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Why The Tide And NFL #TurnToCold Collaboration Is A Winner

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Today, Procter and Gamble’s Tide® brand is announcing a partnership with the National Football League that is designed to encourage consumers to use cold water on more loads of laundry in an effort to help the environment while saving money on energy bills. P&G reports that by switching out more loads to cold water, an average consumer can save $150 yearly on electric bills. The “Turn to Cold” campaign is setting the lofty goal of having 16 billion loads of laundry washed on cold per year, resulting in a reduction of $5.6 million metric tons of greenhouse gases per year, a level equivalent to removing more than one million cars per year.

While many companies are placing greater focus on prompting  corporate social responsibility (CSR) programs as a result of greater consumer expectations for companies to do good beyond just producing quality products and services, I am especially impressed by this campaign in that it appears to be highly authentic and take into account the interests of multiple parties. In addition, it is cleverly conceived, applying marketing and branding principles in an effective way to create “win-win” situations.

Indeed, “Turn to Cold” is designed to create multiple winners and because it is well conceived, it appears destined to succeed. The “winners” should include consumers, the environment, the Tide brand, the NFL, and creative advertising, for reasons discussed below:

Winner #1: Consumers

Something special about this campaign is that if consumers follow its advice and use more cold water for doing laundry they will not only be engaging in environmentally friendly behavior, but will also save money. An added benefit is that their clothes should last longer as well. For decades, many firms have too often put out “environmentally friendly” products that cost cash-strapped consumers more and provide a higher margin for the seller, thereby putting the onus on consumers— and often with limited success.

Marc Pritchard, Chief Brand Officer of Procter and Gamble describes the “win-win” aspect of the campaign as follows: ”When it comes to laundry, consumers want clean clothes, that’s the first need. Increasingly consumers want to do things that improve the environment, either through less energy, less waste, less water, but often don’t know how to do that. And that’s why what this represents is an opportunity to help consumers understand that there’s something you can do that not only gives you a superior clean performance that you get from Tide, plus it’s going to reduce the energy that you use to heat your water.”

I recall reading an excellent article in the Wall Street Journal years ago (2002) that focused on how U.S. consumers were spending many hours doing high volumes of laundry but often not taking the time to understand cycles, washing temperatures, or the proper sequence of putting in clothes (water, detergent, laundry). The dilemma posed by the article was that some consumers were not happy with washing results, blaming the washing machine manufacturer or detergent for poor performance when they were actually at fault themselves. Moreover, an appropriate mechanism for educating these time pressured individuals who had become creatures of habit was not readily available. 

Years later, the Tide/NFL campaign, by reaching 80 million households, should have the firepower to educate consumers not only on the proper washing temperature to get clothes clean, but also on how save money by using warm cycles less often while also helping the environment.

Winner #2: The Environment

The “Turn to Cold” campaign’s goal of reducting greenhouse gas emisisons by more than 5 and one-half million metric tons every year is sizable. Clearly the scope of the campaign has the potential to make a real, and meaningful difference in greenhouse gas emissions.

It is also notable that as part of the campaign, several NFL teams are changing their own laundry practices to set an example for consumers are large. Tim Ellis, NFL Vice President and Chief Marketing Officer notes that part of the NFL’s commitment is getting its own teams to wash team uniforms in cold water in addition to supporting the campaign for consumers in general. He says, “The fact that a simple turn of the dial could make such a meaningful impact on the planet, we are excited for Tide to work with our Clubs to make the switch in an authentic way. Currently there are 15 teams committing to turn to cold, and we look forward to working with Tide to encourage our more than 80 million households of NFL fans who do billions of lbs of laundry each year to join the movement.”

Winner #3: The Tide Brand

In speaking to P&G’s Pritchard about the campaign, I am particularly impressed by how Tide’s commitment to its brand’s positioning as providing superior cleaning performance is emphasized. While corporate social responsibility is also a key part of Tide’s overall brand vision, Pritchard emphasizes that the company is keeping its eye on the ball as it relates to the brand’s core benefit, stating, “First and foremost, Tide’s iconic selling line is ‘If it's got to be clean, it's got to be Tide’. Tide is the best cleaning product on the market. What we’re doing as a company is ensuring that we provide a superior performance that our products provide – delivering superiority on the core benefit, in this case clean clothes, but doing it in a way that’s environmentally sustainable.”

