Selection of New Creative Advertisement for Mountain Dew

Problem Statement: Selection of new creative advertisement for Mountain Dew

Diagnosis:

 Mountain Dew is a carbonated soft drink under PepsiCo brand

Pepsi and Mountain Dew were the number 2 and 3 soft drinks in US.

 PepsiCo had given the advertising contract to BBDO, New York.

 "Do the Dew" campaign of Mountain Dew was entering its 8th year, and the company wants come up with a new ad for which BBDO was given the responsibility.

 A right ad was to be chosen to maximize the impact of Mountain Dew's relatively small media budget.

Carbonated Soft Drinks market

The Carbonated Soft Drink (CSD) market in US had been dominated by Coke and Pepsi. During 1960's and 1970's Pepsi and Coke attacked each other directly with taste tests and advertisements which is termed as cola wars. The CSD market had boomed during 1970's and 1980's as people moved away from coffee to soft drinks as a source of caffeine. The major national brands of CSD was controlled by the following 3 companies

1. Coca-Cola company - Coke, Diet Coke, sprite

2. PepsiCo - Pepsi, Diet Pepsi, Mountain Dew

3. Cadbury-Schweppes -Dr Pepper , 7-UP

To diffuse into the CSD category the company were constantly using the 4P's- product, promotion, packaging and pricing innovation.

Innovation in the CSD category: 20 ounce bottle at $0.99

Competition in CSD market:

The companies were in fierce competition with each other and launched products to counter the other parties. The examples are as follows;

1. Pepsi launched lemon-lime Slice against Sprite

2. Coca-Cola launched Mr.Pibb against Dr. Pepper

3. Coca-Cola pitched Mellow yellow and Surge against Mountain Dew

In 1990's the growth of colas had slowed down and the "flavour" CSD's like Sprite, Mountain Dew and dr. pepper had a good growth. There was also an overall slowdown of CSD as a whole, around this time the non-carbonated drinks have come into market and acted as substitutes.