Commer-cialization

DE0936

Akinori Asatomi 10022992

Shu Wen Tan (Stefanie) 06023035

Sohee Yoon 10002666

Soohyun Lim 10006691

Yi-Pei Wu (Katie) 07109413

Contents Introduction

- Project Discription

1 2

Yi-Pei Wu (Katie)

- Market Communication - Personal Reflection

3Shu Wen Tan (Stefanie)

- Branding - Personal Reflection

4

Sohee Yoon

- Business Plan - User Segmentation - Marketing Mix; 4P - Personal Reflection

5Soohyun Lim

- Packaging - Positioning - SWOT Analysis - Personal Reflection

6

Akinori Asatomi

- Product Development - Distribution Channel - Personal Reflection

7

Contents

1Introduction- Project Discription

Yi-Pei Wu (Katie)- Market Communication- Personal Reflection

Shu Wen Tan (Stefanie) - Branding - Personal Reflection

Sohee Yoon - Business Plan - User Segmentation - Marketing Mix; 4P - Personal Reflection

Soohyun Lim - Packaging - Positioning - SWOT Analysis - Personal Reflection

Akinori Asatomi

- Product Development - Distribution Channel - Personal Reflection

Introduction

Project Discription & Team Management

2

According to our project brief, we have been assigned the responsibility to come up with a product or service that has to relate to well-being and recovery as the fun-damental bases to commercialize our idea strategically. As a group, before we start doing the research, we have understood the idea of preparing a business plan that coverage the idea of branding and market communica-tion; hence, result in producing confidential documen-tary to reach the project success.

The whole notion of the business idea were based individual experience, we questioned ourselves on the position of a customer, “what is our needs?” besides that, we are representing an international customer, therefore, I came up with the question; “what is the first thing you guys would like to do when you go back to your own country?”, typical responses consisted of; having traditional food, a massage, relaxing, etc. Based on the results, we draw out the big picture based on “Recovery”, and interconnected between customer perspective as well as marketer perspective, conse-quently ground up our market opportunity.

Figure 1. Showing our market opportunity

Project Features

Image 1. Our product original package Image 2. Eye mask effect illustration

Megurism (めぐり ズム) sold by KAO in Japan is an eye-mask a paper containing iron content added saline solution goes through non-woven fabric. When users taking its cover out then exposed the air, the content was oxidized and increases its degrees around 40 with steam.

Takes 5-10 minutes for heating, it can be used in any-where regardless of location and time. The mask can be expected that effects inhibitory of eye fatigue and relaxa-tion. Additionally, it is effective against insomnia, dark circle and xerophthalmia. These points make appeals to consumers and it is reason why we would like to import the eye-mask into the UK market.

Introduction-Product Features

Team management

Image 2. Our lovely team discussion, picture taken by Yi Pei Wu.

The following paper will articulate the business factors in creative and strategic form, as a design management student, we will provide strategic level of management skill to demonstrate our understanding on this extent.

Our team constructed with two design managers; Yi Pei Wu, Sohee Yoon and three designers; Akinori Asatomi, Shu Wen Tan, Soohyun Lim who are studying industrial and fashion related course. We generally did market re-search all together and divided individual focusing points that design managers mainly contribute to market com-munications part, whereas Akinori Asatomi and Soohyun Lim referring to product design and development, Finally, Shu Wen Tan will contribute more on branding section.

For the future plan, we considered about further development of the mask, which is combining two functional designs. One of the ideas is changing a shape more suitable for European’s face. As we know, this product is based on Asia so that try to import the mask into the UK and Europe it would be needed to have different shape to satisfy custom-ers. Another design is draw illustration of acupres-sure points like a map with embossed forms. Near the eyes have some finger pressure points and if we know and press these points as a massage it will influence quality and quantity of tears and also help circulation of tears well. This design can help to rec-ognise each point for massage and we can feel that easily as a touch even we cannot see the points when it covered eyes. Our ideas can be make our desirable result which is release people’s stress of eyes effec-tively.

