Chapter 2:
Successful Marketing Plans Often Solve
Consumer Problems
Overview
Many successful marketing plans are based on solutions to
consumer problems. In evaluating the marketing plans for your
product or service, it can be helpful to find out whether your
offering
solves
perceived problems for potential customers. If
potential customers really see your product or service as the
solution to their problems, this is a good indication that they
might become
buyers
. If your product or service provides the only
solution to a major problem, the
chances
of
consumers buying it is even better. Make sure,
however, that this is really their perception and not just an
assumption on your part. Jumbo-Koter is an example of success based
on a new product that offers the solution to an
irritating
customer
problem.
One of the objectives in painting a wall is to get the paint
spread evenly where the ceiling and the wall come together and in
the corners where one wall meets the other. Many painters use a
roller to paint most of the wall because a roller is much faster
than a brush for applying large amounts of paint. They then
typically use a brush to apply paint in the corners because a
traditional roller is too big to do that job. The problem with
using a
roller
on the wall and a brush in the corners is that the
paint sometimes looks different in the corners and around the edge
of the wall. To solve this problem,
painters
often use mini-rollers
because these rollers can get closer than a traditional roller. A
mini-roller
is less than half the
size
of a traditional roller,
which makes it easier to control.
Here is where the consumer problem comes in. Many painters have
problems with their mini-rollers. Because these rollers are smaller
than traditional rollers, they are great for getting paint into
tight places and corners. On the other hand, the small size of the
roller sometimes causes it to stick after a certain number of uses.
Painters often become frustrated when they have to drag a stuck
mini-roller down a wall. This consumer problem led to a whole new
product line called the Jumbo-Koter, and to a marketing plan that
effectively leveraged the strengths of the Wooster Brush
Company.
Wooster Brush Decided to
Compete
Through Innovation
The paint applicator industry is made up of a relatively small
number of companies, and it changes only slightly from year to
year. This is partly because
painters
tend to be very steadfast in
terms of the type of paint applicators they use. TheWooster Brush
Company is one of the larger factors in this industry and has been
around for 151
years
. With its long history, Wooster Brush has been
in an
excellent
position to watch and benefit from trends as they
have developed in this industry.
Over the past few years, Wooster Brush had been manufacturing a
small-diameter roller-cover system. As the company watched the use
of this
mini-roller
, it noticed that the
roller
really
didnt perform as well as it could. It
didnt always roll up the wall well. It might
just slide up the wall when it was filled with paint, and it would
not always
turn
as
freely
as it should. The company also noticed
that users of competitive mini-rollers often
experienced
similar
problems.
Another trend identified by Wooster Brush was the influx of
foreign competition into the mini-roller market. Because of the
effectiveness of using a mini-roller for detail painting jobs, the
market for these small rollers was growing. As this was happening,
several manufacturers were importing minirollers from China and
other offshore sources. Wooster Brush was being forced to compete
with these lower-priced imports. The company concluded that its
best response would be to innovate. It would make substantial
improvements to its existing mini-roller.
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For many years Wooster Brush had been a leader in traditional
roller covers (9 inches long, 11/2 inches in diameter). It also
produced an excellent cage frame that was very well accepted in the
marketplace
. The company decided to shrink all of that down to a
small diameter. The engineering department was challenged to come
up with a very tiny cage frame and a small, low-priced roller cover
that would consistently roll on the wall without slipping. To meet
competitive costs, mini-roller covers would be developed in a
variety of professional-quality
fabrics
that would be more
affordable than traditional small-diameter covers.
The
engineers
were able to develop a system that turned more
freely. The old mini-roller contained a free-floating retaining
band
that was hard to line up with the wire handle and that often
caused friction between the frame and the roller cover. This made
it hard to roll. The new system is actually a separate cage system
and a cover. The cover has nothing to do with the rolling of the
frame. There are no works inside. The cover is easy to slide on and
off. It will withstand the abuse of a professional painter and
still allow for constant rolling day in and day out. The system
will also keep the cover from walking off as you paint up the wall.
In sum, the best technology from the large Wooster Brush
frames
was
used in the development of Jumbo-Koter.
Like most successful new products, Jumbo-Koter was not created
overnight. Six years earlier the company had noticed the need for
an improvement in mini-rollers. At that time Wooster Brush had made
an initial attempt to create a small caged cover system. The
company succeeded technically, but the product was not very
attractive. FinallyWooster Brush
pushed
the button on a major
development effort that took eighteen months to complete. It took
another three months to achieve the initial national distribution.
At the time of this writing, Jumbo-Koter has been in national
distribution for one year and is
considered
by current users to be
a major innovation in the paint applicator category.