EMMA ROSE CONNOLLY | PLANSBOOK | APRIL 2019

TaBLE OF CONTENTS

SITUATIONANALYSIS

industrycompany

competition product

consumer

Situation Analysis Industry, Company, Competition, Product, ConsumerEnvironmental Analysis RFPSWOT

Marketing Strategy Objectives / Time Frame Target Market Brand Value Proposition The Big Idea IMC plan

Creative StrategyCreative Brief New Packaging

Media Ads to be used PrintSocial MediaDisplay SitesStreaming Sites

Public Relations Strategy Influencer EventsSocial Media Contest

EvaluationWorks Cited

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14-20

21-24

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The industry: Health FoodThe health food industry is a $4-billion-dollar-a-year business that took off in the early 1990s. American consumers, in particular, began to regard their health as a chief concern when buying food. To this end, the health food industry “jackpot” so to say, was based on the connection between fatty foods and disease – as well as the fact that in the United States alone, more than sixty-five pounds of fat was consumed by an average American each year. Therefore, many manu-facturers began to make processed foods with less fat and calorie ingredients, claiming that these new products were healthy and nutritious, when, in fact, a health-conscious individual would know that these foods actually aren’t healthy, and are actually full of preservatives.

This created a HUGE opportunity for businesses to market themselves as “healthy.”

In 2014, a multitide of various company’s sales of natural and organic foods/drinks in The United States of America alone reached $53.5 billion, which is almost 54% higher than sales in 2009. Additionally, these increased sales are due to obesity concerns among consumers. Today, consumers tend to focus not only on what’s ‘trendy’ or not, but also the importance of a good environmental impact of food and whether or not certain types of food products are actually good for you.

the companyWhat started out as a hike in Colorado’s picture-esq Rocky Mountains ultimately turned into a brilliant idea. Instantaneously, in May of 2000, LÄRABAR was born. Lara Merriken, founder of the now-nationally recognized product, combined simple ingredients like fruits and nuts to create a genius protein bar. The purpose of this company, nonetheless, was to create a delicious, convenient and wholesome snack with less than 10 ingredients and no added sugars. Lara put together focus groups with friends and families to tinker with recipes until a general consensus about flavors and taste was made.

Nearly three years later, on April 14th, 2003, LÄRABAR officially hit the market – all packaged by Lara herself. With five different flavors (Cherry Pie, Apple Pie, Cashew Cookie, Banana Cookie and Chocolate Coconut Chew), Lara sold nearly 1 million bars in just a year. Lara released eight new flavors just two years later. In 2008, as the bar continued to grow, LÄRABAR was purchased by General Mills (an American manufacturer and marketer of branded consumer foods) for 50 million dollars.

LÄRABAR continued to release brand new flavors, including their 2012 Uber bar (fruits and nuts), their 2013 ALT bar (first protein bar), and their 2013 Renola bar (fruits, seeds and nuts). To this day, there are over 5 variations and 30 different flavors of LÄRABAR. That being said, every single bar has less than 10 ingredients, and are sourced from fair trade certified farmers.

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COMPETITION

-Ingredients are all familiar-Looks like what you’re eating -Great for on-the-go-various flavors

-chicory root for fiber-expensive -very sweet

-Variety of flavors -High protein-affordable

-“lasting energy”

-artifical taste -added sugars

-contains ingredients you can’t pronounce: glycerin coating, soy

crisps, sunflower lecithin

KIND BAR

think thin

CONS

CONS

PROS

PROS

competition cont’d.

-100% organic -product for all demographics-filling

-high price -not really a snack, more of a on-the-go quick fix -a lot of ADDED SUGAR and fake ingredients

-very few ingredients -simple

-tastes good-trendy packaging

-high price point

(2.99 a bar)-only 11 different flavors

cliff bar

rx bar

CONS

CONS

PROS

PROS

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THE PRODUCT

LÄRABAR is bar composed of unsweetened fruits, nuts and spices that provide vitamins, protein, healthy fats, minerals and good carbohydrates - making it one of the healthiest bars in the health food industry.

