case study

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Oral-B is certified as the #1 dentist-recommended toothbrush brand worldwide. The brand owned by P&G has been offering in Turkey a variety of manual toothbrushes, electronic/rechargeable toothbrushes, replacement brush heads, kids toothbrushes, floss and mouthwashes to fit oral care needs. Every brush head has exclusive, dentist-designed features and it is compatible with all Oral-B brush handles.

 

1. Below items are listed in Oral-B product mix. Analyze the product mix of Oral-B offered in Turkey market by giving related explanation and necessary calculation on width, length and depth as product mix indicators.

 

Manual toothbrush Pro-Expert (Pro-Flex Clinic, Pro-Expert All in One, Pro-Expert Extra Clean, Pro-Expert Sensitive, Pro-Expert Massager); 3DWhite (3DWhite Luxe, 3DWhite Luxe Vibrating, Advantage 3DWhite, Advantage 3DWhite Fresh); Complete (Complete Ultrathin); Advantage (Advantage Sensitive, Advantage Complete Clean, Advantage Complete 5 Way Clean); 3 Effect (Classic 3 Effect, Delicate White 3 Effect, Maxi Clean 3 Effect, Natural Fresh 3 Effect); Interdenta l (Interdental 228mm); Kids (4-24 months, 2-4 ages, 5-7 ages, Classical)
Electronic toothbrush Smart (Smart 4000, Smart 6000); Genius (Genius 8000 White, 10000 N Rose, 10000N Black, 10000N Orchid Purple); Pro (Pro 500 Cross Action, Pro 750 3DWhite, Pro 750 Black Power, Pro 2000); Vitality (3DWhite, Cross Action, Cross Action Plus); Kids (Mickey Kids, Star Wars Kids, Frozen Kids, Junior over age 6, Teen)
Replacement brush head Cross Action, Sensi UltraThin, 3DWhite, Floss Action, Precision Clean, TriZone, Frozen, Star Wars
Floss Essential Floss, Super Floss, Satin Tape, Pro-Expert Clinic

 
Mouthwash Complete Care, 3D White Luxe, Pro-Expert Clinic, Pro-Expert Multi Protection (non-alcohol), Pro-Expert Clinic Power (non-alcohol)

 

 

 

2. The electronic toothbrush line includes products listed under Oral-B Vitality, Oral-B Pro, Oral-B Smart and Oral-B Genius and Kids. Focus on brand development and branding and explain which ways are adopted (a) to develop brands for the electronic toothbrush products and (b) which strategy is used in branding Oral-B’s products in this line?

 

3. Oral-B recently added its Oral-B toothpaste (see File 1) in order to be able to offer complete solution to the market and become as they call a “megabrand” (see File 2).

What can you call the product strategy that the company adopts by adding toothpaste to its product mix? Why? What are the advantages of this strategy to the company? Explain.

 

The toothpaste market is mainly segmented based on consumers’ sought benefits from the product: advanced health, multi-benefit, whitening, freshness. Oral-B clearly targets the advanced health segment with its basic products (File1). After a while, marketing team came up with the idea of extending the toothpaste line, especially based on capturing the consumers at the higher end of the market who also care about whiteness and freshness.

On the other hand, the parent company P&G has already been tapping these markets with its other brand İpana (File 3).

 

4. The marketing team prepared a report about the current state of IPANA product line. The report indicated that İpana is managed through 3 group of products entitled as Complete, 3DWhite, and Pro-Expert; the share of each group in total sales of the line is 50%, 40%, and 10% serving medium quality-medium price (Complete & 3DWhite) and high quality-high price markets (Pro-Expert), respectively. It is clear that İpana does not offer any item in the advanced health segment. The team believes that Oral-B, with its proficiency in innovation, would be successful by offering new items targeting premium and super premium segments, this time focusing on whitening and freshening attributes. Although Oral-B struggles with the market leader Sensodyn in the advanced health segment, the team sees important growth opportunity for the brand. So, the company introduced new products in its line of toothpaste (see File 4) based on the analysis of the marketing team.

 

a) Evaluate the rationale of extending Oral-B toothpaste. What are the underlying factors of this decision? Explain.

b) Is the company’s approach and analysis satisfactory? Why? Would you consider other inquiry? Justify your answer by giving explanations.