Boon Rawd Brewery The Use of Market Research

BOON RAWD BREWERY: Researching beer brand image and strategy options

This case study brings together quantitative and qualitative research methods to produce some powerful insights into consumer preferences and associations, and reveals alternative brand-positioning strategies. Boon Rawd Brewery is a household name in Thailand, and has an exemplary image as a good employer and a well-managed company with a strong record of social responsibility. The most famous of the company's products is Singha beer.

A research study, initiated by the company, was designed to elicit the positions of certain brands of beer in the minds of consumers, and the associations that were most important to the consumers. The study was also designed to reveal strategic opportunities for new and existing products. The research team brought together a series of customers in several focus groups, in the key geographic markets of Bangkok and Chiangmai. Participants were first asked to fill in a short questionnaire on the attributes they thought were important in choosing a brand.

Participants were then asked to consider six brands of beer predominant in the Thailand beer market. These were:

• Heineken, a global premium brand, originating from Holland, which has seen good growth in market share in previous years
• Carlsberg, another global brand and originating from Denmark
• Singha, the traditional Thai beer, which had seen some image-development work in previous years to increase its acceptability to younger, affluent groups
• Kloster, a beer made in Thailand, but branded and positioned as a European beer
• Leo, a lower-priced beer, which was marketed primarily on a low price/lower quality strategy
• Chang, a recent entrant, brought in on a low-cost strategy to take the lower-end rural market

How closely each person and each group of people thought the six brands were related, can be summarized in a chart, produced using a technique called multi-dimensional scaling.

Figure 6.1 shows a perceptual maps. Each dimension on the graph can be interpreted as an attribute that causes the consumers to differentiate between the products. At this stage, these dimensions (axes) were unknown, but the relative distances between the brands are a direct mathematical representation of the "product space" as perceived by the consumer.

It can be seen clearly that Heineken and Kloster were seen as very similar to each other, but different from Singha, Carlsberg, Leo, and Chang. However, it can also be seen that Heineken, Kloster, and Carlsberg were similarly perceived on the horizontal dimension, when compared to Singha and Leo, with Chang being positioned in the middle. On the vertical dimension, there is less differentiation, but it can be seen that Heineken and Kloster, followed closely by Singha, were positioned at one end of the dimension, with Chang at the other end.

Figure 6.1: Market perception of six beer brands in Thailand

Interpreting these dimensions is key to developing a strategy, and the preciseness with which the dimensions can be defined has a major impact on the validity of the final strategies. This would have to be done next.

Interpretation is a subjective process that, nevertheless, includes the assistance of some statistical methods. If a researcher knows beforehand some of the attributes that are important to a certain market, these attributes can be presented directly to consumers, and brands can again be compared based on these attributes. Several attributes such as cost, taste, image, and packaging attributes were tested, and these were overlaid over the map that had been generated.

Interestingly, the cost dimension did not seem to be highly related to brand choices in this sample of fairly affluent, moderate to heavy beer drinkers. However, some image attributes were highly related, though any one attribute could not explain the difference in the positions completely.

The transcripts and observations from the focus groups also helped in the interpretation. These subjective perceptions of the brands included dimensions that the researchers could not have possibly anticipated, and several perceptions took to brand managers by surprise.

For example, when asked what Singha would look like if the beer were a person (Mr. Singha), almost all groups of participants mentioned words and phrases such as friendly, casual, easy to get to know, joker, casually dressed, local, and good-hearted. Mr. Heineken was seen as sober, serious, successful, a little aloof, wearing a smart suit with accessories, and European.

Participants also were asked to imagine situations in which they would consume the different brands. In social situations, for example, many said they would consume the more prestigious and expensive brands, but at home they would consume the cheaper ones like Leo and Chang. In describing the Singha brand, many recalled with smiling faces, happy situations involving family, friends, and natural settings such as sitting on the side of a river and fishing. In describing the Heineken brand, they recalled business and more serious situations or formal occasions such as weddings, company social functions, or situations where they wanted to make a good impression.

All of this data helped interpret the dimensions on the perceptual map.

Still further information helped in describing the brand images. For example, before the focus groups were held, several lifestyle images were developed based on previous in-company research, general lifestyle research of Thai consumers, and images used in the beer industry internationally. These images described the sort of lifestyle that consumers may aspire to, elements of which could be built into the final product through product design, packaging, and promotion These were refined and eventually defined:

• the Master European Brewer: a personality based on those of existing beer brands that are marketed on the competence of their makers, professionalism, craftsmanship, and their origin in countries renowned for the art of brewing
• the International Thai: essentially, reflects the Thai who is proud of Thailand's positive attributes seen by the rest of the world;. proud of being Thai, yet is a citizen of the world and knows the difference between jingoism and genuine attributes of Thailand as seen from abroad; modern and ambitious-wants to achieve success internationally
• the Modern Thai: a rough Thai equivalent of the yuppie and has strong similarities to this group around the world; young, fashion-conscious, professional, and well-educated achiever who looks to symbols of status and wishes to set himself or herself apart from those who have not achieved as much; in contrast to the international Thai who seeks respect internationally, the modern Thai seeks respect locally and usually has a strong local network; has high disposable income and invests some of it in symbols of achievement like consuming premium or quality beer, a well-known trait; also has some characteristics in common with the international Thai, but is more of a local person with not as great an aspiration as the international Thai to achieve internationally or share similar interest in Thailand's place in the world
• the Cosmopolitan World Traveler: confident, adventurous, successful and culturally-aware individual; more "international" than any of the other personalities and has little relating directly to "Thai-ness" or specific Thai values as do the modern and international Thai; but like the international Thai, is international in outlook; cares less about Thailand's role in the world unlike the international Thai
• the Heritage Thai: a personality that appeals to those who value heritage, and in Thailand this includes Thai heritage in particular; a more mature personality, is reliable and respects values and traditions like family; Boon Rawd's corporate image and many of its advertisements its an reflect this personality