LÄRABAR believes that the foundation of a balanced body, mind and soul is derived from the foods you eat.

What you eat is the most satisfying when it is in a wholesome, healthy form.

THE Consumer current audienceage/race18-44 years old, mainly Caucasian PSYCHOGRAPHICSLÄRABAR’s consumers may not necessarily have an active lifestyle, but are pretty health-conscious. They are people who check the ingredients on everything and are looking for a wholesome snack. media consumptionThe current audience is digital savvy; comfortable with various media outlets, and are active on social media channels. That being said, they need to be more engaged. future audienceage/race18-24 years old, all types of racePSYCHOGRAPHICSMillenials place a heavy emphasis on healthy food choices, ultimately keeping up with trends and what’s “cool” right now. media consumptionMillenials are highly active on all social media platforms. With technology at their fingertips, they are overindexed in media.

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REQUEST FOR PROPOSAL

R f penvironmental analysis

There are 3 trends that are affecting the bar industry:

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Growing demand for organic snacks

Consumers know what artifical ingredients are. Snack bars, made with fruits and vegetables are deemed ‘healthy.’ This on-going trend will ultimately help shape the growth of the snack bar industry.

Growing demand for vegan snacks

Now-a-days, everyone seems to be vegan, or avoiding any and all animal products. It’s said that nearly 8 million Americans are vegan. Snack bars actually excel in this area because of their simple, yet tasty (and trendy) ingredients.

Growing demand for High protein / FIber snacks

This is a tricky one, because various protein bars in the industry vary. Bars made without whole fruits lack fiber, but maybe not protein (and vice versa). Adding both ingredients will boost snack bar sales.

*By 2021, the market is projected to reach $7.631.4 million

LÄRABAR, acquired by General Mills, is looking for a full-service agency to help them expand awareness of their brand, while maintaining their established status in the marketplace and standards for living a healthy, balanced life.

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swot analysis

strengths

weaknesses

opportunities

threats

--gluten free--dairy free--soy free

--non GMO--Kosher

--fair trade--<10 ingredients

--convenient--real food--low price

--Launch marketing campaign targeting millennials

-- Potential to strengthen presence through advertising and marketing -- Trendy because they’re healthy --Spread awareness to vegan and

health-conscious community

--High fruit sugar--Strong date taste

--Not a big marketing campaign--A lot of competing bars

are out on the market

--Many companies are starting to create products with very few

ingredients. This causes problems for LARABAR.

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marketingSTRATEGY

OBJECTIVEs/GOALS• Spread awareness about LÄRABAR to the number of health-conscious 18-24 year olds through social media, magazines, streaming sites and display sites.

• launch an online campaign with hashtag #realeasyenergy, which will increase the number of consumers interacting online with the brand.

• Drive the traffic and attendance of pr events (with influencers)

• Increase positive social media reviews

• emphasize the importance of healthy, clean living

time frame THE REAL. EASY. ENERGY. CAMPAIGN WILL RUN FOR ONE YEAR FROM APRIL 2019 TO APRIL 2020.

objectives / time framebrand value proposition

target market advertising plan

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brand value proposition

simplefunctional

emotional

All of the ingredients in LÄRABAR are simple, pure and delicious. Never more than 10 ingredients in any bar, they are the perfect snack for people who look after their health and know what putting good food into their body actually means.

Unlike most of its competitors, LÄRABAR is actually affordable. At a selling price at $1.29, it’s the cheapest of its kin on the market. Additionally, not only is it an easy, on-the-go snack, LÄRABAR is gluten free, dairy free, and preservative free.