Our outcomeWe are “LUCKY GUY GROUP”

3

A business plan assists us to find out the deeper insights on planning our enterprise an ultimately drives the enterprise towards success and ensuring its long-term health. As a design manager, to be able to imply the design into any kind of business enterprise are to be seem as the essences. Since design has been introduced into the business commerce, it becomes valuable to implicate as the recommendation. To be a valuable brand or product, we have to make our product remarkable and easy to remember in the customer’s mindset.

To achieve this we created the slogan “Easy come Easy go“, which we interpreted as the customer may purchase the product easily and get rid of their tired eyes easily. The concept of the business, is to aiming the new market place for the producer to increase their market share as well as their brand reputation, as the KAO company market position within Asia place are incredibly huge. Hence, we starting to list down our market objectives as following: • A bigger market share within European country • Higher reputation spreading• Lower costs relative • Broader or more attractive product line than rivals internationally• Leading Customer-driven company worldwide• Recognition as a leader in technology and/or prod-uct innovation

The points showing above, it interrelates to the Kao corporations’ objective as “the global group of compa-nies that is closest to the consumers in each market”. (KAO 1994-2001)

However, our product are tend to be more like rela-tionship marketing, to say that, bring our product into the market by utilizing the strategy, generally, it is the customer based marketing tools which helping us to identify our market direction by implying those elements, which is more focus on our consumer reten-tion, answering their needs, listening to their feed-back, and finally to matching their needs

Perceiving theoretical arguments given by intellects, it enables us to innovate new product ideas to recognize the market environment and deliver the needs and wants to our customers. Therefore, we have indicated certain factors based on the following statistic and pursue through the analytical result enable us to con-form both marketer and consumer expectation from the marketplace.

Business Plan

According to the quantitative research from Kao’s annual report, it stated that the brand has only reach their goal in Asian place for the most, their net sales within Europe shows the insufficient amount within the geog-raphy area data measurement, which means that our intention of introduce the product has become persuad-able to the new market place. Market communication represent as a means to have a conversation between producer and consumer, the product value determines the company market share, customer’s loyalty and all interrelation advantages and disadvantages based on the marketing performance measurement to examine the business satisfaction, therefore, the strategy we have produced in this article, will demonstrate my person-al understanding based on the module perception as well as intelligence I have understood hence to finalize the evaluation for our product idea. To introduce our product to this marketplace, I have outlined four persuadable points that support my thoughts;

YI PEI WU (MA Design Management)07109413

Figure 1. The statistic data which highlighting shows the Europe has got the lowest number by geographic consolidated result(Kao corporation Ltd 2010)

Figure2. The collected consolidated result shows the

Europe hs got the lowest sales amount under the Kao product

line(Kao corporation Ltd 2010)

Market Communication& Research

Figure 3. The diagram showing the step-by-step process of our idea plan to addressing some essential factors

Figure5. The diagram shows the consumer buying behav-iour (Mintel International Group Ltd 2011)

Reflect back to strategy I have learned, there are some vital necessities I found might be suitable for us to evolve, which I explain it as experiential marketing, which is to answering, to listening, to matching whatever we get from customer responses. Refer to that, the next few statistics shows following is to unable ourselves to understand the consumer behaviour and supporting our ideas, result in enhancing us to develop on the right track and then commercialise the product more confidently to the new marketplace.

Figure4. The data shows the consumer consumption analy-sis for the eye care product and other product sector(Mintel International Group Ltd 2011)

Distribution Channel

Figure 6. The data shows the consumer consumption analysis for the eye care product and other product sector(Mintel International Group Ltd 2011)

From systematically data analysis, we have then decided to distribute the product to international pharmacy-led health and beauty retailer- Boots.

Figure 7. The statistic collective data produce from the Mintel(Mintel International Group Ltd 2011)

These are the reason why we choose Boots to be our distribution line:

•International store•Easy to purchase everywhere within UK, even in the airport (for traveler)•Customer loyalty •Brand loyalty (Boots)•Attract customers attention •The product can have the own labels feature located in the store, and can still reach outstanding result, such as No.7 product•Interactive marketing involved (e-commerce), word-by-web

The advantages shown above we considerate as the most appropriate communication channel by us-ing Boots business strategy, meanwhile also meet the Kao’s company goal, to be “the global group of companies that is closest to the consumers in each market”(KAO 1994-2001).

