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February 2007 - Strategy Magazine
Who to watch

Rebranding
Rescue mission: In a race against time, Kruger's Nancy Marcus managed to successfully rebrand five strong properties before losing trademark rights

by Annette Bourdeau
page 19

It's not everyday that a brand has to differentiate itself from itself. But that's exactly the conundrum faced by Nancy Marcus, VP marketing at Scott Paper. When parent company, Montreal-based Kruger Products, bought Scott Paper from Dallas-based Kimberly-Clark in 1997, the agreement of sale only included use of the Scott Paper name and its associated brands like Cottonelle and ScotTowels until June 2007. So, while the company had scored some market-leading brands at the time, it faced the daunting task of being forced to rebrand within the next decade.

That's where Marcus came in. Kruger approached her in 2001 with its unusual marketing dilemma. "[They said] 'Nancy, we've got five brand transitions and one company name transition in the next few years,'" she recalls. Always up for a challenge, Marcus left her post as VP marketing at tobacco co, Toronto-based RJR Macdonald, to lead the complete brand overhauls. Her first big challenge was to get the right agencies on board. After poring through material from the 80+ agencies that submitted proposals, Marcus settled on Toronto-based John St. for English Canada, and Montreal's PALM Arnold for the Quebec market.

Faced with multiple brands to relaunch, Marcus decided to tackle Cottonelle first. "It's one of the jewels," she says of the brand, which was the number-one-selling bathroom tissue at the time. "We wanted to do a slow evolution." She took a cautious, three-phase approach to the transition, beginning with a 2004 campaign announcing the brand was changing its name to Cashmere, followed by the name change itself in 2005. Finally, in 2006, they took the name "Cottonelle" off the packaging altogether.

Marcus focused on tying Cashmere to fashion as a key differentiation point. In 2004, she and PR agency, Toronto-based Strategic Objectives, launched a Cashmere-sponsored fashion show featuring cashmere garments by prominent Canadian designers like David Dixon and Paul Hardy. At the same time, she launched an online contest to win a white cashmere pashmina, supported by POS and on-package messaging. "We were quite astounded by consumers' reaction to [the contest]," recalls Marcus, adding that they extended the pashmina giveaway to incorporate a grand prize trip to New York City. "The response tripled expectations."

And, an effort last fall involving design students surpassed the results of the pro designers' show. This time around, there was one key difference - instead of cashmere, competitors had to craft their creations out of Cashmere toilet paper. The gimmick landed tons of press for Cashmere by outlets like Citytv and Elle Canada. The two student fashion shows - one in Toronto, one in Montreal - scored coverage as far away as Europe. "It was fascinating that [the media coverage] did grow over the last year with the [professional] designers," Marcus says, adding that the competition "absolutely delivered" from an ROI perspective. "It exceeded our expectations."

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