Colgate

Colgate

  • Submitted By: hsichun
  • Date Submitted: 11/18/2008 11:38 PM
  • Category: Business
  • Words: 942
  • Page: 4
  • Views: 1

Brand segment I think there are three segments in the toothbrush category: value, professional and super-premium. As being a new innovative and technical toothbrush, Colgate Precision should count into super-premium segment, because Precision has superiority technology over the other toothbrushes already on the market. Also, there are already two toothbrush products in the Colgate company, Colgate Classical and Plus, where belonging to each value and professional segment. Colgate Precision should not have a direct conflict with these two segments. That is, in order to prevent cannibalization, Colgate Precision should be far away Colgate Plus. In addition, in the super-premium segment there is only one dominant competitor, Oral-B, which only focuses on super-premium toothbrush and creates a remarkable unit and dollar market share (Exhibit 1). Nevertheless, many other competitors such as Procter & gamble and Smithkline Beecham are the new entrants in the segment. Therefore, Colgate can use its advantage of experiences about the other two segments to compete with the real competitor, Oral-B. In this way, it will save not only cost but also time to get into a new segment. Brand positioning As being a top-of-the range, super-premium product, Precision can be positioned as two ways: niche or mainstream positioning. In the Exhibit 2, we can see therapeutic brushers accounting for 46% of adult which is the biggest segment in the toothbrush users. So, if Colgate positions Precision as a niche product concerning with gum disease and removing plaque, it can be expected to capture 3% of the U.S. toothbrush market (which stands for 13MM units toothbrushes) by the end of the first year following its launch. On the other hand, if Colgate positions Precision as a mainstream product, it could be capture 10% of the market by the end of the first year. Due to the market share, it is obvious that mainstream product would be more profitable than niche product. But being a...

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