YI PEI WU (MA Design Management)07109413

Apart from those given market communication strat-egy, branding might be the one which effect the whole notion of the enterprise sufficiently. As Kao has such huge product line world widely (in UK, they have won the leading hair care product by Sunday Times Style Award for best styling product but they don’t have family brand on health care product in UK market), in this case, the idea bring out the new product line sales as the first intervene to the market, however, the diagram showing below evident the company did not paying too much attention on spend their expenses on promotion sector comparing with others in 2009.

Branding

Figure 8. The diagram shows the company spending ex-penses on their company activities. (Kao corporation Ltd 2010)

To conclude, based on this teamwork, some people might think diversely as what I have covered on this paper There might be different argument with each of our perception, however the project has enhanced my ability to consider things diversely,, to understand the whole notion of the business is not an easy things to achieve, despite that, I still found it quite practical and enjoyable from during the process and I would like to commercialise the project idea into the real world and have my own business based on those learning out-comes.

Conclusion & Reflection

Bibliography

Best, Kathrtn. The Fundamentals of Design Manag-ment. Switzerland: Ava Publishing SA, 2010.KAO. About Kao Group. 1994-2001 йил 1-january. http://www.kao.com/group/en/group/kaoway_01.html (accessed 2011 йил 21-March).Kao corporation Ltd. “Kao group site.” Kao, corpora-tion. Jan 15, 2010. http://www.kao.com/group/en/group/reports.html (accessed Mar 27, 2010).Lockwood, Thomas. Design Thinking . New york: All-worth press, 2010.Mintel International Group Ltd . Mintel Oxygen. 2011 йил 1-Jan. http://oxygen.mintel.com/index.html (ac-cessed 2011 йил 29-March).Philip Kotler, Kevin Lane Keller. A Framework for Mar-keting Management. Fourth Edition. London: Pearson, 2009.Robert Brunner, Stewart Emery, Russ Hall. Design matters. Essex: Harlow: Financial Times Prentice Hall, 2009.Varey, Richard J. Marketing Communication. London&NewYork: Routledge, 2002.

YI PEI WU (MA Design Management)07109413

4

Branding is the Cognitive level of the consumers of the product and product line, Is also the intangible assets of enterprises. There are so many content could be related with branding, for example: Product, Brand Symbol, Brand Culture,Brand Positioning,and so on. However, the most important thing is to brand value, brand personality and brand positioning these three parts.

Brand value is a company (corporate) its trademark, its product and service network, with the sum of the positive information. A brand is not high-tech informa-tion, which is a name only. All company, painstaking efforts and maintain its own brand, which is author-ized to obtain it, to make people think it has a “reputa-ble, law-abiding, reliable, professional, value, economy, efficiency”and the world. Management and brand management, is to get the brand value.

Branding

Although the Kao company has a hundred years of history, but very focused on information technology, more than 6,000 employees in its researcher and development staff as high as 28.3%, there are more than 200 software development systems analysts and programmers.As early as 1954, the company set up an internal research, to deal with consumer feedback. And in 1978 into the first generation of computerized KAO ECHO system, but with the operation of the inter-nal organization and resources, the Consumer Advice Centre, the Consumer Information Center Communica-tion Center and the life of these three units of func-tion and integration of resources, the establishment of consumer By intelligence and support network.Its purpose is to assist in information technology through customer service and management work, the system experienced a second-and third-generation technol-ogy upgrades, until 1997, the fourth generation of leaders KAO ECHO System.Brand has been able to create the greatest benefits, because the brand could let the company become the core of the marketing; also, it can serve as a centrip-etal force to connecting companies and customers. Otherwise, the failure of corporate brand image will lead to the centrifugal force generated.

