Consumer Awareness Towards Brand Equity | Nexba Essay.

Discuss about the Consumer Awareness Towards Brand Equity.

Troy Douglas and Drew Bilbe founded Nexba in 2010. The main purpose was to provide healthier alternatives to people. The idea of launching Nexba came to Drew when he was at Mexican Beach, enjoying homemade cool iced tea. Upon returning home, he shared his idea with his best friend and fellow entrepreneur to create the range of healthier ice tea. There was no stopping since then. The company has many options available now like soft drink, sparkling water and infusions in many flavours. All of these beverages haves either low sugar or no sugar with no artificial content. Their mission is to become fastest growing global natural, sugar free brand. The company is challenging big companies like Nestle, Pepsico, and Cola etc. The challenges in front of them are creating awareness, partnering with other retailers and provide superior value to customers (Huang & Sarigöllü, 2014). Nexba is local Australian beverage start up. It was launched in 2010.It has multiple products in its portfolio like ice tea, soft drink, cola, aerated drinks etc. The company has tied up with all major retailers like Coles, Woolworths, Alda, 7-Eleven etc. It has partnered with leading P&C customers nationally. It has also tied up with Dominos to create exclusive range of products. The company claims to challenge obesity, cardiovascular disease and type 2 diabetes caused due to high sugar or calories. The company has authentic product line which is made out of natural ingredients like fruits, stevia etc.

The current global market thrives for natural product. There is great boom where impact of sugar is known to people and is more talked by media (Jacobson, 2017). So people as well as companies are taking health of customers seriously and finding alternatives to provide them healthy drinks (Bublitz & Peracchio, 2015). So the companies like Nexba are not only appreciated by customers but as well as retailers. The growing trend of healthy living and sugar-free diets has growth potential (Jacobson, 2017). The success of Nexba depends on its strategic retail partnership with national retail, supermarket and food chains. These stores help Nexba to reach to mass audience. In the coming year, the coming sees itself creating awareness about its product both globally and internationally, becoming available in large formats i.e. in 1 litre pack. Currently company sells a four pack glass range .The new advancement will open them up to another type of customer. 

Problem Statement

The company wants to accelerate as the world’s recognized natural sugar free beverage player. Australians need healthy alternatives that help in reducing sugar consumption and reduce the harmful artificial sweeteners and ingredients like high fructose (Falbe & Madsen, 2017). The company expects to launch new products in the markets.

Nexba wants to increase its visibility through petrol and convenience stores and also through school canteen accounts. The company is providing healthy alternatives for mass market. They are providing ready-to- drink, a lifestyle beverage, a natural product with low sugar and low calories. Nexba is partnering with some of leading P&C customers nationally to release variants to attract wider audience. The products use natural sweetener that tastes similar to sugar but without calories, tooth decay or impact on blood sugar levels. This leads to reduction in obesity, type 2 diabetes and cardiovascular diseases (Brand-Miller & Barclay, 2017). However there is no trade off in taste and thus the products are aligned with customers’ demand.

• Strengths

The company has product options available in different flavors like orange which are highly favorable by customers. The Nexba technology and product mainly focuses on brand and product development. All other operations like bottling, manufacturing are outsourced. So the company maintains its authenticity by delivering innovative and healthy products. The other strength of the company is its channel partners for retailing (Varley & Rafiq, 2014). These include Coles supermarket, Coles Express, 7-Eleven, Woolsworth, Alde, United Petroleum and many more. The company looks forward to long term profit through these lines. The products are produced from fruit extract, natural fruit flavor. There are no sugars or artificial content. The products are genuine and giving tough competition to strong brands.

• Weaknesses

Nexba has to depend upon utilizing the production capacity of different brands. They have come up with agreement in Sydney with global alcoholic drink giant Diageo, which owns Johnnie Walker and Smirnoff. So the company lacks sufficient production capacity to increase or to meet the volumes.

• Opportunities

There is a huge opportunity in catering to consumers’ demand for healthy soft drinks. The consumers are concerned about sugar, diabetes and obesity (Lee & Oey, 2014). There are large supermarket giants who would like to introduce Nexba products. Also Dominos’ has asked Nexba to create exclusive healthy beverage for them. The wellness and health category in beverages is growing rapidly. Nexba is also looking for opportunities with fast food outlets.

• Threats

Coca-Cola is launched a low kilojoule version named Coca-Cola Life which uses stevia as natural sweetener. Pepsi has also introduced Pepsi Next in 2012 also reduces stevia to reduce sugar content. So Nexba is currently competing Nestea, Lipton, Pepsico and Coca Cola who are global giants.

Potential market segments

The company is strictly committed to health. The company generally position themselves as healthier drink for daily lifestyle. The company present themselves as major fighter for obesity, cardio vascular disease and type-2 diabetes (Happell & Platania-Phung, 2015). They use no sugar and anything artificial. This helps the families to select Nexba over other players. It claims to use stevia, erythritol, natural flavours. They do not use sugar fruit extract. This not only attracts the customers but supermarkets like Woolsworth, Dominos’ who are changing their shelves as per growing healthier requirements. The company present themselves as one of the fastest growing entrepreneurs who majorly focus on authentic product development and branding. The company also tries to come up with innovative products to give tough competition to its competitors.

