In December,
2012, one special team was organized in a Korean snack company. It was ‘the
special team of developing potato chip. This company already has had one chip
product, but it was not famous. Although they had other famous products, they
could not give up large and gradually growing up market, potato chip market.
After 1 year and 9 months, they introduced ‘Honey-Butter chip’, and it brought
a huge success. It already has experienced shortage of goods phenomenon even
the company did not do any advertisement. It sold about 103 hundred million won
(about 9,296,029 dollar) without any advertisement for its first 100 days.
The special
developing team had eaten over 100 kinds of chips in the world. They found that
almost every potato chip was salty, and they decided to make new taste, not
salty. They got inspiration from one snack, which was kind of Tteok-bokki snack.
It had spicy taste but based in sweet tasty. After countless product tests,
they found surprising combination, honey and gourmet butter. They broke the
general mold, that is, people usually use oligosaccharide or syrup for sweet
tasty but they use honey. And it works! They made samples, and did blind test.
1,000 people participated in the blind test, and 93% of them chose ‘Honey-butter
chip’ among various potato chips.
After ‘Honey-butter
chip’ released, the company did not have to do marketing. Customers did ‘buzz
marketing’ by themselves. People who have eaten it uploaded their opinion about
the chip in their SNS, and it became really famous. The factory which makes ‘Honey-butter
chip’ became to run 24 hours per one day, but it is still in short supply. Even
if people have money to buy, they cannot buy it because there is no product.
Nowadays, some people sell ‘Honey-butter chip’ in a second hand market. One of
beer company already bought a number of ‘Honey-butter chip’ before it became
famous, and nowadays the company sells their product, beer pack with one ‘Honey-butter
chip’. And this marketing strategy makes an increasing of profit.
Shifting a view
point can be the largest factor of this success; however, the development of
Social Network Services can be also another factor. There are some products which
became famous because of only ‘buzz marketing’. ‘Merry-Ddalki’ is very famous
drink in one café brand, it made by fresh strawberry, yogurt, whipped-cream and
yogurt ice cream. It sold one million cups for its first 3 months. The biggest
factor of their fame was ‘Instagram’. And another example is ‘MY BOTTLE’, and
it is a water bottle made by Japan. Originally it was not released in Korea,
but it became famous by Instagram. Through the fever of ‘Honey butter chip’, we
can learn two important facts. First, targeting niche market by shifting a view
point is important, and second, companies sometimes do not have to marketing as
SNS developing.
Photos from:
http://www.hani.co.kr/arti/economy/consumer/665185.html
http://www.bulmanzero.com/news/articleView.html?idxno=12290
Flora, I really liked how you were able to relate the Honey Butter Chips to the class material. The fact that buzz marketing created by social media services such as Instagram was an enormous factor for the chips was a very interesting fact. It is surprising to read that the chips sold 9 million dollars worth of product without any sort of advertisements. The same goes for the "My Bottle" as well the "Merry-Ddalki". The fact that social media can have such a massive impact on the product's sales. It is also interesting to read about products that Americans would not be exposed to otherwise. It is a good peak into a different culture.
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