Started by a woman in a time when women didn't start companies. Governed for nineteen generations, not by a corporate policy, but by a family philosophy. Brewed naturally by master craftsmen the same way today as it has been for almost four hundred years. Passing on old traditions while making new ones, takes time.

That's the pitch that Kikkoman US is hoping will bring viewers and distributors to Make Haste Slowly: The Kikkoman Story — a 24-minute commissioned film on the Japanese brand's almost 400-year history — with the hopes it picked up by a TV network as a non-fiction program. “Audiences want authenticity,” said the short's Academy Award-nominated director Lucy Walker to Adweek. “Nobody’s going to watch 24 minutes of phony stuff.” Check out another clip below.Continue reading...

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You might say Vlasic is in a pickle.

The pickle brand is familiar to Americans thanks to a cartoon stork mascot that was introduced in 1974 with attitude and voice inspired by Groucho Marx. It's still got the stork, but trying to avoid a classic case of being overlooked by consumers.

Pickles, after all, are made to be on the side, an accompaniment to the main event; like a condiment, they are meant to complement other foods. As a result, pickles may become relegated to the bottom of a consumer's shopping list, or worse, left off altogether. Shopping lists (or nowadays, shopping apps) have become increasingly essential to consumers as rising prices force them to manage their food purchases.

That's why Vlasic is fishing where the fish are — or shopping where the shoppers are. The brand is paying for signage in grocery stores, using in-store shelf ads near related products such as ground beef and burger buns in a new effort to beef up market share. In choosing which items it wants to flank, Vlasic cites researching showing that around 80% of pickles consumed by Americans accompany a hamburger or sandwich.Continue reading...