SHU WEN TAN (MA Design)06023035

Although the Kao company has a hundred years of history, but very focused on information technology, more than 6,000 employees in its researcher and development staff as high as 28.3%, there are more than 200 software development systems analysts and programmers.As early as 1954, the company set up an internal research, to deal with consumer feedback. And in 1978 into the first generation of computerized KAO ECHO system, but with the operation of the inter-nal organization and resources, the Consumer Advice Centre, the Consumer Information Center Communica-tion Center and the life of these three units of func-tion and integration of resources, the establishment of consumer By intelligence and support network.Its purpose is to assist in information technology through customer service and management work, the system experienced a second-and third-generation technol-ogy upgrades, until 1997, the fourth generation of leaders KAO ECHO System.Brand has been able to create the greatest benefits, because the brand could let the company become the core of the marketing; also, it can serve as a centrip-etal force to connecting companies and customers. Otherwise, the failure of corporate brand image will lead to the centrifugal force generated.

KAO profits increased for 22 consecutive years, paid dividends for 12 consecutive years of growth - in the volatile ups and downs of the Japanese companies, such as KAO the development of the state can continue to maintain the business it is rare.The production and sale of home-based KAO Corpora-tion of supplies, its cutting-edge technology area did not give people any impression, but the momentum of innovation in management had no any weakening.Back in the mid 60s of last century, KAO profits for the use of different management systems, there was no words as ‘IT’ at that time, but it has started regulating the profits of each product’s investment direction in order to maintain continuous Growth.In 1999, KAO step faster than SONY in Japan to import the first EVA (economic value added) of the manage-ment target.Since 1986, KAO launched in the whole company to reduce costs for the purpose of the TCR (Total Cost Reduction) activities. From the development, produc-tion and sales to logistics, the company each year and implement the 1000 proposed improvement measures to reduce costs, has been every year for 17 consecu-tive years to reduce operating cost 100 billion yen. A thorough summary of their activities as much as the creator- Toyota TCR.In summary, we could know how how important the brand value is and how KAO could get its brand value.

   Figure 1. Brands centripetal photos, 2. Non brands centrifugal photos

SHU WEN TAN (MA Design)06023035

Brand positioning is the comprehensive analysis of target market and competition, under the premise to create a unique product line with the original brand image, and the overall image of the brand design, com-munication, and thus the minds of consumers in the target value of occupying a unique position Process or action. The focus is on psychological feelings of target customers, channel is the overall image of the brand design, the real target is based on the characteristics of consumers, design and dissemination of the brand value of product attributes to the hearts of the target customers of the brand’s unique position.Also, brand positioning refers to the enterprise mar-ket positioning and product positioning, based on a particular brand of cultural orientation and personal-ity differences in the business decision-making, it is the target market to establish a brand image related to the process and results. In other words, referring to a particular brand to identify an appropriate mar-ket position, so that the minds of the consumer goods occupy a special place, when a need arises suddenly, such as a sudden thirst in the hot summer, people will immediately Think of the “Coca Cola “ red and white cool and refreshing.

Brand personality is a particular brand has a series of humanize characteristics, that shows the personali-ty of the brand quality. It is an important part of brand identity, it could make the product or service become humanities. It could bring a strong brand personality and unique brand associations rich connotation of the brand.Although the word ‘brand personality’ has long been proposed. (Gardner & Levy, 1955), but has been its slow progress in theoretical research. In 20th cen-tury 80s, Sirgy (1982) said that any brand or product should have the personality, and Aaker (1997) applied psychology in the ‘dimensions of personality psy-chology research methods’as the basis to explore the dimensions of brand personality research. Many scholars began to explore the brand personal-ity, brand personality has become the marketing, the focus of the field of psychology. Brand personality as a relatively new terminology, not only rooted in the clas-sical theory of personality psychology, but also reflects the unique brand personality (Milas & Mlacic, 2007). Although scholars have long used the definition of personality on the brand personality, but the academic definition of the concept of brand personality, there are some differences.

According Aaker model (brand personality scale), this product can be used a few words to describe:Wholesome;Cheerful;Up to date;Reliable;Responsible;Peacefulness.

  Figure 3. Brand personality scale

5 Business Plan

In my general comprehension a business plan is the integral method to map out a desired short or long-term future for a business. Developing a business plan is significantly important at the beginning of all en-trepreneurial steps because it will affect to the whole future of the business, determining if the profits rose as they where expected to and how well goals have been met.

