COMPETITION BETWEEN THREE BRANDS
illy : This brand is focused on targeting the up part of the market. Indeed, the Italian brand has always been giving to consumers a high image of itself through a packaging, a high coffee quality and different events that Illy was associated with. As an example, the marketing and communication side of this brand has invested and still invests to be associated with Art. Illy has been sponsor of important and famous Art events as the Monumenta exhibition from Paris but as well to events closer to us as the Festival de Cannes. Illy has made artistic creations the major key success of its communication and marketing strategy. We can easily observe it through its “premium” products, this Italian roaster exclusively distributes Arabicas from high quality producer. Illy takes care of its high brand image by offering to consumers high standard of products, like the Espresso machine created in 1995 by the famous italian designer Lucca Trazzi or with its cup collection and coffee boxes named “Illy Art Collection” It is what consumers feel and expect then about the brand, high quality products and even synonymous of Art. When they drink a coffee from Illy, it has to be a unique and remembering experience.
Nescafé : This brand is particular by the fact that they do reach one of the biggest part of the coffee market shares. Nescafé is mainly the first worldwide coffee distributor. It usually bases different marketing and communication strategy according to the country it is present on, with the objective of getting as many market shares as possible. The key success of Nescafé : being at 360° aware about the diversity of coffee consumer expectations which are culturally different. This brand is focused on the coffee traditions of the countries it commercializes its products. Then Nescafe products would differentiate in between countries. The marketing and communication based on Nescafé products would not be the same in India, Greece, Western Europe, etc... Through many differentiations within its products, Nescafé finds the best way of reaching as many consumers as it can according to their different cultural insights, behaviours of coffee tradition. Nescafé focuses its strategy by being aware about those diverse consumer expectations for then being able to communicate in a way which would allow them to get the biggest number of market shares.
Maxwell House : “Friends and coffee” , Maxwell House based its marketing and communication around this topic. Having good coffee in between good friends, it is how Maxwell House instant coffee should be seen by consumers. Maxwell House marketing strategy is about positivism. The best “home made” coffee according to Canadians from Quebec believes that the World would be much better if the cup was half full instead of half empty. When their instant coffee came out on the market, the communication and marketing strategies were about friendships and positivism while drinking this “home made” coffee. Having a break, gathering in between people you like and sharing around a good coffee is the key point of its marketing strategy and it works. This strategy has been mainly efficient in Canada, where the end of the winter would leave the summer and cosy coffee moments in between friends.