With nearly 30 flavors now available, consumers will be pleased to know that they truly are helping with every purchase of LÄRABAR made. Because they are supporting a fair-trade brand, consumers can feel the comfort in offering a better deal to the farmers and workers involved in its production. Additionally, because there are always less than 10 ingredients in every bar, consumers looking for a healthy snack can eat without feeling the guilt associated with snacking.

the target market

student Avery is an 18-year-old first year

biology student. She can be found in the library during the week days and out

socializing with friends most weekends. She is pretty conscious of what she eats, but is not

restrictive with her food choices. In between classes, Avery spends a majority of

her time refreshing her social media apps, including Facebook and Instagram. She gets

email notifications about different products to stay up to date on the

current trends.

graduate Gavin, 23, has recently graduated from business school. He has just moved to New York City, where he has landed a

corporate office job at Morgan Stanley. Gone are the college days –

now, Gavin’s life has quickly sped up, as he meets deadlines and crazy demands

of bossy bosses. He is having a hard time fitting healthy meals in, as he’s

constantly working.

avery gavin

FOUR hypothetical consumers that are the perfect target for LÄRABAR:

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REAL. EASY. ENERGY.Right now, LÄRABAR’S bars don’t have anything special on their packaging. Though their branding is most definitely consistent throughout, they need something to catch the eyes of consumers: real. easy. energy. not only makes sense and will make the design of the product look better, but it will also appeal to consumers who are looking for a quick, easy and tasty on-the-go snack – one that will actually provide them the energy to keep hustling throughout the day.

THE BIG IDEAthe target market

VEGAN HIPPIEHannah is a 22-year-old student at San Diego State University. She is a

true vegan who practices the plant diet lifestyle. Hannah loves to promote her

lifestyle on her ‘influencer’ Instagram page – hannahshappyhealth, where

she has a whopping 24k followers. Hannah attends yoga every day and

believes the mind is capable of anything.

STUDENT ATHLETE Josh is a very active 21-year-old student

athlete at Villanova University. A member of the crew team, Josh can be found working out at the athletic center, attending rowing practice on the daily, as well as hanging out

with the rest of the team. With such an active lifestyle, Josh is always looking for a way to get real energy, all whilst eating the

right foods. LÄRABAR is the perfect solution – providing Josh with easy, fast and REAL energy to help him perform his best on the

crew team.

hannah josh2122

contd.

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iMC planGiven the demographic of LÄRABAR ‘s target market (millennials between the ages of 18 and 24), a wide variety of media platforms will be used. Ads will be placed in front of the target audience in their everyday lives –to ultimately generate knowledge about the brand.

LÄRABAR will be launching an online, social media campaign in late April, in order for consumers to make the necessary dietary changes before the summer begins. Through the new slogan “real. easy. energy.,” LÄRABAR has created various ads showing different ways LÄRABAR can appeal to one’s lifestyle.

Furthermore, LÄRABAR will be reaching out to various influencers to help spread awareness about their bars. A large part of the campaign is to create attentiveness to the brand. The agency has chosen humor to appeal to consumers because it’s more effective to create ads that will translate to the target market.

The first of many ads will run on LÄRABAR’s official Instagram/ Facebook pages– introducing the new slogan and how consumers can activelyparticipate in the new campaign online. By using the hashtag #realeasyenergy, consumers can interact with others around the world, which will ultimately increase positive social media reviews.

creativeSTRATEGY

creative briefCreative strategy

new packaging

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creative brief

WHO?WHAT?WHERE?WHEN?WHY?HOW?

Advertisements will be geared towards health-conscious millennials aged 18-24. This target audience enjoys a healthy, active lifestyle and is looking to be proactive with that they put in their bodies. Since millen-nials are avid social media users, these consumers are seeking visually pleasing, wholesome ads that will capture their attention.

LÄRABAR’S products are being advertised, along with their new slogan: real. easy. energy. Because of preservatives, looking for a quick, healthy snack fix isn’t as easy as it seems. With LÄRABAR’s relatively cheaper price, consumers not only get a simple, delicious and healthy bar, but it’s affordable too.

