Slim.Fast Re-launch

Background

The Slim.Fast range contains a selection of calorie controlled weight loss products. Historically, this has consisted of the infamous shake complemented by meal and snack bars. However, the new Slim.Fast range now consists of tasty smoothies, wet soups, fruit bars and packet snacks all of which are delicious and nutritious. Soup was to be the focus of this campaign, whose objectives were: to generate mass reappraisal of the brand; to stimulate trial of the soup and purchase; and to drive traffic to the website to find out more about the Slim.Fast plan.

Idea

The new brand positioning is based around the insight that most diets are deprivational. The beauty of Slim.Fast is that slimmers have the freedom to snack up to six times a day from a selection of snacks and still lose weight. In order to differentiate themselves in this marketplace, Slim.Fast’s strategy was to own the territory of ‘pleasurable weightloss’. This led to the core brand proposition that you can slim happy with Slim.Fast, and the creative employs a playful and light-hearted tone across all communications. The central direct element of the campaign is the ‘Happy 365 diary’, which is full of quirky dietary tips, interesting facts and humorous anecdotes. It also features discreet references to Slim.Fast products and money-off coupons to raise awareness of the new range and drive purchase throughout the year.

The Happy 365 diary was promoted via numerous channels. The most loyal customers were mailed a copy of the diary as well as details of the merits of the new vegetable soup. Previous responders who had not engaged with the brand for a while were mailed a sample of the soup or a coupon to stimulate trial and invited to visit the website to claim a free copy of the diary. The campaign included a heavy online element, with interactive games on instant messenger, sponsored editorial content and threads for slimming discussion boards. Samples and leaflets were distributed to mothers via the National Day Nursery Association and in-store starter packs were made available at a reduced price from Tesco.

Results

The campaign has only recently gone live but initial results have been astounding. In the first week, website visitors rose from a weekly average of 15,000 to 63,000. Coupon redemption is currently at 11%. All 5,000 diaries available on the website were redeemed within two days of the launch of the campaign.

Target Audience

The primary audience for this campaign are busy women who juggle work and family commitments. These women are generally healthy despite the lack of exercise and being somewhat overweight. They struggle to stick to diets because their life is full of food: planning, buying and preparing food for others.

Size

50,000 diary mailings, 105,000 soup sample mailings and 365,000 coupon mailings. Online broadcast media including banners, skyscrapers and MPUs on Yahoo, MSN, The Sun, AOL, NTL World. Editorial content, discussion board threads and the interactive Slim Happy game were placed on portals such as handbag.com and yahoo. 212,000 samples and leaflets were distributed via National Day Nurseries Association and 72,000 bespoke starter packs were made available at a reduced price from Tesco.

Our Thoughts

The art direction of this pack is fun, lively and warm. Good values for a brand like Slim.Fast, we would have thought. So perhaps the client should let the agency art director have a look at their product packaging. The free soup the mailer includes comes in a squidgy vacuum packed carton that makes its contents seem a little serious and unappetising.