In our product case, working out a business plan played important role because of the nature of our product. It is an existing product which is imported from a foreign producer, but is completely new on the UK market. As well as our product is the first in the UK market, it was significant to design a timeline for our plan that complies how quickly our new product could be imported to separate it from the competitors and which developments on the product need to be done to fit into the UK market.

In terms of our business plan we were confronted with some difficulties concerning the origin of our brand. The brand comes from Japan, so it was difficult to find appropriate English documents. Fortunately, we have a Japanese team member who contributed to translate a number of documents even though there is a limitation for deeply understanding and analyzing the current Japanese market and its values.

From constructing a business plan I learned that, at planning and identifying future opportunities and risks the business can react immediately to help creat-ing the most favourable future outcomes.

(Figure1. Time Management)

Sohee Yoon (MA Design Management)10002666

As mentioned in the introduction, our product is imported from an existing brand into a new market, because of that it was not familiar for us to create a new logo types or a brand slogan which are initial elements of branding. However, in this case of brand-ing, I realized that it is important to understand the brands’ new audience. Davis (2009) pointed out that an essential of the branding process is to understand the brand’s audience. One of the main aims of a new market entrant is to create a brand that stands for quality and reliability and creates a loyalty amongst the customers. It is very hard to create this kind of rust amongst the customers and it should be one of the highest goals of a brand to avoid any failure of this created trust because it is difficult to win the loyalty of a customer, but it can be lost in seconds by only one bad experience. As our product relies mainly on the customers’ experience itself it is significantly impor-tant and careful to consider how a high loyalty of the

audience for the brand can be approached. Therefore, our group decided to focus on marketing communica-tion as a main transmission to deliver our brand in the new market.

In addition, while trying to understand the brand’s au-dience we build our own audience ‘types’ by dividing the audience into different segments to create groups of interests. Caused by this segmentation brands usually adopt different means to catch the customers attention (Davis, 2009). As a result we built up three different types of user profiles, who are students, travelers and workers. According to the different user type we will approach different ways of communica-tion such as advertising or promotions.

(Figure2. User Segmentation)  

Branding

To sum up our product case of branding, we well approached in an appropriate way that beyond the visually branding we identified what is our brand’s value, where do we want our brand to sit and how can we re-build our brand position in the new market. At the beginning of the session, when I come up with branding I thought it is mainly about designing a logo, a slogan and a package that looks more attractive to the customer, however, I found that branding is a huge boundary that includes the philosophy of the brand which is about intangible things such as the values, communication, equity, loyalty and positioning. To deal with branding aspects, we need a clear under-standing and holistic view of what is making the brand desirable, including aspects which do not concern the appearance and the positioning of the brand.

Marketing Communication

In my understating, marketing communication is about designing a positive relationship between the products/ services and the buyers/ end users. It is the way of how the product communicates with people and how to create an emotional connection with their customers. Our eye mask product is very focused on the marketing communications, which are including a description of customers and the customer’s needs, a marketing mix, a promotion plan, and a channel and distribution strategy. According to our projects’ objec-tive, coming from the existing brand, we need to find out a way of communicating with the new UK market.

 (Figure3. Marketing Mix; 4P)

Sohee Yoon (MA Design Management)10002666

As a result, we determined to establish our product through Boots as our biggest retail contractor. Boots got a huge network of shops all around the UK and the customer’s orientation of Boots is in a similar direc-tion as the one of our company. Boots focuses on the well being and beauty of their customers and a good customer service with various promotions. This is the reason why both brands will have a well doing syner-gy together. Boots will promote the origins and values of our product by promoting it to increase their own turn over by selling our product.

From my comprehension the definition of marketing is sometimes faulty because it is seen in the narrow context of advertising or selling, however this is not the whole story. It is one of the key management dis-ciplines to get familiar with the issue of marketing to make useful interpretations of the customers’ needs and desires. Therefore, the marketing process is also included in the central of business performance of companies rather than as an option for selling, be-cause it positions a brand amongst all the other com-petitors. If this positioning succeeds good sales figures are easier to realize than with a faulty positioning of the brand.

