Axion
Creating a brand character to drive sales
Through association with a good-looking chef, a dishwashing liquid brand successfully distanced itself from the negative image of household chores.
The challenge
Reverse Axion's decline and create category interest
Colgate-Palmolive's Axion dishwashing liquid brand was experiencing a long-term decline in market share. Increased promotional activity among key competitors was a factor, but the main issue was the change in society: an increase in the number of women choosing to go out to work meant that household chores were increasingly seen as tedious and even demeaning. The category lacked excitement and engagement.
Our insight
Reverse consumer perceptions of household tasks
We recognized that we needed to set dishwashing in a more exciting and entertaining context.
Our target audience was aspirational, and needed to be reassured that household tasks are not just 'women's work'. If we could create an association between dishwashing and lively creative entertainment, we could reverse the perception that it is just a routine chore.
Our solution
Create a sexy character to engage consumers
We developed the Chef Axion character, a good-looking and entertaining male chef who could show that cooking and household tasks can be fun and a source of pride.
We worked with the creative agency and the broadcaster to script and produce a series of vignettes, which featured Chef Axion demonstrating new recipes and cooking tips - always with the product in shot so that he could quickly wash up his utensils.
These vignettes were broadcast in-show, used for live mentions of the product, broadcast on TV screens at point of sale (a developing channel in Mexico) and later developed into podcasts for online recipe sites.
The results
- 7% year-on-year sales increase
- Reversed decline in market share
- Successfully shifted consumer perceptions
