Vegemite: Marketing and Product

A definition of brand as Muzellec and lambkin (2005) cited from the American Association of Marketing, could be “a name, term, symbol, design or a combination of them intended to identify goods or services of one seller or a group of sellers and to differentiate them from those of competitors”. After 1922 when the initial product “vegemite” was invented and had to be positioned at the Australian Market through different kinds of commercials for television, radio, contests, a new challenge appeared for the Kraft Foods Inc. Company. Although the product was very popular in Australia, in the mid-2000s a change in the local society happened and many immigrants showed up. Vegemite was a product with strong taste and not so successful to people that was not grown up with Australian traditions. This was one of the main reasons for the company to produce another brand as successful as the initial product but milder and also for more uses than only in breakfast. The new product was produced and ready to find its position in the market but first had to be named. At the same time when the product was reaching the market, a naming contest was running as a marketing strategy. People had to suggest a name through a website that company had designed. After the contest was finished, marketing department had to pick up a name from all the suggested ones. At that time, marketing team was considering about another phenomenon of that time, the generation Y. According to Broadbridge et al. (2007) and Cui et al. (2003) generation Y are the people who have been born between 1977 and 1994 and referred as the internet generation which are very familiar with the digital technologies. This was the main reason for naming the new product as “isnack 2.0”. Knäpper (2008) defines that “i” was used to symbolize the internet but it widely used from Apple Company as a marketing strategy for their products beginning from “imac” till nowadays with “iphone” and “ipad”. The “2.0” came from the term “web