Oreo Part 2: Innovate in Your Sweet Spot

Sure it is just two chocolate disks with some sweetened lard in between, but we all know it’s more than just the sum of its parts.  There is something transcendent about Oreos.  A brand does not maintain a No. 1 position for 100 years without being able to connect with customers on an emotional level.  People are no longer content with simply consuming a product; they desire to be moved by it.

Oreo understands the importance of the customer experience.  For decades, their marketing campaigns have nurtured the idea of sharing- sharing a moment to connect with your Grandpa, your mother, your best friend, your pet.  But sharing is only one element of the experience, there is also the eating!  Rarely do you see someone simply remove an Oreo from the package and put it in their mouth.  Oreos are stacked, taken apart, licked, reconfigured, dunked in milk.  You don’t simply eat an Oreo…..you experience it.  If you think it is just a cookie you are mistaken.

Success has not stopped Oreo from innovating.  There is Post Oreo Cereal, Peanut Butter and Chocolate Crème Oreo, Chocolate Dipped Candy Cane Crème Oreo, Fudge Mint Covered Oreo, Double Stuf Oreo, Reduced Fat Oreo, and roughly 20 other innovative extensions.  In 2005 Nabisco introduced the Oreo Dunker elongated cookie.  Here was their insight: dunkers enjoy the experience of eating an Oreo more than non-dunkers.  The primary reason non-dunkers don’t dunk is fear of getting their fingers in the milk.  Nabisco created the Oreo Dunker specifically for this sanitary minded customer.  Oreo didn’t have to change the shape of their cookie, but they did.  Here is what they know that maybe you don’t.  If you are not relentlessly trying to create a memorable customer experience, chances are your product will soon be just a memory.

Next week Oreo Part 3: Leverage Authenticity

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