Ricola - A New Global Advertising Campaign

 

The "Ricola" case highlights the natural tensions that occur between corporate functions and lines of business. In this role-play, the Chief Marketing Officer (CMO) and the Global VP of Advertising want to go global with a new advertising campaign. The CEO also is very much enamored with this new campaign. Market research data suggests this new campaign is positively received by consumers globally with several notable exceptions -- the United States, Spain, Japan, and Brazil.

 

The primary role-play is between the Global VP of Advertising and the VP of Marketing and Advertising for the United States. The Global VP needs the US to run the new campaign given his/her boss (CMO) and the CEO are both very, very positive on the new campaign. Given the market research data, however, the VP of the US is reluctant to go with the new campaign particularly given Ricola will be significantly outspent by their main competitor in the upcoming year ("so I'm going to be outspent significantly by our competition next year with pressure to increase sales, and you want me to switch to a sub-optimal advertising campaign at the same time!"). If these two cannot reach an agreement, then the decision is escalated to the CMO.

 

The case includes video samples of both the old advertising campaign and the new campaign. These videos are actual Ricola ads representing the two campaigns. We have received permission from Ricola to distribute these videos as part of this exercise. This adds a sense of realism to the exercise.

 

Details:

• Primarily a 2 person role-play with the potential to escalate to third person (the case can be run as simply a dyadic role-play)

• Purchase includes role materials, supporting video, detailed teaching notes and sample Powerpoint slides