Tropicana Crunch: Catastrophic Product Decision or Positioning Genius?
We need to talk.
Tropicana wants us to eat cereal with…orange juice. So they’re launching honey-almond cereal.
Personal take: I love cereal and I am not amused. I’m the kind of person that could eat cereal any time of the day.
In fact, one of my favourite parts of working from the trivago office is that they have fresh crunchy cereal in the kitchens all day, and you can just grab a bowl and fill it up to the brim as many times a day as you want. Most times, people just give you a once-over and then they shrug and move on with their lives, while I sit there like:
I may not completely have my shit together and may still be struggling with this whole meal-prep thing you need to do when you’re a fully-independent adult, but hey at least I have some cereal.
Anyway, back to Tropicana Crunch…
I think there’s a bunch of valuable lessons here for us brand and strategy nerds. Tropicana just pulled a genius positioning move even though their product isn’t strong and I am here for it!
Let’s first explore what’s wrong with this whole product launch; and then dive right into what they’ve nailed.
What Tropicana Crunch is missing 😶
It just isn’t competitive enough. Tropicana isn’t just competing with other cereals. They’re competing on several levels with a variety of substitutes. Let’s have a closer look.
- Narrow substitutes: Let’s say you’re craving cereal for breakfast — and cereal alone. There’s tons of options out there and Tropicana Crunch just cannot compare. We are happy with our delicious and familiar cereal varieties, thank you very much. What’s more, they come in a whole host of flavours from cinnamon to chocolate to berries to fruit; so really, Tropicana, thanks but we’re covered. 😃👍
- Form substitutes: Okay so you’re slightly more flexible than before and you just want some form of breakfast so long as it’s orangey, sweet, and filling? No problem! You could pick Tropicana Crunch. But better still, how about a bunch of oranges; or pancakes with oranges; or crêpes/French Toast/yoghurt with oranges?
- Need substitutes: But what if you don’t give a rat’s posterior about what you eat, so long as you get to eat, because you’re absolutely famished? You could eat some good ol’ fried eggs. Or bread and butter. Or sausages. Or avo-toast. It’s endless.
- Resource substitutes: Listen, we all have budgets. Not just monetarily. But we also have limited appetites (yes, even you, Mr/Ms-I-Have-An-Unlimited-Appetite 🙄). Say you could receive an unlimited supply of any food in the world to satisfy your appetite — money no bar and absolutely no consequences for your health. What’s the first thing you’d like? Hands up if you said pizza. And the second thing? Pasta? Ramen? Butter Chicken? All I’m saying is, I hardly think your focus is going to be on cereal that you can eat with orange juice.
It’s trying too hard to revolutionize cereal-eating. Introducing new products is so much about providing people with the right amount of context. Everything we perceive is based on our own frames of reference.
What do you think when you see an iPad? A premium version of the Samsung tablet? A bigger version of a mobile phone? A digital drawing book?
How about when you think of a bottle of Pepsi? When I think Pepsi, I think of KFC, vodka, and teenage rebellion; I bet you didn’t think of the same thing.
Now let’s think of Tropicana Crunch. It’s cereal that you can have with orange juice.
What’s your frame of reference? Do you have any context? Ever tried something crunchy with sweet, freshly squeezed orange juice?
Probably not. See? The whole context is so whack. And sure, you might argue that this is how you build unique products; but this isn’t revolutionary — it isn’t going to change the way the world eats cereal.
But IMHO, Tropicana nailed its launch positioning and messaging 🚀
Tropicana is not promising you this is going to be awesome. In fact, they know this is strange. They say so themselves. Here’s how I think it’ll work.
Tropicana goes viral, ensuring that they don’t promise you delight in every bite. I don’t think Tropicana created an incredible product.
But it’s strange. whack. new.
And ironically enough, it provides enough context by calling it cereal for it to go viral on the internet; you’ve got people (like me) going all, “But that’s not ceeereal?! Ew.”
I’m fairly certain that this was intended as a Guerilla campaign to bring back Tropicana’s brand (and all its old glory) into the spotlight by:
- Activating old Tropicana fans
- Encouraging enough consumers at large to — at the very least — try it.
It’s going to tap into people’s unique perceptions of value. We all have that one weird friend that’s always up to something. In my case, I have a few of them.
- There’s one guy who’ll eat anything. Cow tongue (ew), pig ears (EW), raw meat with onions on bread (BRB, throwing up).
- Then there’s another one that says and does the strangest things, out of the blue, always managing to tickle us pink.
- Then another one that’s edgy and loves everything non-mainstream.
- Then there’s one that rolls up rice in bread and dips it in curry, and declares that the textures just work.
- And finally there’s me. I’m writing this article, fully inclined to believe that cereal and orange juice are a blasphemous pairing made in the depths of hell. But I’m on an eternal mission to try new things in life and all that.
I think a lot of people are going to try this product at least once because it’s unique even if it’s awful. I’ll try it because I’m adventurous. My friend will because he wants to try all kinds of food. Our in-circle comedian, because he wants a reaction.
I suspect Tropicana will make a grand comeback with their original products.
Tropicana has made some very creative decisions and me? I’m convinced that the gal who signed off on this knew perfectly well that Tropicana needs to do something to revive its brand and get people to talk about it.
With that in mind, here’s my verdict:
Not-so-catastrophic product decision; Absolutely genius positioning.
Maybe that’s all it is. A short-lived, well-positioned, brand resuscitation, marketing stunt that gets us product enthusiasts to write about Tropicana and talk about them. God knows it’s been a minute since we paid any attention to Tropicana, eh?
And as far as I’m concerned — that’s where it’s going to end.
A few months of buzz, a few production cycles, a few million people rushing to try it out — and then when Tropicana is back at the top of our minds because of its orange juice sales skyrocketing all over again?
The cereal disappears off our shelves only to become a distant part of our memories like Pepsi Blue.
And just like that, Tropicana Crunch over and out.
