A recent sidebar in the Wall Street Journal alluded to Wheaties tradition of featuring high profile athletes at the peak of their popularity on their boxes and bemoaned the fact that this brand has fallen dramatically in its performance and value over recent years. I was reminded of this dramatic decline when I saw Adrian Peterson on two boxes of Wheaties peeking out from behind some toy cars and mini-frying pans. The reason or this incredible decline is up for debate. Some, like Melanie Hicken, say, “Wheaties is too healthy for junk food lovers yet not healthy enough for the health food crowd.” Others say General Mills has been out marketed and out merchandised by other cereal manufacturers.
I was reminded of a stimulating conversation some friends and I enjoyed with two up and coming marketing leaders from General Mills one beautiful summer evening during an open deck dinner boat cruise on Lake Minnetonka. “What would it take to revitalize the Wheaties brand?” was the topic on the table.
Product reformulation. Dramatic repositioning. New consumer value prop. Relevance and authenticity with a new target market. Social media saturation. Radical realignment of shopper marketing resources and the go to market strategy. Exciting stuff! Very doable! Then reality set in and we realized that none of this would likely happen. Companies, big and small, tend to be irrationally resistant to change no matter how badly it is needed, how solid the business case for change is, or how big the opportunity the new direction presents. For a bureaucratic behemoth like General Mills to change on the scale needed to save Wheaties is virtually impossible.
Sadly, and frustratingly, we concluded that Wheaties is likely to continue its slow demise until no one even notices it’s gone. Please don’t let this happen to your company.