Conclusion

In conclusion of this commercialization module, I have to say that before I attended this module I had a very narrow view of branding and marketing communica-tion. As I studied graphic design in my undergraduate level those concepts were mainly discussed by aspects of visualization and the appearance of a product how-ever, I became bigger picture of knowledge and that there are a lot of other points and aspects to consider beyond the visualization. In addition, learning to make a business plan gave me some very useful and new insights of business aspects which I have not had yet because I studied only from the designers’ view.

Sohee Yoon (MA Design Management)10002666

References

Davis, M. (2009) The fundamentals of branding. Lausanne; Worthing: AVA Academia.

Bibliography

Best, K. (2010) The fundamentals of design manage-ment. Lausanne; Worthing: AVA Academia.

Healey, M. (2008) What is branding? Mies; Hove: Roto-Vision, Essential design handbooks.

Johnson, R. (2003) Perfect business plan: all you need to get it right first time. Rev. edn. London: Random House Business.

Porter, M. E. (1996) ‘What is strategy?’, Harvard Busi-ness Review, Novermber-December.

Varey, R. J. (2002) Marketing communication: princi-ples and practice. London; New York: Routledge.

Charismatic Brand

Brand is a kind of face of products and contains the logo, package, service and etc. for distinction with competition. Developing a strong brand having dif-ferentiated image provides the solid foundation can withstand the attacks of competitors over the long term. In this regard, Neumeier M. mentioned that “A charismatic brand can be defined as any product, service, or company for which people believe there’s no substitute.” (Neumeier M., 2003: 19). It seems to me that manufacturers produce “products”; however, consumers buy “brand.” Therefore, companies assume prudent an attitude before introducing their brand into market. They should make systematic effort for making the brand identity, which is their desire brand image to plant in customers’ heart and to build brand value. In addition, after introduction of brand, compa-nies should establish an effective marketing strategy through continuous feedback to give favorable, power-ful and unique impression of brand images to clients.

In our case, we have a propensity to import original Japanese brand ‘KAO’ into the new market rather than new branding it, so the biggest pivotal point is that how we make ‘KAO’ image to appeal for the UK buyers. According to this point of view, I highlight about our brand identity elements presented from our desire for occupying British market, in terms of positioning through SWOT analysis, one of the marketing strate-gies, in this essay.

Positioning: Brand Identity

While contemporary society has a lot of information, there is not enough time to handle with the informa-tion. The company’s brand value is influenced by how patrons can accept quickly and easily the information provided by the enterprise. Also, the value increases directly in proportion (Neumeier M., 2003: 12). I believe that all marketing activities converged in an effort to create a strong brand because brand becomes distinguished as a key factor and a competitive power of the corporation inch by inch. In the positioning stage, we need to make sure which brand image can communicate with consumers, and how it can be es-tablished in order to become a powerful brand which can differentiate from other competitive brands to customers.

For example, as can be seen from figure 1 flow model used in one of the brand marketing corpo-rations ‘MetabrandingBBN’ in South Korea, circle in the planning stage deal with the brand phi-losophy and vision for the brand concept based on four factors: symbol, product, personality and benefit. Each of the components forms the organ-ic relationship and constitutes a brand. Core value selected from circle to convey to consumers can be “brand identity”. It is an important matter at the positioning step (Website: Metabranding).

6

SWOT analysis

As I mentioned above, our discussion is centered on the point that formulation of new strategies for the UK market. Marketing strategies can be defined that making decisions about market segments, target customers and prominent competitors. If we import our project product ‘Megurism (めぐり ズム)’ based on this strategy, we can design brand identity such as trademark, goal and culture by visual and other sensory means. Using SWOT analysis helps us easy to understand about features of brand and useful to establish the brand identity as well. The term SWOT stands for Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities, and Threats. It is a research to find strategic challenge addressed by marketing managers. As shown in the following table, SWOT is combining the result of exter-nal environmental analysis: opportunities and threats, and the result of internal environmental analysis: strengths and weaknesses. (Kotler P. & Keller K. L., 2009: 52)

Applied SWOT analysis to our product ‘Megurism (めぐり ズム)’

