The Snapple brand was created in 1972 by three friends, and was built from nothing to sales of $674 million per year by 1994. At the time, Quaker was seeking to grow its beverage business which only consisted of the Gatorade brand. In 1994 Quaker bought Snapple for $1.7 billion. Quaker tried to boost sales by loosely applying the similar techniques used on Gatorade but under Quaker control, the yearly sales of Snapple products declined to $440 million by 1997. In 1997 Snapple brand was sold to Triarc Companies for $300 million.
To understand what needs to be done, we need to start from what Snapple stood for and why was it a success when other similar products failed. Snapple became successful by
• Adopting the “100% Natural” line for the Snapple mantra.
• Launching innovative products, based on fruit juices and teas, which kept a check on the customer pulse and choice
• It focused on a small geographical area so that it highly targeted market covering a smaller base of customers where it could concentrate all its scarce marketing resources.
• Quirky and Offbeat brand positioning: The company had an image of fun and irreverence that was supported through the marketing campaign which was centered on, regular people and being real.
• Most of its distribution was done by individual distributors working for their own account and as a result they had a bigger stake in the brands success.
• Creating a image of an alternative drink for the rebels and the individualist
But when Quaker took it over, the brand floundered. Snapple couldn’t co-exist with Gatorade and failed as:
• Brand Positioning was different: ...