How Hamper Corned Beef Beefed up Their Sales

Have you ever wondered how you could “beef up” your sales of one of your products?

That goal is constantly on the mind of the Marketing Manager of the Meat Category at Heinz, Paul Lennon. One of the products he is responsible for is Hamper Corned Beef. Recently, Lennon decided to “beef up” the sales of that product in two ethnic markets in Australia– Maltese and Filipino.

According to Lennon, Hamper Corned Beef is the premium brand of its kind, especially within certain specific ethnic groups, including Maltese and Filipino. However, he also found that these ethnic markets are very price conscious. So, in order to maintain constant sales of his product and  keep the brand relevant with these key ethnic customer groups, Lennon commissioned Multicultural Marketing and Management (MMM) to create and prepare a new and more focused ethnic marketing campaign

Marketing Strategies for the Ethnic Market

Using preliminary research on these two communities, both communities had high recognition of the brand and the product, especially when the brand name was mentioned specifically. However, if the brand name was not mentioned, customers tended to mix up Hamper Corned Beef with its competitors. Therefore brand name awareness of Hamper Corned Beef was not great enough among the Maltese and Filipino communities.

The goal of the campaign, therefore, became to maintain and enhance the Hamper brand in the two targeted ethnic communities and beef up ongoing sales of the corned beef product in these ethnic communities, but without resorting to a price cut. For Heinz, the strategy was also to be a test case for further niche marketing.

To communicate with the ethnic communities more effectively, MMM recommended using their own media. MMM then compared the usage of ethnic media with the population distribution of the two designated ethnic groups to shape the precise strategies for the campaign. They determined that both groups listen to ethnic radio more than they read ethnic newspapers. Also, over 50% of the Philippine communities live in NSW and around 50% of the Maltese grouping lives in Victoria.

Radio and Press Advertising

With that consumption information in mind, Lennon agreed to MMM’s recommendation of placing more radio advertisements than press notices to reach both groups. The messages put out to the two communities were the following:

• Hamper Corned Beef is the best quality brand
• Enjoy the true taste of Corned Beef
• There's only one authentic Corned Beef

To make the advertisements even more relevant to the ethnic groups, radio and press ads that pinpointed how the two communities consume corned beef were carefully developed.

After consulting with MMM’s cultural consultants, two different advertising copies were presented to Lennon. The Philippine copy used a housewife preparing breakfast for her husband using corned beef, while the Maltese copy talked about preparing dinner instead. 

“I like the idea of an ad that incorporates typical product usage ideas that have a strong relevance to the target audience.  More importantly, the concept connects the product with the daily lives of two ethnic groups, hopefully, encouraging both groups to buy more of the product,” Lennon said.

Campaign Feedback

The feedback from the Philippine community was much better for the radio promotion, while feedback from the Maltese community was more or less the same from both the press and radio ads.

 “I discovered ethnic marketing is a most efficient means of promoting a brand such as Hamper Corned Beef. Now I have another strategy up my sleeve to use to market my products,” said Lennon. 

Scratch the Happy Pig and Be Happy

In support of multiculturalism, Instant Scratchies issues a special ticket each year to coincide with the celebration of the Lunar New Year in the Chinese, Vietnamese & Korean communities.

“Every year, Instant Scratchies creates a special $2 ticket dedicated just to the celebration of the Lunar New Year. This tradition has been going on for 15 years now,” NSW Lotteries Instant Scratchies Product Manager, Darren Potter explained

This year is a very special year since it is the Year of the Golden Pig.  According to the Chinese calendar, the Year of the Golden Pig only comes every 60 years. To celebrate this special occasion, Instant Scratchies has again commissioned William Lai to design the ticket.

Lai was the winner of a design competition for Instant Scratchies in 2000, and, since then, he has designed over eight Lunar New Year Instant Scratchies tickets.

Ticket Design

“It ‘s really  not an easy task to design a ticket that will appeal to both the Australian and Chinese communities. That design particularly   needs to attract and be relevant to the Chinese ethnic communities,” said Lai.

Since this is the Year of the Golden Pig, Lai wants to put more emphasis on the pig. He pictures the pig dressed in a traditional Chinese bureaucratic official costume with an official hat that shows its status.   

Additionally, Lai put a little piggy bank in the hands of the Pig with the Chinese word for “Full” on it, implying that people can be rich all year round. Another element on the ticket is the fish in the lower left-hand corner. According to Lai, this image also implies that people will have abundance all throughout the year.  

“Good omens, happiness, and lots of blessings are the ideas behind the design for this ticket. The Chinese tradition is always in that vein, and I want to keep it the same, so people from the wider community can also sense our good tradition.” Lai says.  

The colour scheme used on the ticket also implies happiness and abundance. Red represents happiness in the Chinese community as well as   good luck while the golden yellow colour represents money and wealth. The whole concept of the ticket is to create a feeling of happiness, wealth and abundance. 

Potter has said that the Lunar New Year Instant Scratchies is one of their best selling tickets. One of the reasons is that the ticket appeals to players from the mainstream as well as from the Chinese, Korean, and Vietnamese communities. 

All the images and omens on the ticket carry many blessings for the ticket buyers, namely, may you have a lucky year ahead of you in the Year of the Golden Pig!!

Can Multicultural Team Building Be Your Problem?

As Australia opened to the rest of the world, migrants have come to this land of dreams over the past fifty years. With this influx of migrants, the Australian government and the citizens needed to adapt to a society that now consisted of people from many culturally diverse backgrounds.

In 2005, the money value brought into Australia by the East Asian markets was valued at over $180 billion. In Australia alone, people from East Asian backgrounds reached 460,000 in number. All these changes mean that no one in the business sector in Australia can ignore this powerful ethnic population.

You may find that from time to time that you need to deal with colleagues or clients from different cultural backgrounds. Sometimes you may feel that doing so is a difficult process.

You may have heard comments like “I don’t understand what he’s talking about..” or “ I can’t understand his English…”  Or “I don’t know why he got so upset.  It was just a joke…” 

Jessie Wong, cultural trainer at Multicultural Marketing and Management notes that.

“To ensure diversity and help everyone cooperate in a workplace is not easy.  What makes it even harder is to ask people from different cultural backgrounds to work harmoniously and work together

Here are some tips that can help you cope with a multicultural environment in a positive manner:

• Try to understand taboos and customs that exist in other cultures
• Never make fun or jokes of religious or cultural matters
• Be patient with someone else’s accent.  Realize that he or she is trying hard to speak “English” to you. Speaking louder won’t help people understand you better
• Use “plain” English when you a re communicating with someone who arrived in Australia less than five years ago. Language experts say it takes at least ten years for a migrant to get use to the language and culture of a new environment. (of course, there are always  exceptions)

Other than asking for advice from experts, there are courses that can help. With globalization now a major trend for many businesses, understanding other cultures and their business etiquette and cultural taboos will help your business grow in many new and different directions.

So why not put yourself into a total different environment and soak yourself in another culture without ever leaving Australia? Attend a cross-cultural workshop to expand your cultural skills.