The brand’s commitment to delivering for its consumers by delivering both a core benefit and sustainability comes through in the campaign. “It’s not a repositioning, it’s a way in which you can achieve a clean that consumers want and need, while also delivering and improving from a sustainability standpoint,” says Pritchard, “ It’s an important distinction because what consumers say is, they want to do something sustainable, but they don’t want to make a tradeoff. What people have come to expect from Tide is the absolute best cleaning performance, so they wouldn’t except the trade off if you just made it sustainable, but it didn’t clean as well.”

Pritchard adds that formula improvements have been instrumental in allowing for this program to work: “That’s what makes the Tide Cold Water program so powerful and why we are targeting the ¾ loads that are washed on cold, this formula is moving across the whole Tide line up, “ he says, “Slowly we’ve been working on improving the formula through different improvements in the enzymes so they can clean and get better and better in cold water, so you can get the superior clean because ‘If it's got to be clean, it's got to be Tide’. In addition, it then allows you to change your habit and still have the additional benefits of reduced energy, improve sustainability and also saves you money.”

By not departing from the brand’s core focus on superior cleaning while creating a “win-win” for consumers by saving money and helping the environment, Tide’s management team is effectively applying marketing principles in a way that should build brand equity.

Winner #4: The National Football League’s Brand

With ratings for the 2021 Summer Olympics declining by 42% from the 2016 Rio Games and reaching all-time lows for NBC, the NFL is now arguably a completely unique property for advertisers wishing to reach a massive audience (80 million viewers) over a sustained period of time. The fact that the NFL’s audience includes both large numbers of women and men, with women now making up about 47% of NFL fans, is also a plus for many advertisers. Both P&G and the NFL appear to be very aware of how unique the impact of a message delivered via this partnership can be in an otherwise highly cluttered and fragmented media environment.

Clearly, having a major advertiser such as Procter and Gamble as a partner helps the NFL financially. However, there are also image and reputation benefits for the NFL for being associated with sustainability. Ellis observes, “We value our longstanding partnership with Tide and are impressed with their creativity and inspiration behind the #TurnToCold program. After seeing the incredible influence that two big brands can have when they join forces for good, we are excited to collaborate with Tide on this program and further utilize our NFL platform to motivate our passionate fan base to support a small change that can make a massive impact on our environment.”

 Winner #5: Creativity in Advertising

While the full campaign had not aired yet (see first Youtube spot below), the initial creative spot is both funny and on point. Given how dirty used NFL jerseys become, the focusing on NFL teams using cold water allows the message of effective cleaning to get across and reinforces the NFL’s commitment to the broader campaign objective. 

Much of the focus on the campaign will be on cold-inspired marketing  themes using celebrities such as Stone Cold and Ice-T in addition to NFL players including Atlanta Falcons quarterback Matt “Matty Ice” Ryan. In addition, the campaign is introducing the “Tide Cold Washer” which is a talking washing machine that reminds consumers to wash in cold in the voices of players from 10 different teams.  The campaign will also be supported by a sweepstakes to win one of the Tide Cold Washers on Tide.com and social media activities including encouragement of user generated content.

The Likely End Result

Because of the number of “wins” provided by this campaign, “Turn to Cold” appears poised for major success. Tide’s use of a partnership with perhaps the only media property (NFL games) capable of reaching a sufficient audience to accomplish its ambitous goal of changing consumption habits on a large scale shows savvy. Moreover, the campaigns ability to communicate how improvement in Tide’s formula allows for a scenario where more loads can be washed in a way that saves energy while being softer on the pocketbook is brilliant. I do hope that the degree of education on when “warm” or “hot” water is still needed in specific situation is part of the campaign, but this seems like a very small potential caveat in light of how much the Tide/NFL partnership appears poised to accomplish. This really is marketing at its very best.

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