Milk for 30-year-olds: how to create a brand for 3 million rubles, which won the "Magnit", Metro and “Aeroflot”
In the spring of 2019, a friend sent a photo to one of the shareholders of Bryansky dairy plant Alexander Reznikov from the plane "Aeroflot": on board there was distributed milk with a minimalist design and the inscription "Milk of Bryansky dairy plant" on the package. "We were very surprised and began to search who supplies our product to "Aeroflot". It turned out that this is one of Moscow distributors", — explains the Director of development of ultra-pasteurized milk of Bryansky dairy plant Irina Lipskaya. Until 2016, the company was only a regional supplier. Now the plant supplies 30 tons of milk a week to Russian airports and airlines through the Moscow distributor and sells products under the BDP brand in the Federal networks “Magnit”, “Carousel”, Metro and “Lenta”. How did the new brand help the plant with a 45-year history to get on the shelves of the capital's networks and on board “Aeroflot” aircrafts?
In the 1970s Bryansky dairy plant began with the production of drinking milk, but soon kefir, butter, sour cream, cottage cheese and cottage cheese mass appeared in the range. The expansion of the product line helped to increase the volume of processing to 450-500 tons per day. Milk was purchased from local farmers, buyers of ready-made products were only Bryansk grocery stores. In 1998, according to "SPARK-Interfax", the plant gained 86 million rubles and received about 6 million rubles of profit. In the early noughties, the company purchased new equipment from Swedish Tetra Pak for acceptance, processing and packaging of dairy products. The investment was justified: in the 2000s, the plant increased its turnover to 300-400 million rubles. However, each year was ended with a loss or a small profit.
In early 2010, the plant was bought by Bryansk entrepreneurs Alexander Reznikov (now he owns 18.4% of the shares), Pavel Maslenko (18.2%), Konstantin Malykhin (15.9%) and Sergey Veremiev (15.9%). The next year, the company's revenue grew to 1.2 billion rubles, and the profit amounted to 6 million rubles. "The growth indicator was the work with network retailers, including the “Magnit” network", said Alexey Ryabtsev, General Director of the company. - The shareholders purchased the plant in a state of decay: the capacity was underloaded, trade even with local networks was not established. A contract with a major network could have made a significant difference, and that's the way they went". However, the company did not go further than 500 km from Bryansk in the early 2010s: the logistics depended on the shelf life of dairy products, and it was not longer than 14 days at Bryansky dairy plant. The plant then sold products under four brands: "Milgrad", "Milanya", "Vesely lug" and "Glinyanaya Krynka".
The turning point for Bryansky dairy plant was December 2016, when Alexey Ryabtsev was appointed to the position of General Director. He has been working with the plant's shareholders since 2004 - as a private lawyer, he advised their company "Dubrovka-Moloko". In 2010, he began to advise Bryansky dairy plant bought by entrepreneurs. In December 2016, Ryabtsev and his shareholders decided "to expand the geography of sales" and launched a new direction - the production of ultra-pasteurized milk with a shelf life of six months. The idea was proposed by Konstantin Malykhin, he received an offer from Tetra Pak to buy an ultra-pasteurization line, Ryabtsev recalls: "This suggestion gained all votes. This was the only way we could reach the Federal level".
Eight branding options were developed for Bryansky dairy plant, of which the plant chose the most minimalistic. Valery Nistratov for Forbes
The line for ultra-pasteurization was expensive, about €2.3 million, and almost a year, until December 2017, the partners spent a lot of time on the study of technologies and equipment, as well as on the search for alternative Tetra Pak offers, but in the end they still settled on this company. "We even haggled, and the manufacturer gave us about €200,000, discount" recalls Ryabtsev. Even before the launch of the new line at the end of 2017, the company gained on the sale of milk in Bryansk, as well as in neighboring Orel, Smolensk, Kaluga and Tula and other cities about 3 billion rubles, in 2018, the revenue, according to the company, increased to 3.4 billion rubles.
On November 14, 2018, managers of Bryansky dairy plant solemnly cut the red ribbon at the entrance to the production room with a new ultra-pasteurization line with a capacity of 130 tons of milk per day. Milk, cream, yogurt at the stage of packing was already poured into packages and jars with a minimalist design and the words "Milk of Bryansky dairy plant". In February 2018, the company ordered the brand concept and packaging design from the Depot Agency. "We had an option to work under one of the existing brands, but most of them were already more than 10 years old, they have lost relevance", says Ryabtsev. The task of the plant was to make a name for themselves simply, but loudly. By August, the Agency had developed eight branding options for Bryansky dairy plant, of which the plant chose two: the final one with a minimalistic design and a talking inscription, and another with futuristic images of scales, conveyors and aseptic tanks. We made the final choice in favor of the first. Branding experts have reasoned that white packaging, precise shapes and words highlight the product on the shelf more effectively than pastoral motifs. "You can imagine that a milk shelf is a kind of space where all the brands are trying to shout over each other, and one just says: Hey, man, I have good milk. Everyone is shouting, but he is not", explains the logics the managing partner of Depot Alexey Andreev.
As a result, each product in the line (there are seven of them) has its own color and text block. "No cows, no meadows, no fields, but just an inscription with the same name of the plant: we are the manufacturer, this is our milk," says the General Director of the plant. The packaging design cost Bryansky dairy plant 3 million rubles. In addition to packaging for products, the Agency has created an identity for Souvenirs with the same design. And on the door of Ryabtsev's office there was a sign with the inscription "Director of Bryansky dairy plant" in green, as on a package of milk. "Cleanliness and neatness subconsciously bribe people. If they have such a package, it means that the factory is neat, so they are pedants", says Farhad Kuchkarov, Director of strategy at Depot WPF.
First of all, the new design of milk packaging plant showed to Tetra Pak, which developed a layout for Bryansky dairy plant packaging. "They were a little shocked: they did not understand what it was, why it was necessary and who came up with it", Ryabtsev recalls. "But after the prototype of the future packaging was on the real shelf in the store, there was no doubt. Moving away from the traditional images associated with milk allowed the product to stand out effectively", says Mikhail Rzhavin, marketing Director of Tetra Pak in Russia, Ukraine, Belarus, Central Asia and the Caucasus.
The original packaging surprised not only Tetra Pak: some potential buyers who participated in focus groups, reproached the company for saving on branding. "But we even liked it. We did the design for the future: for Millennials, for example, it is important that there is no unnecessary information", says Alexey Ryabtsev.
Dairy products of the plant are sold in 22,000 retail outlets from Kaliningrad to Kamchatka.Valery Nistratov for Forbes
At the end of 2018, Bryansky dairy plant began selling products through distributors throughout Russia, and in the summer of 2019, they appeared in the Federal networks "Magnit", "Dixie", "Lenta", Metro and "Carousel". "The plant's products are in demand among customers, and we are aimed at further joint growth with the supplier", comments Maria Filippova, Director of public relations at “Lenta” network.
Now the dairy products of the plant are sold in 22,000 outlets in 37 cities of Russia - from Kaliningrad to Kamchatka. Branding also helped to reach the Federal networks, says Alexey Ryabtsev. "Over the past five years, there has been a trend to simplify packaging", agrees the founder and CEO of the company "Cheburashkin Brothers. Family farm" Vladislav Cheburashkin. — We were one of the first to follow it. We and Bryansky dairy plant are in different market segments, we have a premium product with a short shelf life".
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