Just as the previously known attributes were superimposed onto the perceptual maps, so too were trial personalities or images by asking the participants to again rate each brand against each if these five images.

Although there were some important differences between groups in relation to their geographic location, sex, age, nominated favorite brand, and frequency of product usage, some perceptions seemed to be uniform throughout the group. These general perceptions are usually the most valid and salient, especially with a broad-based campaign such as the ones used in beer advertising.

Figure 6.2 shows the positions of these "virtual images" on the perceptual map. Note how Heineken and Kloster represent well the Master European Brewer "space", while Carlsberg appears slightly off-center in the Cosmopolitan World Traveler space. Singha appears on the edge of the International Thai space while Leo represents the Heritage Thai dimension. Chang does not seem to be able to be explained by any of the images. As a low-priced brand and the cheapest on the market, sold in bulk with a whisky product via a predominantly rural market, Chang seemed to compete mainly on price. As several focus group participants mentioned: "You drink Chang to get drunk!" The Modern Thai space does not appear to be served by any product.

Figure 6.2: Superimposing brand and brand personalities

The next step was to finally interpret the dimensions. After analyzing the contents of the focus group transcripts and using the previous attributes and the "virtual images," as a guide, it was possible to label the vertical dimension as Established-Contemporary and the horizontal dimension as Heart-Head.

The brands towards the top of the Established-Contemporary dimension had a more modern, new, up-to-date, fresh, and present or future image, as compared to the brands at the bottom, which were perceived as traditional, established, and consumed by older and more conservative people.

The brands towards the left of the Head/Heart dimension were perceived as more logical, and serious, while those towards the right were perceived as appealing more to the heart.

Having drawn out the map for these 5 major images and the 6 brands, the strategies can now be formulated.

First of all, the global brands were clustered towards the Head dimension, although local brand Kloster was also perceived similarly-Kloster's marketers had given it a European image by using a European name. Interestingly, Kloster's previous tag line was: "Happiness you can drink," a clever line that would have appealed to the Thai sense of informality and fun, but nowadays the brand is more associated with the more sober Head image and has lost market share over time.

Brand strategy and re-positioning options

The options for Boon Rawd are to create a master-European-brewer brand themselves and compete in the market place, directly against the global brands and Kloster. Kloster had demonstrated that even though it is a local brand, it could create an image as an international brand. However, there are some hidden traps with this approach. Several focus group participants mentioned that they thought Kloster lost some credibility by being a local brand dressed up in international clothing (the issue of country of origin). Furthermore, this Master European Brewer image space, though obviously a valuable one (whether it will grow faster or slower in the immediate future is dependent on the rate of Thailand's recovery), is already crowded.The options for Boon Rawd are to create a master-European-brewer brand themselves and compete in the market place, directly against the global brands and Kloster. Kloster had demonstrated that even though it is a local brand, it could create an image as an international brand. However, there are some hidden traps with this approach. Several focus group participants mentioned that they thought Kloster lost some credibility by being a local brand dressed up in international clothing (the issue of country of origin). Furthermore, this Master European Brewer image space, though obviously a valuable one (whether it will grow faster or slower in the immediate future is dependent on the rate of Thailand's recovery), is already crowded.

Another strategy to regain some of the market share that Singha had lost due to the entry of the global brands and low-end products, was to re-position the Singha product itself. It was sensed that Singha possessed a great deal of customer loyalty and one strategy would be to develop Singha to be even more Heart-based, and to move further into the international Thai space. This could be accomplished by an integrated marketing communications campaign.

A further option would be to develop a Singha export brand and prove that Singha could be accepted worldwide. This would also instill pride in Thai consumers in that they were consuming a Thai product that was recognized internationally, targeting in a tangential but strategic way, the monopoly global brands have on internationalism.

For reasons of confidentiality, further information is not available, but the study has been of immense use to strategic thinking.

Figure 6.3: Brand strategy and re-positioning options

Central to the above case study is the interaction of quantitative and qualitative methodology in creating a brand strategy. Qualitative techniques can provide richness of data, necessary for delving into the often unconscious brand images that customers may already have of a product, thus allowing companies to build on them. Quantitative techniques can provide objective evidence that subjective assumptions made have a basis in reality. Both research techniques are required for successful brand-image and positioning-strategy research. Finally, it should be mentioned that market research is only a guide to strategic thinking, and does not present complete solutions for brand strategy. It does, however, help paint in the full picture, especially with respect to consumer thinking.

Source: Orient Pacific Century Market Research

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