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INNOVATE, RINSE, REPEAT Making the product was half the battle. Consumer testing is at the heart of product development for P&G, which has more than 25 facilities across the globe where people can use the things it makes. The Beckett Ridge Innovation Center, about 30 minutes from P&G's Cincinnati headquarters, is one. Inside, there's a 3,000-square-foot grocery store packed with everything from Charmin diapers to Cascade dishwashing liquid. There's also a 2,000-square-foot mock clapboard house where researchers analyze how people do laundry, wash dishes, take showers and change babies' diapers. About 50 P&G researchers work at the center, watching and videotaping about 20,000 people each year in their "natural" environment. The testers are picked by third-party companies and paid based on the task they complete. "When we watch consumers in action, we can see things they can't otherwise explain or articulate," says Jessica Hall White, director of P&G's unit that makes fabric care brands like Tide, Gain and Downy. When P&G researchers had consumers test Tide Pods at the center, they found that 97 percent were satisfied with their experience, compared with about 68 percent who were satisfied beforehand using regular detergent. People also liked how Tide Pods felt in their hands. When it came to packaging, P&G took a more futuristic approach to testing. The company used three screens at the Innovation Center to project 3D images of a virtual grocery store. There, testers could see early designs of Tide Pod packaging on the virtual store shelves alongside regular detergents. Researchers learned that people sometimes overlooked the product. So P&G determined that in order to stand out, Tide Pods needed to have see-through packaging. The company developed a clear fishbowl-like container that shows the pods clearly. The product was developed. The consumer tests were done. The packaging was complete. Next, it was time to get Tide Pods to market. P&G was poised to be the first detergent maker to get its new dissolvable pods into stores. They were to cost $20.89 for 57 pods and land on shelves by September 2011. But the company ran into problems making the pods, which require different equipment from what's used to manufacture regular detergent. At the same time, P&G was flooded with orders from supermarkets and retailers. P&G declined to detail the manufacturing problems, but it says the issues forced it to push back the launch date of Tide Pods by five months to February. In the hyper-competitive world of consumer products, that might as well be an eternity. Tide Pods entered a market that was already getting crowded. Henkel's Purex UltraPacks and Sun Products' All Mighty Pacs came out in February, too. And Church and Dwight plans to launch its Toss `N Done Power Packs- made of crystals
-- this month. All of the products are priced similarly -- more expensive than liquid or powder detergents. But P&G has a big advantage. The Tide brand is one of the most recognized in the world, so P&G hopes to win over shoppers with performance and brand recognition. The company says it expects Tide Pods to ring up $300 million in sales during its first year. John San Marco, an analyst with Janney Capital Markets, says P&G is at a slight disadvantage because it wasn't first to market its product. But he believes its Tide Pods product is likely to hit its first-year sales goal. "It seems when Procter does anything in the laundry category it makes a huge wave," he says. Still, P&G isn't taking chances. The company spent an estimated $150 million on a marketing campaign to roll out Tide Pods. The first commercial debuted during the Academy Awards, one of TV's biggest events. The tagline for the ad: "Pop In. Stand Out."
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