Proctor & Gamble have revealed the first fully branded Household Gondola Ends in Waitrose, with a compelling message to support people saving energy at home.
Research released by Shopper Intelligence in 2022 provided real-life data to demonstrate that category presence on gondola ends acts as a sign-post, reminder or prompt for a category visit in the main aisle.
The Shopper Intelligence study also found the gondola end advertising effect to be “definitely stronger for unplanned categories. Our research has shown the popularity of gondola ends in driving impulse purchases,” said Rhian Thomas, head of insight at ShopperVista IGD.
This is a notable collaboration between a single brand and retailer, innovating in a category to provide a brand focus with strong consumer-led messages to support energy efficiency during a turbulent economic period.
It’s just a gondola end but it has caused a lot of debate on LinkedIn. It was described as everything from an effective use of a portfolio, creating in-store impact and a linked multi-brand story to being cluttered and confused with too many messages and too many brands and SKUs.
In the end the success or failure (of any initiative) needs to be measured against the objectives. So, the cogent points for and against the design and messaging of this POS/promotional initiative can only be judged against P&G’s desired and achieved outcomes.
Our thoughts:
- Shoppers are deeply habitual and interact with scarily few of our attempts to engage them in-store. The strong, branded colour ways, left to right flow of messages and the scale of the presentation must tick the disruption box.
- Whilst there might be too many messages, they are all integrated behind a single theme – saving energy. This is timely and links with other communications investment across the brands i.e. it is integrated, not stand alone.
- Commercially, this is a great way for P&G to get maximum bang for its buck, making a big portfolio statement to the shopper and retailer at a time when they may not be launching lots of NPD.
Finally, P&G is fabulous at integrating commercial and brand initiatives to deliver long and short-term impact. This should not be viewed in isolation but a step on a journey to build brands, be relevant and distinctive, work with customers at a category and brand level and flex some competitive muscle. Conclusion: Tick.
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