Household staples aren’t always easy to market, but this brand pulled it off. Here’s how!
| From the desk of Miles Everson: Hi! Welcome to today’s edition “Gorillas of Guerrilla Marketing!” For those of you who may not know, guerrilla marketing is an unconventional strategy that encourages marketers to utilize out-of-the-box strategies when engaging with their target audience. I’m a fan of this strategy because it shows just how effective unconventional strategies can be in marketing a brand or offering. Today, I’ll talk about a campaign that generated buzz for a household staple. Keep reading below to know more! |
Household staples aren’t always easy to market, but this brand pulled it off. Here’s how! The microwave has become an essential part of any household across the world since its invention nearly 80 years ago. Regardless of which country you go to, you’re bound to find a microwave in any household, essentially making it a staple of modern life. Yet, despite its status as a household staple, microwaves tend to be one of the least marketable household items.
The thing is, microwaves have long lifespans and are only bought when the need arises. Consumer awareness is also high, owing to its status as a staple. On top of that, microwaves share similar features, regardless of brand. As a result of all these, advertising and marketing efforts focusing solely on this product category is a challenging and expensive undertaking. This was the challenge Consul, a home appliance brand catering exclusively to the Brazilian market, faced in 2024. Consul was about to release a new microwave product line to its target market. Unfortunately, it had to come up with a way to make this new offering stand out. How did it pull it off? By tapping into a cultural phenomenon: Leftover pizzas!
Even though pizza is a dish that’s best eaten fresh off the oven, there’s no denying that it still tastes good after being reheated. YUM! Reheating pizza using a microwave is something millions of people do across the globe, and Brazil isn’t an exception. That’s precisely what Consul and its creative partner DM9 picked up on! The new microwave offering that Consul created has a pizza reheating function, making it a well-positioned product for pizza lovers in Brazil. However, having a product is only part of the puzzle. What did Consul and DM9 do to market the microwave? They turned to Brazil’s local pizzerias and collaborated with them! Consul partnered with 20 pizzerias and rebanded them temporarily into “ Consul Microwave’s Pizzeria Di Yesterday.” For two weeks, these stores offered pizzas that were baked the night before and reheated the morning after in Consul’s microwaves. After offering these reheated pizzas and showcasing Consul’s microwaves, customers were given an offer that was hard to refuse: Buy a Consul microwave and get 30% off!
That was a clever way to introduce and promote a product… but was it successful? The results speak for themselves:
On top of these stellar results, the campaign received attention from widely-acclaimed organizations such as D&AD and the Clio Awards. Congratulations, Consul! Turning A Cultural Phenomenon Into A Captivating Hook Consul was working with a product category that wasn’t as easy to promote. However, instead of letting that be a hindrance, the brand used a cultural phenomenon to generate buzz for an everyday product. If anything, this campaign shows that boring, everyday products can be marketed to a highly aware audience. All that’s needed is creativity and the willingness to take an out-of-the-box approach. Are you ready to do that, too? Hope you’ve found this week’s guerrilla marketing insight interesting and helpful. Stay tuned for next Thursday’s Gorillas of Guerrilla Marketing! Do you want to know how an 1,813-character code changed Super Bowl advertising in 2024?? See it in next week’s article! |
Miles Everson
CEO of MBO Partners and former Global Advisory and Consulting CEO at PwC, Everson has worked with many of the world's largest and most prominent organizations, specializing in executive management. He helps companies balance growth, reduce risk, maximize return, and excel in strategic business priorities.
He is a sought-after public speaker and contributor and has been a case study for success from Harvard Business School.
Everson is a Certified Public Accountant, a member of the American Institute of Certified Public Accountants and Minnesota Society of Certified Public Accountants. He graduated from St. Cloud State University with a B.S. in Accounting.
