In Feb’16, Godrej launched a new bathroom freshener brand AER Pocket offering fresh fragrances with the promise of Happy Bathrooms. Product tests suggested that the unique fragrances were a winner and was reason enough for people to switch from their current brand. Hence sampling the fragrance at a mass level became the objective for us.
Media task for us was to launch the brand nationally and generate trials for the product. Shopper insights suggested that decision of fragrance is made at the point of sale, with consumers resorting to even opening packs to sample the fragrance. However, sampling multiple fragrances at the same time leads to confusion of olfactory senses. Hence, we needed a platform where we could conduct sampling in a no-fragrance clutter environment. While giving out product samples would be the obvious solution, but cost of product and carrying cost, etc would have made sampling an expensive option. Also, sampling exercises are susceptible to huge pilferage. We hence had to make the consumers experience the fragrance without giving away the product.
Of all the traditional mediums available, a newspaper is one where consumers actually touch and feel the medium to consume it. Even after identifying the medium to be used, the main challenge of carrying out a sampling activity without using a sample persisted. We hence decided to use medium as our sample! We partnered with leading publications across India to create a unique jacket flap print innovation wherein the entire flap was infused with the exact same fragrance of the Godrej AER Pocket Consumers just had to cut the flap page and keep it in their bathroom. This innovation was executed in 6 leading dailies in 11 cities. Consumers were pleasantly surprised with the AER fragrance and placed the fragrant flap in their bathrooms. This newspaper activity was picked up by various RJs across leading radio stations spoke about similar experience on radio.
