in the market, Brand EvoSys also came up with 6’ life size dummy of all 3 flavours which were displayed at the pillar entrance of the Malad store. To keep the continuation, Q-managers were created displaying all the variants as well. Also, additional excitement was created in the snacks category by setting up more life-size-packs on the canopy top. Complete with nacho’s flying off in the air supported by category header, bay breakers and arches over the category aisle, the collateral used in the campaign was extensive.
Apart from modern trade, for GT, the brand approached the problem statement with a different framework as GT is far more constrained when it comes to product visibility, given the limited real estate and the host of choice of products that they carry.
“We designed a special outer case for the product that transforms into a counter top display for GT. This helped us get great visibility on launch at the same time reduced our efforts and cost for implementing separate visibility elements in the GT format” shares Varun.
According to the brand team there were a host of execution challenges from the concept stage. The primary challenge was replicating the packaging in a larger than life format which was achieved with a unique mold preparation that helped them replicate the same look and feel of the tray. Also, a lot of delicate elements of barrels and airplane models were created that took significant time, energy and detailing, as the agency had to work with multiple partners to make it happen.
On the need for such a shopper-connective programme in the store level, Varun informs, “Given the uniqueness of the product, we had to make sure it is noticed by the consumers, as it’s a drastic shift from what the current category has to offer. Also, trade activation helps accelerate the journey of discovering product market fitment in the initial phase of the brand and product journey. We got to engage with the consumers at a deeper level to understand if they truly resonate with the proposition that we have to offer. This can never be achieved just by the virtue of product sitting on the shelves.”
Staying true to the positioning of ‘legendary experiences’, the brand’s next drive is going to be through unique merchandise for trade to relate to the brand. Also for trade events, there is going to be a different avatar of Colonel’s story inspired by travel across the world using some of the most iconic elements form the past.
Varun Jhawar Co-Founder, Fizzy Foodlabs opines, “We drew inspiration from liquor brand’s way of merchandising and story-telling as that category solely relies on POS communication for their marketing. Brand EvoSys was our partner who took the brief in the right spirit and created an elegant, life size story board for the brand through various army style visual elements. Also, one of the key USP’s of the product is our patented packaging design, which needed to be highlighted as a part of the launch. Significant focus was also given to visually communicate this uniqueness of having chip and dip together in a convenient tray format.”
“The entire project was smoothly executed and well supported by the HyperCITY and Fizzy Foods team. The only challenge of the project was, it took us around 4 days to complete the whole execution at HyperCITY, Malad since different type of materials were explored and developments took considerable time to match each element exactly with the design. Overall, a great experience and such innovative projects help us to bring the best out of us,” informs Kaushik Bhattacharjee, Founder & MD, Brand EvoSys.