Strength & Weakness: The eye-mask ‘Megurism (めぐり ズム)’ with lav-ender perfume get starts to heat up automatically when people take the cover off (New technology). The mask is useful in anywhere and anytime, so it helps people get relaxation easily in living as well as low price (Economy of time, Convenience). The virtue of ‘Megurism’ is inhibitory of eye fatigue, insomnia and dark circle because the heating function and lavender perfume are effective eye massage and therapy. These points make appeals to consumers. On the other hand, the biggest weakness is that the UK customers are not familiar with using the mask. Besides, lacks of the technology protection, limitation of use time and disposal material are its disadvantages.

Soohyun Lim (MA Design)10006691

Figure 1, Brand Identity Flow Model from ‘MetabrandingBBN’

Figure 2, Personal understanding of SWOT analysis

Opportunity & Threat:

The UK is a potential market to increase the mar-ket share for profit and growth, and the eye-mask is new technology to the UK consumers. Interestingly, limitation of use time is also opportunity which can develop of our product because it is unfulfilled clients’ needs. However, the threat is that other competitive companies are easily to produce substitute products. This problem may cause some obstacles about trade regulations and barriers.

Package design

Through the SWOT analysis, we conclude focusing “SO strategies: pursue opportunities that are a good fit to the company’s strengths.”(Website: QuickMBA) through development of package and product design. In this part, I touch on package design. Package design has more meaning than the primary functions like storing and carrying. It has become one of the main elements of the branding part. People pre-fer attracted design rather to a strategy, since unique package leads to a strong association about specific brand. In the view of Neumeier M., he mentioned that “Innovation lies at the heart of both better design and business.” (Neumeier M., 2003: 74), and also package design is the last and best chance that can attract po-tential customers at the counter (Neumeier M., 2003: 90). Arranging the products’ messages on package is necessary in order that customers can recognise it easily. Those explanations which differentiated from others’ can help to build unique brand image.

Soohyun Lim (MA Design)10006691

Figure 3, Original package design and translation

Figure 4, Our new package design for market communication According to the above package design, we transfer the tone of color for general target regardless of gen-der and put European model picture. Additionally, we try to emphasis image of well-being product via bigger lavender picture, and sum up the messages on the front-side package to strengthen readability. Clients can see more detailed description such as the usages, effects, and ingredients on the backside with picture.

Further, we will put our developed mask design: changing shape by European face, draw acupressure points for efficient eye massage.

Conclusion

Neumeier M. wrote in his book: “Whenever there’s a rift between strategy and creativity–between logic and magic–there’s a brand gap.”(Neumeier M., 2003: 15). In my opinion, many designers and marketers have some problems to understand each other: strategic or design. These disagreements result in the brand gap that can break company’s goals and turn the company to be out of harmony. Furthermore, we should remind that the enterprise might be estranged from buyers when the brand image miscommunicates each other. Namely, the company expresses their brand image to customers, but they recognize in different or wrong way, since understanding brand image is a subjective impression of customers regardless of the companies’ intent. In order to reduce the gap, effective branding via accurate market analysis is mandatory to establish the brand identity. Also, they should make the effort to communicate with clients.

References:

Kotler P. & Keller K. L. (2009) A framework for Mar-keting Management. 4th den. Upper Saddle River, NJ: Pearson Education Inc.

Neumeier M. (2003) The brand gap. How to bridge the distance between business strategy and design: a whiteboard overview. Berkeley, Calif.: New Riders.

Website: Metabranding. Available at: http://www.metabranding.com/index.php?flag=1 (Accessed: 30 March 2011)

Website: QuickMBA. Available at: http://www.quick-mba.com/strategy/swot/ (Accessed: 30 March 2011)

Soohyun Lim (MA Design)10006691

I will focus on explaining our concept of product development, followed by my personal reflection and understanding on the discussion.

Product development and future plans

Our development has three main aspects: region-al, product and marketing.

