"Milkuit is a brand extension from Energen. It is one of Energen tools to strengthen the brand image and brand equity towards brand that associated with nutrition and health. Milkut has launched at June 2004, and it is the first brand and line extension from Energen after 13 years known as milk and cereal products. The product launch is not very smooth, several factors were behind this trouble.
First, the product didn?t get through marketing concept of new product development process. It was only focusing on development of the product itself, creating taste that accepted by consumers and the packaging design was created without any strategic direction.
Second, the management directions also play a role in this failure. When the first brief, the management want this product become a premium product and only sold in modern trade at Rp. 1.000 per pack that doubled competitor?s price. But sales in modern trade are limited, management demanded higher volume, and then the marketing team are releasing this product to traditional trade without any proper preparation and strategy.
Third, the distribution in traditional trade is very weak, this happened because the distribution system and teams from Mayora is not really working well. Inbisco, a distribution company and sister company from Mayora is not applied direct distribution system. They have different sub distributors in every area. With indirect distribution system, Inbisco have less power to reach certain numeric distribution in short term period.
Fourth, inconsistent communication strategy is one of the biggest contribution to failure of this new brand extension from Energen. It?s hard for marketing team to determine a proper strategy because there are no marketing researches before they develop Energen Milkuit. Knowing this situation Mayora is willing to revitalize and re-launch Energen Milkuit to become one of key player in biscuit market. Energen Milkuit is aimed to be a significant brand in cookies category with nutrition and health benefit from the product.
Differentiation is the anchor of a brand?s equity. Without differentiation a company cannot charge a premium, nor can it sustain a brand. That was what happened with Energen Milkuit that fail to succeed in the market. Energen Milkuit was offering products that quite similar to competitor?s product with higher price without any significant differentiation. That?s why Energen Milkuit needs to have significant differentiation if they want to fight with competitors. After Mayora find the suitable differentiation for Energen Milkuit, they need to reposition the brand to establish more compelling points of difference. We need to reposition a brand to establish a point of parity on some key image dimension. Updating a brand may require some combination of new products, new advertising, new promotions, new packaging, and so forth.
Energen Milkuit must have a proper marketing communication strategy to be success in this relaunch. The communication strategy will determine whether the consumer aware and buy the products or not. All strategy for revitalize and relaunch Energen Milkuit should put into marketing plan. The objectives to have marketing plan are to make clear how it will impact three important overall business performance objectives, revenue growth, strategic position, and financial performance."
Depok: Fakultas Ekonomi dan Bisnis Universitas Indonesia, 2009
