Something Special
As the acknowledgement of travel retail’s potential to establish an international consumer profile for a new product in super-quick time has increased, so – inevitably – has the number of companies inclined to take advantage of its discerning clientele by launching items that are, if sometimes only for a short while, exclusive to travel retail.
The trend has certainly been apparent in the whisky segment of the liquor category, where the ongoing shift towards premiumisation has created the perfect context for some beautifully-realised exclusives. Pernod Ricard Travel Retail (PRTR) has been among the primary proponents of this approach, most recently through its non-chill-filtered offer from The Glenlivet brand, Nàdurra.
“Our strategy is to develop exclusives where there is a benefit for the consumer and retailer in doing so,” explains Robin Johnston, regional director of PRTR outfit Chivas Brothers. In expanding upon the point, Johnston cites a number of possible benefits: adding value to the brand “by offering a slightly different property that brings something else to the mother brand, and almost always a more premium one than the core reference”; making an airport purchase “a little more special” for the consumer; and adding value for the retailer by “delivering good margins, being more premium products with no price comparisons to domestic markets. This is particularly important in differentiating the intra-EU duty paid TR business from domestic markets.”
All of these points doubtless fed into the March 2005 launch of The Glenlivet Nàdurra, which was developed with substantial input from World Duty Free. The retailer’s involvement, notes Johnston, extended to bottle size, strength and in-store messaging. Once the final offer had been defined and was ready to go, the supplier brought in a team of brand ambassadors to train WDF staff on the key sales points for the product. These included the attributes of a non-chill-filtered malt, along with “a recap on what a 16yo age statement means in Scotch whisky, what ‘single malt’ means, and of course the unique history of The Glenlivet.”
Launched with a price tage of £34.99 – constituting a trade-up that is felt to be “still attainable from the mainstream malt arena” – the product has gone on to prove the validity of a strategy defined by Johnston as “a blend (if I can use that word for a single malt!) of adding value to all three parties: the consumer, the retailer and the brand company.”
In harnessing travel retail’s “more male and upmarket” consumer profile, longer browse times and sampling opportunities, The Glenlivet Nàdurra has rewarded PRTR/Chivas’ belief in the value of exclusivity in a segment that Johnston suggests is intrinsically well-suited to the approach.
“Perhaps we have more levers to pull in liquor, in Scotch whisky at any rate, in terms of age statement, cask type, alcoholic strength, filtration, blending style and so on,” he says. “This means that the product can have real benefits to the consumer and to the brand company. This could be more difficult in other categories.”
BGTRD’s exclusive plans
While PRTR has now racked up considerable experience with exclusives, Bacardi Global Travel Retail Division (BGTRD) appears to be on the cusp of entering this particular arena in a major way. “This has not been done in the past, and we recognise that our consumers are looking for unique offerings for themselves as well as for gifting,” says BGTRD’s marketing director, Gary Chau.
Limited edition premium products and gift-packs are among the possible developments cited by Chau. BGTRD is also weighing up the possibility of “working with retailers, who we consider true partners, on opportunities to launch specific super-premium products exclusively. The exclusive relationship would be for a limited time, prior to our introducing the products to the rest of the world. With the right partners, we would also consider developing integrated programmes together.”
It is clear, then, that exclusivity is likely to play a central part in BGTRD’s future strategy – arguably a wholly logical development for a company that has been able to use the travel retail channel’s unique qualities so successfully to support, for example, the Dewar’s brand. Whatever happens, however, Chau says it will be vital to “provide consumers with a tangible reason to justify the higher prices that are usually associated with these exclusives”.
Expect to find out more at this year’s TFWA World Exhibition. “We will be able to do a proper ‘reveal’ in Cannes 2007,” concludes Chau.
In offering consumers the opportunity to get their hands on a product that is unavailable elsewhere, the appeal of TR exclusives to the modern day traveller is not hard to explain. What may prove rather more difficult for suppliers in the years ahead is ensuring that their offers stand out on shelves and make a lasting impact when there are simply so many of them for consumers to choose from.
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