The company aims to target broader market in the longer run. It is planning to spread globally. The company is currently trying to target all major supermarket giants. They are coming up with packaging which attracts large amount of audience. Moreover they are not leaving any stone unturned. They are planning to produce healthy product for Dominos’- pizza chain. Also the company has excellent people on board to create strategic planning. The company has outsourced its bottling, retailing operations so that it can focus on the core value i.e. product development. In the coming year one of the major focuses of company is create more awareness about the product (Arora & Kumar, 2018). So company would be using its funds for expansion and in building the brand awareness (Ang & Hooi, 2018). The company is also sure to start attaining profitability in the coming year. The company focus on all small aspects like packaging, pricing etc. (Vignali, 2015). The staffs are young, and designing is also given prime importance. The key marketing objective in quantitative terms can be discussed as:

1. Increase the revenue of the company by 12% in next 3 years
2. Increase profitability of the company by 8%

Nexba definitely wants to enter into profitability. They are targeting $8 to $10 million revenue in this financial year. They are increasing their production every year. They have already tripled the sales and expect $10 million turnover in the next year. The founders have put a lot of efforts in building the market share of more than 4%. The company looks forward to increase it in the long run. They have switched to contract manufacturing.

The growing trend towards healthy living and sugar free diet has enormous growth potential. In terms of strategies company is using differentiation strategy to compete other players. All its products are sugar free and natural. It is using natural fruit, Stevia and erythritol. The company makes its presence in the events which promotes healthier lifestyle (Walker, 2015). The company also focuses on building relationship with the channel partners. The needs of retail partners are analysed and specific products are marketed for them. The company will use CTD for marketing and has third party logistic service provider. The company does not believe in vertical integration (Fernie & Sparks, 2014). Instead it focuses on the core product development and branding (Australia, 2015). From Ansoff Matrix, we can say that the company is going to invest its resources in market penetration, product development, market development and diversification (Dawes, 2018). In terms of product development the company is introducing new flavours in the same market. For market penetration it is tying up with food outlets to cater to multiple audiences. The company is also trying to expand globally through online and offline channels which help in product development. The company is also tying with global players like Dominos’ by bringing new product in the new market.

SWOT analysis

Following Promotional mix will describe all the elements of product industry used by the company to set its marketing strategy (Resnick & Lourenço, 2016).

Product: The Company has spent years in innovation matching the natural sugar curve to bring sugar free beverage. However, it does not compromise on taste. The mixture of ingredients includes Erythrotol, Stevia, Natural flavours .Stevia is extracted from sweet leaves of Stevia plant. It is naturally 200-300 times sweeter than sugar (Grevsen & Henriksen, 2014). However, it does not have impact on insulin, tooth decay or blood glucose which is not in case of sugar (Prakash & Bunders, 2014). The second ingredient is erythrotol which naturally occurs from human tissues, melons, peers and body fluids. In case of Nexba it is created by fermenting natural sugar found in corn. The by product has no calories and does not laxative effect. There are no artificial preservatives. The company uses citric Acid and Malic Acid. These can be found in citrus foods such as oranges, limes and lemons.

Price: The Company provides value to the customer at affordable price. The price is kept in a way that mass market can be attracted. The company understand its competitors so in order to promote themselves in beverage industry their price should be at par with competitors. For a large order the company also provides discount. There is wholesale price for stockist who can be café, restaurant or bars.

Place: The company has made its presence both online and offline. Nexba products can directly be brought from online stores. They can also be brought from Australian retailers. A wide range is available in 7-Eleven, Alda and Chemist warehouse. The shipping and return policy is easy and flexible

Promotion: The Company will pay special attention for promotion. Up till now it was using its retailers to push its products into the market. The company has also launched certain events like Selfie events on the YouTube to create awareness. It is also leveraging social media. In future the company is going to promote its product by paying special attention to social media marketing, sales promotion, advertisement etc. The company will focus its design and packaging to keep itself separate from its competitors.

The development of strategy is still easy. However, implementation is always a difficult task. The company will follow managerial function for implementing the strategy for the upcoming year. It includes

Planning: The founders and partners have already decided to expand company globally, provide innovative products, relationship building with the channel partners and increasing awareness. Organizing: All this comes when all the departments are aligned towards the goal. So it is necessary to build performance criteria for each department. Also the organization structure is kept lean. Employees are empowered by providing them decision making authority.

Target Market Positioning

Leading: The Company will maintain its personality of young and brave. The founders will have transformational leadership style. In this case both senior and low executives are given authority and have say in decision making. The benchmarking is done so that each and every individual will meet its target. Innovation is given prime importance.

Controlling: The matrix will be used to evaluate the performance of all employees. There is no hierarchy based promotion. The success will be based on performance based. For example for any sales executive his performance scale will constitute his efforts on pitching more retailers. The performance is measured quarterly so that by the end of year the company will achieve its marketing and financial goals (Armstrong & Brennan, 2015).

The mechanism of implementation would be effective when the organization also has a system of feedback in place. With the control procedure of feedback, the organization would be able to focus on continuous improvement and sustainable development.

The promotion mix tool is used to communicate to wider audience about Nexba products. The company will majorly use sales promotion that stimulates consumer purchase. It includes free samples, discounts, product positioning etc. Advertising is another way in which company will approach to broader audience as healthy beverage. The newspaper, Internet ads and social media will be used to attract mass market.

Type of Promotion	% allocation of budget	Key platforms
Sales promotion	45%	Discounts, product placement
Traditional Advertisement	15%	Newspaper, Banners
Social Media Advertisement	40%	Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, Search Engine Optimization

Conclusion

Nexba has brought a revolution in the beverage industry by coming up with healthier drinks. It has given relief to families and customers who are looking for healthier lifestyle. The company is 6+ year old company but still lack brand awareness. It is targeting many famous retailers to put its product on shelf but still it has long way to go to mark its presence. The opportunity provided by Dominos’ if used wisely the company will be recognized as global brand. However, the success of the company is because of its authentic product and founders’ efforts. It is important that the management should be open with the budget of the marketing as with time increased investment in the marketing could be the need of the hour. It is important that the markers should also check the success of the marketing plan at regular time interval.

References

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