Boots in the UK being the largest cosmetic retailer allows product being imported from Japan, this opens up the opportunities to the rest of European countries. The product is redesigned to adapt to Caucasians’ facial features before being imported to the UK. The design of the product will be improved as research progresses; there may be more adaptations to be dis-covered from the research other than facial features. For example, one may find European lifestyles differ-ent from that of Asians and notice other useful fea-tures that may be added to the product. For instance, instead of warming up to relax the eyes, the product may cool down and calm the senses of users – such feature may be popular among younger consumers who needs recovery after the night out.

Related to the product development mentioned above, marketing development may take place as research and product evolve. The targeted audiences of our products are: students (10-20 years old), travelers (10-50 years old) and working people (20-50 years old). As the descriptions of the audiences are rather general, we may expand and specify our targeting audiences with more detailed descriptions at a later stage. For example, workers who work at call centre or in trading floors who are constantly required to be engage at computer stations. This would help us to de-velop other marketing strategies than Viral marketing, which is the primary strategy we have adapted.

7

Branding

Our concept of product development fits the idea of “branding evolves with marketing” (Pitsaki, 2010). As the product evolves, it is essential to adjust our marketing strategy, which is related to branding; the marketing strategies should echo the brand’s mission statement. Moreover, the mission statement of Boots is “aims to be the place for health and beauty custom-ers. We want to secure market leadership in the UK and build on our brands’ growing success internation-ally.”, our proposition strengthens Boots’ identity by introducing them the product that fits to their belief (health and beauty). The international collaboration with KAO would also reinforce Boots’ identity to suc-ceed internationally.

Distribution Channel

Our concept is to import the eye masks manufactured by KAO in Japan to the UK. Our role is the design agent who redesigns and repackages the product for KAO to better suit Caucasians, by introducing the product to Europe. The eye masks will mainly be sold in Boots stores and on the Boots Internet website.

Akinori Asatomi (MA Design)10022992

Reflection

Our choice of importing the eye masks from KAO is sensible because it is the biggest cosmetic manufac-turer in Japan, who also has the technology to produce reliable products. “Safety” should be on the top of out priority because eye masks are in direct contact with the human eye areas, which is sensitive and delicate. The feedback given from the colleagues also indicates potential users’ major concern is safety. Taken alto-gether, it was a good decision made to adopt products from KAO with quality guarantee.

Boots as retailers are also seen as “customers”, be-cause they need to find the products attractive and profitable to import and sell in the UK. Choosing Boots as the retailer has the lowest potential risk because Boots is the biggest and most profitable cosmetic retailer in the UK; they already has established market share and consumer population. Our product would also fit into the range of the products being sold in Boots for that the range of products is wide.

Since the values of the customers may be very differ-ent due to cultural differences, environmental issues are paid with more attention in Europe than that in Asia. It may be worthwhile to invest in research and development during the process of redesign, in order to convert the product into an environment friendly product.

In terms of our targeting audience, I reckon we could have refined the descriptions to a greater extent. Firstly, the age of 10 for the start is too young, and the age range for 10 to 20 for students is also too narrow. The purpose of targeting students is to relieve their strain from lengthy computer usage; however, the age range of 16 – 25 would perhaps be more appropriate.

As for marketing strategy, Viral marketing seems to be the suitable method, not only because the risk is low but also because it fits to the marketing style of Boots. As a designer agent positioned between KAO and Boots, I reckon the risk of our ideas being exploited is high. If we present this proposition to KAO, they can contact Boots on their own to present this idea. In order to avoid this, we need to focus on our “redesign” and obtain intellectual property right for our design to protect our proposition. The major weakness of our proposition is that it is not an original product; we have chosen to redesign and repackage an existing product and introduce it to the UK. My personal opinion is that it would have been a better strategy to design an original product rather than importing existing product. Because Boots does not have the patent for the product, unless protected by intellectual property right, other European manu-facturers or wholesalers can easily replicate and manufacture similar eye masks.

Group Process

The project management had been a smooth and organised process, however, it was difficult to obtain a consensus among team members and to reach agree-ment. Moreover, it was also challenging to ensure equal contribution among members.

ReferencePitsaki, I. (2010). Brand Concepts in Publishing. The International Journal of the Book. Common Ground Publishing: Illinois.

Akinori Asatomi (MA Design)10022992