Brief Explanation

-Communicate Kent’s brand identity of “Modern, Stylish, and Innovative”. -Shake up people’s perception of GWP as “yet another standard novelty item”. -Create a novelty item appealing to Kent users: manly business person in their 30’s and 40’s. -Increase purchasing appetite by offering a truly unique innovative novelty gift (GWP).

The Brief

Tobacco sales in the Japan Duty Free retail environment is extremely challenging and novelty gift promotions are often used to attract highly value-conscious consumers. This promotion tactic has become so commonplace amongst manufacturers that its impact and appeal for both consumers and retailers alike has diminished. Therefore, our challenge was to develop a cutting-edge novelty item that would maximize the sales promotion potential, retailer negotiations and effective KENT brand appeal.

How the final design was conceived

Target consumers of KENT display a preference for digital/electronic gadgets. In order to shake up their perception of “yet another novelty item, and to stimulate to their intellectual curiosity, we teamed up with a product designer, Hironao Tsuboi to create a truly innovative portable speaker from scratch which manifests the brand identity of “Modern, Stylish, and Innovative”. This speaker has no buttons. Users turn on/off the speaker and adjust the volume by plugging the [VOL] and turning the knob. A truly unique portable-speaker nobody has ever experienced.

Indication of how successful the outcome was in the market

In a month from the promotion launch, we achieved a 140% increase in sales volume against same period from last year. This success is expected to translate into a 1.4% share of market increase for the KENT brand, propelling the client’s overall share of market among domestic airports to approximately 15%.