Sweet Success Enterprises Inc. Branding and Marketing Overview
San Antonio-based Sweet Success Enterprises Inc. acquired Nestlé's original Sweet Success™ brand in 2002 and has re-launched a product line to tap into the rapidly growing demand for convenient and nutritious functional beverages. Its line of Fuel for Health™ all-natural beverages is available in a growing number of stores and includes select ingredients to boost energy and immunity and enhance a healthy lifestyle. (See www.sweetsuccess.com/products for more information on the products and to order online.)
Sweet Success Enterprises is leveraging a strong brand name that has vast appeal among health-conscious Americans. It is focusing on evolving trends with value-added all-natural functional drinks packed under familiar labels. It's using brand power to squeeze out a strong position in the most rapidly growing segments of the beverage market.
Sweet Success™ is poised to take a dominant role in the explosive "good for you" beverage segment as other producers continue working on brand awareness or breaking away from an unhealthy brand image. While Sweet Success is best known as Nestlé’s meal replacement product line, it's also a line of products that has always been and will continue to be marketed to consumers looking for a healthy advantage. That is this company's edge.
People are demanding more than just refreshment and great taste. They want their drinks to do it all - to help them prevent disease, protect their bones or give them a boost of energy. The News and Observer June 2, 2005.
"Beverages are a natural delivery system ... Down the road, we're going to see an avalanche of beverages with functional ingredients," John Sicher, publisher of Beverage Digest, said in the same article.
Brand Development
Nestle USA launched the Sweet Success line in 1993. It spent more than $170 million building brand awareness and captured 18 percent of the meal replacement market, second only to Slim-Fast. The brand averaged over $43 million in annual net revenue between 1997 and 2000. It was in grocers, mass merchants and pharmacies nationwide. The best tasting products in the segment, consumers said.
Sweet Success Enterprises bought the brand and all properties associated with it in late 2002. The company has put together a flexible and dynamic team of the industry's top professionals. There's a leading expert on cutting-edge nutritionals. There's a founder and/or senior officer for four successful NASDAQ National Market companies.
In 2005, the company signed two-time NFL Pro Bowl player Jeremy Shockey (tight end for the New York Giants) to promote its upcoming energy, stamina and strength enhancing drinks. It also has a multi-year promotion and licensing agreement with reality television producer Mark Burnett that anticipates prominent product placement and integration into his hit network shows like "The Apprentice" with Donald Trump.
In August 2006 Sweet Success appointed R. Glenn Williamson as president and COO. It was announced that Mr. Williamson, who was founder or senior officer of four NASDAQ National Market companies, would assume responsibilities for the day-to-day operations of Sweet Success as it expands the sales and distribution of its line of all-natural beverages. In September 2006, Mike Launer was appointed Senior Vice President of Sales to lead the company’s sales efforts. Later that same month, Dr Chandrasekhara Mallangi, who developed the original Sweet Success shakes while at Nestle, was named the company’s Chief Scientist. Dr Mallangi has more than 35 years experience developing beverage lines including dairy-based drinks, fruit and vegetable juices and a variety of innovative healthy-lifestyle products.
In October 2000, to kick off its national launch the Company shipped its Power Blend all-natural energy drink to GNC, the largest global specialty retailer of nutritional supplements, for sale in stores nationwide . Power Blend is to be available at approximately 2500 GNC stores for the Holiday Season.
Market Evolution
Sweet Success™ is well positioned to meet the current demands of consumers and to deliver practical and delicious products for today's evolving lifestyles. Many of the same people who were buying Sweet Success™ meal replacement shakes five years ago are now part of the drive for multifunctional, good-for-you beverages. Today's mass market is less concerned with being thin and more committed than ever to feeling and being well.
Mark Dollins, a PepsiCo spokesman, said existing company products that were fine-tuned and marketed as "good for you" represented 40 percent of PepsiCo's North American volume last year, up 2 percentage points from the previous year. "It's a growing piece of our product portfolio," he said. The Philadelphia Inquirer June 1, 2004.
Other major brands are catching on and trying to increase relevance to modern consumers. New product labeling requirements and the FDA's revised nutrition pyramid is fueling the shift. Coca-Cola bought the Odwalla™ beverage line to expand its product base in an attempt to meet the demand. Dr. Pepper/7 Up launched 7 Up-Plus™ containing "real" fruit juice and fortified with calcium. McDonald's introduced a large line of salad products to its menu. According to an August 2003 Albany Times Union article, PepsiCo CEO Steve Reinemund said his company's growth strategy includes 50 percent of their new products being nutritious in some form and fitting into a health and wellness initiative.
"Pepsi is looking at and will be testing beverages we've never heard of. Think dairy. Think grain. Think fiber," John Sicher, editor of Beverage Digest, told Forbes Magazine in January 2003.
"The $64 billion soft-drink industry's healthier trend is being driven by a loss of sales share by its flagship fizzy drinks to juice and water options." USA Today Aug. 15, 2004.
In 2004, according to Nielsen figures, mainstream beverage product lines from Coca-Cola, Pepsi, Cadbury/Schweppes and major retail store brands lost .7 percent market share (to 87.4 percent share) while other categories like functional, nutritious and "good for you" (Red Bull, Odwalla, Arizona, Hansen's) grew 16.4 percent. The "new age" group of beverages grew 14.2 percent in 2002, according to Beverage World Magazine.
Return to Market
The initial product line, test-launched in mid-2005, consisted of two varieties of all-natural nutritious beverages, Bavarian Chocolate Supreme and Creamy Vanilla Supreme, which are dairy-based and fortified with vitamins and minerals and enhanced with a proprietary blend of Aktivated Barley™, Ground Flax and Omega-3 Fatty Acids. Both have since been re-named Vita-Tein to emphasize their functionality as vitamin packed protein beverages.
The next product, introduced and test-marketed in early 2006, was a nutritional energy beverage, branded as Power Blend™. Power Blend™ contains a proprietary blend of Maca, Ginseng, D-ribose and Guarana for a natural energy boost.
In October 2006, the company introduced Chocolate Immunity Infusion™ a non-dairy, non-soy hypoallergenic shake for building the immune system, and ChocKoala Immunity Jr.™ a children’s version of the product.
In November 2006, the company produced Ultra Greens™, a juice based superfood with Chlorella, Spirulina and Barley Greens.
Slated for production is the company’s 7th innovative and delicious All-Natural Healthy-lifestyle beverage-- GlucaSafe™. Enhanced with the antioxidant powers of green-tea, white-tea and pomegranate and infused with Cinnulin PF ®, GlucaSafe is a functional juice for diabetics.
Growth
The healthy beverage market is estimated at $14 Billion. The segment has grown 19% compound annual growth since 1990, compared to 2.6 percent for the beverage category overall. According to a 2005 study by the Natural marketing Institute, 50% of consumers are looking to healthy foods and beverages for the energy they need.
Sweet Success products are currently offered through approximately 500 retail and chain stores throughout the U.S. Stores stocked include Price Chopper, Reasor’s, Piggly Wiggly, Country Mart, Wiseway’s, Homeland, Ramey’s and various convenience stores. The recent shipment to GNC will bring the total store count to over 3,000 retail outlets nationwide.
The Company’s business plan contemplates increased consumer sales through expansion of points of sale to include club stores, nutrition centers, health food outlets and other retail and distribution establishments nationally.
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