P&G Rolls Out New Ad for Wet Toilet Paper
Sunday August 12 7:32 PM ET
dailynews.yahoo.com
By Brad Dorfman
CHICAGO (Reuters) - When promoting the new moistened toilet
paper now hitting the market, advertisers can try to confront sensitive
personal hygiene issues like cleanliness and absorbency that most
people prefer to duck in conversation.
Or they can actually bring out a duck.
Consumer products giant Procter & Gamble Co. is taking the latter
approach when it launches advertising next week for Charmin Fresh
Mates, its entry in the newly developed wet toilet paper market against
Kimberly-Clark Corp.'s Cottonelle Fresh Rollwipes
Trying to sell any form of toilet paper can be a sensitive endeavor, with
manufacturers having to strike a balance in talking about absorbency
and cleanliness without alienating consumers, Ken Harris, a partner at
Cannondale Associates, a consumer products marketing and sales
consulting firm.
``No matter what you do, there are going to be some people who are
offended by the word toilet paper,'' Harris said.
WET? QUACK!
The task can be even more difficult when moisture is added to the
equation, a P&G spokesman conceded.
P&G's approach to the tender subject is an animated commercial for
television to begin airing Monday in select markets featuring an orange
and blue duck.
The duck offers a roll of Fresh Mates to the bear that P&G has used to
advertise its regular Charmin brand toilet paper for the past year. Like
many real-life consumers, the bear has no idea what the product --
similar to a baby wipe but on a roll and flushable -- is for and
quizzically asks ``Wet?''
To help get the point across, the duck shakes its tail feathers and, an
understanding reached, the two creatures exchange a ``high five.''
The commercial was developed by Darcy Masius Benton & Bowles, a
unit of advertising holding group Bcom3 Inc., which landed on the duck
as a companion to the bear it already used.
``This subject of moist cleaning is not one that is easy to talk about,''
Terry Loftus, a P&G spokesman, said of the company's decision to
take a light-hearted approach. Loftus declined to disclose the cost of
the advertising campaign, which will be shown in the mid-Atlantic and
southeastern states where the product is being sold.
A spokesman for Kimberly-Clark declined to discuss details about the
company's ads, which will also begin running early next week in the
southeastern United States, where the company initially begins to sell
Rollwipes.
``It portrays a personal topic in a very lighthearted, playful and
attractive way,'' the spokesman, David Dickson, said.
That would be a departure from the company's more prosaic
commercials for regular Cottonelle, which focus on cleanliness.
NEW MARKET, WITH BUZZ
For a product most consumers did not know existed at the beginning of
the year, wet toilet paper has created a lot of media buzz and a little
controversy.
Kimberly-Clark first announced it would sell the product in January,
claiming it would be the first wet toilet paper on a roll. The
announcement was greeted with a lot of media attention including jokes
from late night comedians on television.
But in May, P&G bought the patent rights to Moist Mates from
privately held Moist Mates LLC, calling it ``America's first moist bath
tissue on a roll. Unlike moistened wipes for babies, both companies say
their products are flushable.
Meanwhile, equipment problems and concerns about meeting strong
demand for Rollwipes caused Kimberly-Clark to delay and scale back
the initial release, allowing P&G to start shipping a few days ahead of
Kimberly-Clark in early July.
P&G is targeting people who have already tried some sort of makeshift
wet toilet paper, mostly women from families with young children,
Terry Loftus, Loftus said.
Both companies site data showing that 60 percent of U.S. consumers
have at some point made their own form of the product, moistening a
sheet of regular toilet paper or putting together some combination of
toilet paper and wet wipe. Twenty-five percent are regular users, they
say. |