LÄRABAR’s campaign will run on social media (Facebook and Instagram), throughout various magazines (Men’s Health, Women’s Health and Cosmopolitan), as well as on streaming (Youtube and Hulu ) and display sites (Buzzfeed and Pandora).

The online, social media campaign will be launching in late April, right before the start of the summer. PR events (including influencer events) are more successful in the warmer weather and sunshine. Summer is right around the corner, which is the the perfect time to make dietary changes in one’s lifestyle.

LÄRABAR is advertising in order to promote its new slogan and overall awareness about their brand. To be successful, LÄRABAR must remember their promising, wholesome values, all whilst promoting their product. Health-conscious millenials between the ages of 18-24 will love LÄRABAR because they associate fewer ingredients with healthier foods.

This campaign is heavily utilizing social media and various media channels to spread awareness, ultimately capturing the attention of busy, tech consumed consumers. With technology at everyone’s fingertips (espe-cially the target market), this is the ideal way to spread awareness. Ads will be colorful and vibrant, mimicking the packaging of the bars. Without using too much force, social media and magazines/websites will place ads right in front of millenial’s eyes.

creative strategyIn order to reach active, health-conscious, millenials, consumers will partcipate in an online campaign. The agency and LÄRABAR will be launching this social media campaign in April (just in time for the beginning of summer). The creative team, in particular, will be implementing a new tagline: real. easy. energy. onto all new LÄRABAR packaging. Additionally, the creative team will create web and print ads that introduce the bar as well as the new slogan. These ads will have humorous and catchy phrases to appeal to the eyes of the consumer - they’ll be colorful and vibrant and will almost mimic the simplicity of the bars. The main goal of these ads is to make sure consumers recognize and stop when scrolling through various websites and social media

This online campaign will ultimately engage active and healthymillenial consumers who are looking for a great on-the-go healthy snack.

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New larabar packaging

The new slogan will be placed on every single LÄRABAR. Not only does it look great and sounds catchy, but it means that people looking for a good, go-to snack that provides REAL energy from REAL food, will look no further.

media

ads to be usedsocial media display media

streaming media

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ads to be used ads continued26 27

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ads continuedPRINT

Women’s Health gives women insight on how to eat clean and live a fit lifestyle. Displaying these print ads in this magazine can help spread awareness about why LÄRABAR is the perfect fit for those who live a healthy lifestyle.

This monthly magazine targets women. It creates content featuring fashion, beauty, health, wellness and lifestyle. Additionally, it’s known that this magazine is popular amongst college women, a group that most certianly falls into the target market.

Similarly to Women’s Health, Men’s health is a guide to fitness, health, workouts, nutrition and health. Men who read this magazine are health- conscious inviduals, so this magazine is perfect fit to accomplish LÄRABAR’s brand awareness.

circulation: 16,335,000 women

circulation: 14,087,000 women

circulation: 21,000,000 men

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..

SOCIAL MEDIALÄRABAR’s advertising will utilize social media platforms. Since the targetmarket is heavily involved with technology and are always up to date with the newest trends, social media is the ideal place to target LÄRABAR’s ads.Specifically, to catch the eyes of the consumer, LÄRABAR will operate on Instagram and Facebook – with either posts, stories, or both. It’s evident that Instagram and Facebook use cookies to target ads directly at the consumer. The agency plans to achieve this throughout the LÄRABAR campaign.

The agency will launch both image and video ads on Facebook, including sponsored advertisements that will lead consumers to learn more about products. These ads will be displayed every other week and will run throughout the course of the year.

SOCIAL MEDIA

It’s evident that millenials scroll through Instagram all day long. The agency will use various square and iphone length photos to advertise LÄRABAR. The ad displayed on the left will be the first of many to come . This ad launches the #realeasyenergy campaign and invites consumers to engage around the world. The ads will run on days weeks coinciding with Facebook.

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.

display ads

An enterntainment and social news company, Buzzfeed allows companies to publish and sponsor content on their site. This creates a unique platform for LÄRABAR to advertise because it’s a very popular source for 18-24 year old millenials. It’s a proven fact that these young adults spend their free time browsing on Buzzfeed. And with a click through rate of 10-20 times higher than the average bannder ad, Buzzfeed is a great source for promotion.

