Kironmoy Datta, senior brand manager for Novartis Consumer Health, which manufactures Buckley's, says it continues to build on the two-decades-old campaign of "It tastes awful. And it works."

This spring it launched Vanilla Mint Listerine, the seventh different flavor to reach the market since it first branched out from its original, um, recipe in the early 1990s. The others are FreshBurst, Cool Mint, Fluoride, Natural Citrus, and Advanced with Tartar Control.

"We've been launching products that have a less intense flavor," says Tanya Willer, brand manager for Listerine. "There are a number of consumers who previously haven't used Listerine because its intensity hasn't appealed to them."

The latest offering from the company is a "whitening pre-brush treatment." Unlike its sister products, which kill germs that cause gingivitis and plaque, this one contains hydrogen peroxide to help whiten teeth. It's a rinse designed to complement regular oral care routines.

"We launched it in response to the fact that consumers want whiter teeth," Willer says. "About 75 percent of them [feel that way] but only 20 percent of them will take the steps to do so," she adds, noting some of the hurdles for pursuing pearlier whites include the expense and the time commitment required.

She disputes any suggestion that Listerine is abandoning what made it famous and successful in the first place—the bad taste.

"Our trademark hasn't been the taste," she counters. "It's been about Listerine's therapeutic quality and the fact we kill germs that cause plaque, gingivitis, and bad breath. The fact that our flavor extensions over the last 15 years have been so successful means that we aren't pigeonholed into that original flavor. We've been able to successfully move beyond it."

That being said, the original flavor, which had been designed to be a disinfectant for surgical procedures, remains its third-best seller.

"We have a very loyal set of consumers who continue to use it," she says. "It's one of our strongest flavors. Even when a new product is introduced, those customers would never switch."

She adds that Listerine's message has evolved over the years from one focused on eradicating halitosis to one of overall oral care.

"All mouthwashes, at a minimum, need to fight bad breath," she says. "The thing that sets Listerine apart is the therapeutic benefit in killing germs. Fighting bad breath should be a given. If a mouthwash can't do that, it shouldn't even be in the game. A lot of people understand there are certain mouthwashes that will mask your bad breath. But it will come back unless you kill the germs that caused it."

Willer says Listerine has successfully launched a number of other oral products, including Listerine PocketPaks and Listerine PocketMist. The former, a dissolving breath strip, was introduced in 2000, while the latter, a breath spray, hit the market last year.

She says non-mouthwash products aren't too much of a stretch in consumers' eyes (and mouths). "They expect products that are in the oral care area from Listerine—a good-quality product, something that is efficacious and is going to clean their mouths."

Evolution of Flavor
Rob Warren, director of the Asper Centre for Entrepreneurship at the University of Manitoba in Winnipeg, Canada, says the challenge facing orally administered products today is that the majority of consumers aren't interested in something that tastes horrible.

"We expect more," he says. "With the different formulations available, we think you can find ways to make the product a more pleasant experience."

Warren says Listerine is simply following the lead of dentists everywhere who have been trying for years to make visits to their chairs as enjoyable as possible. "Dentists are saying they're taking the pain out of visits. Listerine should be thinking, 'We should be doing something similar because we're part of the same process.' "

Buckley's, meanwhile, is playing the humor card in marketing its product while simultaneously tapping into the characteristics of historical cold and cough remedies, which never tasted good.

"It's a point of differentiation for them," Warren says. "It's a medical product, and medicine isn't supposed to taste like an orange drink. It's supposed to taste bad to kill the nasty virus in the back of your throat."

Despite Buckley's success throughout the years, Warren isn't sure it will be able to sustain its bad-tasting strategy. "I think eventually they'll have to change," he says. "The market today is really shifting—people just don't want anything unpleasant in their mouths. In 20 or 30 years, their [current] market will be gone. They'd want to start switching [to a better-tasting flavor] or they'll have nobody coming up [to replace the current market]."

And if that market disappears, the medicine required to remedy the situation will need more than a spoonful of sugar to work.     

[11-Dec-2006]