Salami Slicing

Brand Growth: More Is Rarely More

Increasingly, the pressure is on brand marketeers and the businesses they serve to do more to drive growth with ever tightening budgets. When brands are being challenged from many different quarters, be it own label challengers or agile, ‘edgy’ brands, the endless temptations of “new is better, old is dead”, and lubricated by a soup of increasingly capricious consumers, you can understand why. ‘Spare’ investment to test and learn, with the acceptance that elements could likely fail, feels like a luxury from a bygone era.

This can lead to the poorly informed seeking ‘new news’ and worshipping at the alters of false marketing Gods. Tempted by the lurid snake oil charms of the next best thing, much activity intended to build brands and enhance company value, often has the opposite effect. In the rush to do more, with less, it’s wise to pause and consider if there are more effective alternatives for growth. Here are a few growth alternatives to counter ‘the usual suspects’:

Issue 1: ‘salami slicing’ your brand’s product quality.
At a time when the cost of goods and taxes have risen so sharply and beyond any sensible forecast, it’s only natural that attention turns to how these costs can be reduced. But when it comes to changes in product quality, a snip here and there, perhaps imperceptible in the short term, or invisible inside the business, will be noticed by those outside, if not immediately, then soon. Remember that consumers migrating away from your brand is likely to be imperceptible in the short term, but very noticeable not long after – and difficult to stop by that point.

Growth Alternative…
Understand what your product truth is and relentlessly protect and amplify it. Great brands are built from undeniable, defensible and owned product truths, often a key foundation of what makes your brand distinctive. Once you know this, you can look for cost savings that support your brand, e.g. cheaper, more sustainable packaging or actually you may find you can add cost because the value exchange reinforces the very thing that consumers buy your brand for.

Issue 2: Fight on more fronts. Win more victories.
It’s easy to slip into a ‘more is more’ attitude without realising it, or believing that in today’s tech-enabled world (a) we can manage this and (b) we can manage this effectively. And initially it can feel energising…. new frontiers for brand growth? Whoopee! Wrong. Not only will you drive yourself burn out, it’s unlikely, unless you really do have considerable, sustained, investment, that all this new stuff will even be noticed. Media fragmentation doesn’t mean personalisation. It means more opportunities to be missed. New messaging on the brand doesn’t mean ‘new news’ and excitement, it means dissonance for your consumer versus what they love you for. Tech doesn’t drive enablement and efficiently. It drives endless filler that fills up the working day with low value-add.

Growth Alternatives…
(i) Decide what not to do.
Virtually everyone, and certainly most organisations collectively, have eyes bigger than their stomachs. Stop prioritising from a long list; instead sacrifice to get a short list. If you’re building a brand, repeatable, scalable consistency is a win-win, so it pays to remember the power of refreshed repetition.

(ii) Don’t get bored with your positioning.
As humans we only have so much mental processing capacity and brain space to consider things. If you’re of the opinion that someone will consider your brand more important, or for longer, than their family, friends, job, or dog, then bon chance and viel glück. Find out what people love about you and then reinforce and leverage the hell out of it. Resist endlessly extending the agenda.

Issue 3: Following in the competitor furrow rather than ploughing it yourself.
When the competitor grass looks greener it can be oh-so tempting to try to mimic your way to success. But who wants more of the same when they’re already happy with what they’ve got? In truth if you closely align to your competition, you are more likely to fall into their shadow even more.

Growth Alternative…
Remember the Magnet and the Mirror.
Step back and confront some hard realities. Knowing what elements of your category you may need to ‘mirror’ for reassurance, and what elements of your brand are your leadership ‘Magnets’ will prevent you from being pulled in different directions.

Rigourous diagnosis, born from well-specified consumer research. Simplicity of focus when developing activity. Fighting on just a few fronts that matter to consumer and brand, sacrificing the others. Scaling with as much effort as you can muster, year in year out. That’s the alternative growth prognosis we recommend this year.

Gael Laurie is Brand Building Director of The Crow Flies, a research, strategy and innovation company that helps brands find a direct route to long lasting success. gael@thecrowflies.co.uk; +44 (0) 1889 725670 or +44 (0) 7885 408367; www.thecrowflies.co.uk; @crowflieshigh. © The Crow Flies, 2025

Don’t Slice Your Salami

I heard the expression ‘salami slicing’ a few years ago by someone describing the effect of small cost cutting steps on a product’s cost of goods, one then another, again and again, over a long period of time. Individually consumers didn’t notice, and research response was broadly neutral, so internally they got approved… again and again. But, fast forward a few years; now consumers have noticed the aggregate effect and have been slowly drifting away. And now, the stark reality of a poor product spiralling irreversibly downwards is a much bigger challenge.

Reflecting on this experience, it seems the lesson is more relevant than ever today. Brands are being battered on two sides; on the one hand, consumers prioritising value and price and switching to own label brands and discounter offerings; on the other, soaring cost of goods that aren’t easily passed on to consumers.

And time and again in our research, we’re seeing consumers increasingly suspicious of manufacturers and retailers, expecting them to cut product quality, or offer less, to make cost savings. They recognise it, but they’re certainly not happy about it

As a brand owner, what to do then? Faced with short term pressures to find ways to cut costs and continue to grow a brand, how can a marketeer achieve not undermine long-term brand strengthening and with it, a sustainable, profitable growth? Here’s what we’ve learnt through our research:

It may come as a surprise, but consumers are open to change on some product areas, so long as they don’t compromise its performance. Of all the Marketing ‘P’s’ – packaging materials and formats (Product ‘P’) are one that if done right can open up new usage occasions, new distribution outlets and even new audiences as well as providing an opportunity to improve a product’s carbon footprint at the same time.
Packaging design, whilst rarely the white knight in shining armour we’d like it to be, in combination with clever pack format changes, on-position refreshed design can really enhance brand perceptions
There are areas where you should never compromise – and most certainly Positioning. Ensure you are crystal clear what your brand stands for in consumers’ minds and what makes it distinctive from its’ competitors – this should be where your guardrails go up and the investment in dramatizing the positioning (communications for example) protected.
Don’t be tempted to grow your brand by product category stretch – this is a big risk with questionable returns and could easily result in ‘salami slicing’ your resource, your focus, and your product, sacrificing the core of what your brand stands for bit by bit, slice by slice.

If you’re looking for more insight in diagnosing how your brand is seen today, what the options are for the future and then what to do, do get in touch. We’ll help you resist the temptation to slice the salami ever thinner.

Gael Laurie is Brand Building Director at The Crow Flies, a research, brand strategy and innovation company that helps brands find a direct route to long lasting success. gael@thecrowflies.co.uk; +44 (0) 1889 725670; www.thecrowflies.co.uk; @crowflieshigh.

Fish where the fish aren’t

Part 2 of our series on innovation. Part 1 here.

There are all sorts of stories about innovation “eureka” moments. That flash of bath time inspiration which led to the inventor re-mortgaging their house to fund the wonder product. Or the entrepreneurs scouring the supermarket aisles looking for tired or dominated categories to disrupt. Stories like this lead the narrative but are incredibly rare and only the successes get recalled. More often, sadly, re-mortgaging the house leads to moving back in with mum and dad.

And it doesn’t reflect the situation that most marketeers face – corporate cultures; byzantine approval processes; complex supply chains; retailers demanding ‘one out, one in’; sales teams wanting to be ‘wowed’; fractional differences in product masquerading as ‘game-changers’ allowing competitors to copy fast.

The question is therefore: where do you look to innovate to increase your chances of success?

Here are five thought starters to consider when framing up projects and shaping the challenges:

Frame your start point
Starting with your consumer base, it’s possible to draw up a robust picture of the market opportunities that are ripe for some new thinking and creativity. Start by defining the territory. What’s important to consumers in your category? What are the big needs that people want fulfilled? What are the over-arching attitudes to the category? What are the ‘rules’ or accepted practises that be challenged or twisted? Which brands already ‘own’ needs? Should we tackle them head on or out-flank them in some way? Disruption comes from understanding the order. Creativity from understanding the constraints.

Framing your start point and clearly mapping the terrain gives you the space to innovate in not just in one campaign, but again and again – the base from which to build a meaningful pipeline of new products or services.

…but be happy to go off-piste a bit too
When you understand the shape of the market, you understand when you’re taking a flyer too. There’s no harm in investigating what may turn out to be cul-de-sacs. By exploring the odd snickets and ginnels of consumer need and desire, you may find a new path to the prize; indeed, you may find a whole new area of opportunity. But stay in control too – you can spend a lot of time with the metaphorical machete cutting through the undergrowth of possibility, only to quickly wear yourself out and lose the alignment and focus of the group.

Improving lives not stealing share
This might sound like it’s stating the obvious but really – really – start with your consumer. Don’t start with your issues. Don’t start with your target. Be mindful of course of your company needs, personal aims and ambitious goals, but if you start from there, you’ll pursue categories that are big and competitive today rather than those that can be big tomorrow and where you can lead not follow. But more than this, if you start with the question of ‘how can I make my customer’s life a little bit better?’ you’re much more likely to come up with ideas that work for them and you. And it is about improving lives: however small, however insignificant you may think it is – that’s your role as brand steward and that’s your responsibility to the category too – to seek ways to expand consumption in meaningful ways, not just slicing the salami ever thinner.

Needs, desires and problems to solve
There’s a whole marketing narrative around digging deeper for insights. Asking ‘why?’ 5 times…and then ending up with an ‘insight’ that is often unusable. There’s a need for balance here. Yes, be curious and ever watchful about why people behave the way they do around our products and why they hold the attitudes they do. But don’t miss the obvious. Don’t miss the opportunities masquerading as itsy-bitsy usage patterns that can drive significant commercial growth. Why isn’t it resealable when the product goes dry? Why aren’t there enough in the pack for two servings each? How do we make it lighter? How we can improve the spout so it pours better? How can we improve the closure so people don’t crack a nail when opening it? How can we show more easily that the product is ready to serve?

Budweiser changed the best before date from a ‘use by’ date (= old) to a ‘born on’ date (= fresh), knowing that beer drinkers want to drink beer as fresh as possible. No change to the packaging other than some letters on the date code. But with some serious investment in consumer comms, brand equity was grown and consumers knew what to look for to check how fresh their beer was.

Finding the trend transitions
It’s human nature to get excited about some fancy name given to three spots of some weird behaviour in Boulder, Colorado. It’s altogether different to identify a pattern of behaviour linking people in Bathgate, Bournemouth, Ballymena and Brecon. And even harder to calculate whether it’s a trend that hasn’t been exploited yet and is going to have consumer traction going forwards. But that’s what you’re after, the transitions from something that’s emerging to something that’s mainstreaming. To fish where the fish aren’t now but will be tomorrow.

David Preston is founder of The Crow Flies, a research, strategy and innovation company that helps brands find a direct route to long lasting success. david@thecrowflies.co.uk; +44 (0) 1889 725670; www.thecrowflies.co.uk; @crowflieshigh.