Pandora is a free Internet Radio that is popular among any students and young adults. They tend to use this music source while studying, hanging out with friends, working or even excercising at the gym. LÄRABAR intends to advertise in between songs (on commerical breaks), effectively reaching the target market who would be listening to music. Images of ads previously created will be used. Only 6% of people pay for an ad free subscription, meaning over 90% of Pandora listeners will be exposed to LÄRABAR’s ads.

streaming ads

Youtube is becoming an increasingly popular platform for people aged 18-25, which just so happens to fall into LÄRABAR’s target market. The agency will have a seven second commerical shown before videos that are being watched by people in the target market. This includes interests such as: healthy recipes, fitness, vegan, balance, lifestyle, food and living.

With over 33 million users, Hulu has the largest streaming library in the industry. Many college and graduate students don’t have time to watch episodes of TV when they first air, so they turn to hulu to catch up on their favorite shows. Additionally, it’s a known fact that people like to snack while watching TV, so why not grab a LÄRABAR and catch up on your favorite show? LÄRABAR’s ads will run for seven seconds during advertisements, the same as Youtube.

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PUBLIC RELATIONSSTRATEGY

strategy events

+influencers

PR strategy

Events and media traffic (including the online campaign: #realeasyenergy will be monitored closely because they are vital to the promotion / awareness of the brand, LÄRABAR. The events, which will feature inlfluencers, are very important because they will create buzz around the product. Additionally, social media contests will more spread awareness to the active 18-24 year old consumers that LÄRABAR is after.

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influencer events LÄRABAR will hold events for influencers (a person with a large following, who has the ability to influence potential buyers of a product / service by promoting on social media). Bloggers from health and beauty industries (people who promote food products, vegan hippies, active men and women) as well as employees from Women’s Health, Men’s Health, Cosmopolitian and Buzzfeed will be invited to try samples of LÄRABAR, with the purpose of promotion. Since LÄRABAR’S consumers are active, these events won’t be held in local offices; rather, they will be in a park, a gym, a yoga studio, etc. Any attendee will receieve a gift bag with tons of LÄRABARS, stickers, and other swag to encourage advertising on individual or company’s various social media pages.

social media campaignConsumers are asked to send pictures of LÄRABARS in any situation (eating one, seeing someone eat one, a staged photo of the bar, etc.) on Instagram with the caption #realeasyenergy. Consumers are encouraged to send pictures in various places that they eat LÄRABARS (in the car, on a walk, going to yoga, etc. Consumers will be entered to win a coupon on their next LÄRABAR purchase, as well as some great free swag.

evaluation

end of the bookworks cited

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IN SUMMARY, the team will...

- TRACK CLICKS ON ONLINE ADVERTISEMENTS (INSTAGRAM, FACEBOOK, YOUTUBE, HULU, BUZZFEED, + PANDORDA)

-Keep track of the interaction on social media

-pre and post testing surveys with the consumer, to see how they feel about the brand and their products

- meausre if the new slogan is recognized through surveys on social media

- measure the likes, shares and how many users participated in the online campaign

works cited 38 39

http://www.businessinsider.com/millennials-buy-food-stores-on-line-2017-9

https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20171006005349/en/Top-3-Trends-Impacting-Snack-Bars-Market

https://www.larabar.com

www.nielsen.com/us/en/insights/news/2017/millennials-on-millenni-als-a-look-at-viewing-behavior-distraction-social-media-stars.html

http://sciencemeetsfood.org/current-food-trends-rescued-snack-bar/

http://snapshot.numerator.com/brand/larabar

https://www.statista.com/statistics/189603/top-cereal-and-snack-bar-brands-in-the-united-states/

www.supermarketnews.com/consumer-trends/millennials-looking-clean-er-labels-snacks.

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