28 Feb 2008


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Danone Actimel

Danone Actimel

Yogurts and Desserts

Soft Drinks

Top 100 Grocery Brands

Source : Checkout Nielsen Top 100 Grocery Brands
Position: 55
Actimel, Danone's drinking yogurt brand, remained stable in 2007 but it dropped from 47th position to 55 in the Top 100 Grocery Brands league.

The trend suggests buyers are looking beyond products that have been marketed primarily as being good for you. The pro-biotic element of this product is well known, as has the 'good bacteria' tag line used in much of the advertising.

Danone marketing manager James King thinks the product is not so established in consumers' buying habits because it is still a relatively new category.

He suggests the functional food market is growing, with a wider range of people willing to try products associated with it. “We have to remember that we're selling food primarily. If they don't enjoy the product they're less likely to buy it again, so we need a number of factors to create interest in the first place, provided it's not way more expensive and it tastes great.”

Danone revised its website last year “to give people somewhere to go” to get information on its yogurt brands, and to help this along invited them to participate in an online vote for an Actimel flavour they'd most like to see introduced. Some 12,500 votes later and vanilla received the thumbs up.

“We've just launched vanilla, and it appears to be popular in the tastings we've done,” says King. “We're looking at keeping the range fresh later in the year with other flavours, and supporting the brand with significant media investment.”

2007 £106.4m
2006 £106.8m
yoy change =

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