I’ve always said that the people who sell bottled water, especially in countries that have perfectly good water in their taps, are genius. They’ve taken what is essentially a very cheap commodity and applied sufficient marketing spin in orer to increase the price, by thousands of times, and then sell it to the very same consumers who can buy it for next to nothing. In another world it’d be like me buying a BMW from BMW for R500 000, applying sufficient marketing spin to sell it to my friend who owns the very same model BMW for R500 000 000. It’s great business if you can get it.
But then I come accross this post. A post about Seven Eleven Japan, who have launched ‘canned oxygen’. I kid you not. If these guys can pull it off, and there’s no reason they can’t based on bottled water why they can’t, then they become king of my list of people I wish I was.
Suck it up baby!
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Where to now?
I don’t think it’s good marketing as much as tapping into each person’s basic underlying emotion of fear.
“Logically I know that the water in our taps is safe to drink cos Joburg Water tells me it is. But Betty at gym told me that her mother found worm eggs in her water the other day. And what about the sewage they found in the spruit last week. And those water pipes that carry the water to my tap must be really old and I’m sure there’s stuff in there I can’t see. And what about that debate on the radio about the calcium that government is adding to my drinking water. So although I hear what Joburg Water is saying about how clean my water is, I’d rather not take any chances and drink bottled water instead. After all they bottle this stuff directly from the bubbling spring in the mountain, so it’s not like it goes through any pipes or gets contaminated”.
As for the canned oxygen in Japan, with the rate of air pollution growing, especially in certain areas in China, I think I’d better see if there are any shares in that company which haven’t been bought up yet.
How about walk-in oxygen booths (like telephone booths) where the public can pop in for a few minutes of clean, unpolluted oxygen or piping clean oxygen into their homes or offices via their air-conditioning system (we all know the benefits to our grey matter) or oxygen masks in their underground system (a little like the ones in the plane which ‘drop down in case of emergency’) so you can have a few puffs while travelling to and from work.
Maybe it’s about spotting the white spaces and then capitalising on it. After all, as consumers we often don’t realise what we’re needing until someone invents it and sells it to us. Then it becomes indispensable.
Anj, you should visit the Oxyspabar in London. Oh yes – oxygen pods (booths) – complete with your choice of “flavour” – alpine heath anyone? – are already here!
http://www.oxyspabar.com
I was just in London last week. Wish I’d known about it before. Do they have death by chocolate ‘flavour’?
Anj, I’d like to re-write your last sentence, based on your entire comment….. “After all, as consumers we often don’t realise what we’re needing until someone put’s a spin to it and sells it to us. Then it becomes indispensable.”
You’re a marketer’s dream : )
I’d prefer reading in my native language, because my knowledge of your languange is no so well. But it was interesting! Look for some my links: