Problem
Read about Wild Foods and answer discussion questions below.
Wild Foods
A huge, highly regarded consumer packaged goods firm wishes to branch out from selling foods for humans to also perhaps selling food for pets. The company knows a lot about packaging, communications, and pricing. It has a great reputation in trade so the channel partners should be supportive (at least, grocery stores, Target and Walmart, etc., but it knows it will have to approach PetSmart and Petco). It figures that selling pet food can't be all that different from their current strengths (snack foods, small packaged foods, etc.).
The company is beginning with cat food. It is developing product lines currently and plans to launch within 6 months. About a year after that, they ll follow with their dog line. The company has talked about developing foods for other pets (birds, hamsters, ferrets, snakes), but to date no firm plans have been made.
The brand is going to be called Wild Foods and the new-to-the-world feature that the brand will offer is that these canned goods will comprise wild animals. Instead of cat food being the same meats eaten by their owners (e.g., beef, turkey, chicken, tuna), the foodstuffs will be mice, rats, crows, and pigeons (the company's first recipes).
The company expects their new pet food line to be wildly received by pet owners-they expect that pet owners will say, "Finally! A company that knows what my cat wants to eat!" The company also thinks it will earn huge points from people concerned with the environment, given that they're creating a useful by-product of large populations of some unpopular animals usually regarded as vermin or pests.
Task
A. In the company's projection of their product line's likely success, what assumptions do you believe they've made, and do you agree with all of them?
B. What kinds of pre-launch marketing questions, about any of the 49s, do you have?
C. What kinds of marketing research would you suggest for them to address your concerns?