Events Sponsorship & Marketing Case Study Blog Report

    Overview of the company

-        Background

100PLUS was created in the year 1983 by Fraser and Neave Limited. This drink was created to commemorate 100 years of Fraser and Neave Limited Asia. Being the home grown brand of the popular isotonic drink in Singapore, 100PLUS has sponsored many sporting events in Singapore such as 28^th National SEA Games. Created in 1983 primarily targeting marathon runners, now it has become a drink that everyone loves, now 100PLUS has been established to become Singapore and Malaysia number 1 isotonic drink.

-  The company 100PLUS works in the Food and Beverage industry as the company only sells products that are isotonic sports drinks.

- There are only 3 different types of product category that 100PLUS sells, 100PLUS carbonated, 100PLUS zero, 100PLUS active. With also 100PLUS Carbonated having 4 different types of flavours to choose from. Each type of product has different types of purpose for the drinks, for example, 100PLUS active has extra vitamin B inside the drink and designed to help energy production and also aid in after sports recovery.

Customer, clients

For the target market of 100PLUS, it would people who are generally sporty from ages 13-45, with no specific gender group, competitive athletes or people who workout regularly, or teachers, shop managers.

- Key customers of 100PLUS company would be the public, but to be specific it would be those who are active in sports activities as 100PLUS is an isotonic drink and it aids in boosting hydration, electrolytes, carbohydrates for athletes. To segment the market of the target customer, it would be demographic, psychographic, behavioural.

For demographic it would be regardless of age and gender as 100PLUS does not target any specific age group or gender. Under demographic, occupation of the market it could be competitive athletes who does sports for a living. This is because competitive athletes constantly take part in competition and after every competition or marathon drinking 100PLUS will allow them to regain their energy, be hydrated again.

Psychographic, this segmentation is by psychological attributes for 100PLUS it will fall under lifestyle as those who are health-conscious and exercise to keep fit. As majority of Singaporean knows 100PLUS hence they will choose to drink 100PLUS to help them regain their energy level and be hydrated again.

Behavioural, for an athlete the usage rate and also user status of 100PLUS will be regular as they will constantly buy to keep themselves hydrated and help to recover after the sports. Many people who drinks 100PLUS seldom drink different brand of isotonic sports drink hence, customer has a very high loyalty status to 100PLUS.

Lastly, will be socio-economic differentiators, for this case, more of lower middle-class people of working class that are semi-skilled workers will attend sports events like marathons, which are key customers of 100PLUS as going for any type of sports event drinking an isotonic drink before or after helps the athlete to function much more better.

     Competitors

-        H-TWO-O

H-TWO-O is manufactured from another home-grown brand Yeo’s which also as many products under their name, however despite being also a home grown brand, H-TWO-O is not able to compete with 100PLUS as majority of the market share are occupied by 100PLUS, and also it is due to 100PLUS is a pioneer brand in Singapore hence more people know about 100PLUS first and due to brand loyalty more people will stick to 100PLUS instead of buying H-TWO-O, however H-TWO-O still managed to established a strong standing despite having 100PLUS as their competition. 

-        Aquarius

Aquarius originated in 1978 but was only introduced in 1983, however being introduced at the same time as 100PLUS, it was only available at Japan at first and it only landed into the Singapore market in 2012. Entering the market at such late stage, it could not fight with pioneer brand such as 100PLUS and H-TWO-O. However, more people are opting for this option as it is cheaper in price as compared to both 100PLUS and H-TWO-O.   

-        Pocari

Launched in 1980 in Japan, only available at Japan at first and was not in the Singapore market at the same time as the pioneer brands, despite that Pocari made their name known in then Singapore market by sponsoring many different types of sporting event over the past few years with one coming up which is at Sentosa. It also sells a powder packet that none of the other 3 competitors have which makes their brand unique. 

NAME	STRENGTHS	WEAKNESS	OPPORTUNITIES	THREATS
100PLUS	Leading isotonic drink in Singapore. Has the most amount of market share in Singapore	Reliant on its core product only	Working with more major sporting events	More and more competitors are starting to rise as there is no barriers to entries in the market.
H-TWO-O	Has established a strong standing in Singapore despite having 100PLUS in the market	Are not able to compete with 100PLUS based on market share	To grow bigger in the market in the future with new products	More competitors are joining in
AQUARIUS	It is the cheapest out of all 3	Has the least amount of market share	Not widely known in the market, sponsoring more events will get their out in the market.	More competitors are joining in
POCARI	Different types of product such as powder isotonic drink	Not widely sold in the market.	Sponsoring more events in the future.	Competitors are able to easily join in the market as there is no high start up cost.

 Sponsorship involvement.

100Plus has sponsor many major sporting events such as the 28^th SEA Games, Singapore National Table Tennis, HSBC Rugby 7s, OCBC Cycle 2018. 

 

100PLUS was the official sponsor of the 28^th National SEA games in Singapore in 2015, to also commemorate the golden jubilee year, 100PLUS release golden can for the event and island wide on all stores, to rally on Singaporeans to cheer on and go for the gold.

The most recent event that 100PLUS was a sponsor was the annual OCBC Cycle 2018, where 15 local cycling teams and 8 S.E.A teams competing for one goal which is to emerge as champion.  

As everyone know 100PLUS is the leading isotonic sports drink in Singapore, being a sponsor for these events was a logical choice as all these events are related to sports and during sports or after the sports event athletes needs to be hydrated and replenish hence drinking 100PLUS allows that for them.

Also, 100PLUS want to let those countries who are participating in these events to drink 100PLUS so as to get their name to overseas market, so more people will know about them, despite being the leading isotonic brand in both Singapore and Malaysia, they can still branch out to different overseas market to gain bigger market share.

100PLUS brand mission is inspire with creativity and determination and push people to their limits without giving up and to beat themselves in everything. This brand mission suits sporting event such as 28^Th SEA Games and HSBC Rugby 7s as all these events pushes the athletes to their limit and ensuring themselves that they win the gold back for their representing country, and not giving up without a fight in the competition.

Aiming to promote healthy living in Singapore, 100PLUS has also sponsored National Steps Challenge, as an act for Singaporeans to start their healthy living small by taking part in the National Steps Challenge. This event mainly targets elderly people as an act for them to continue be active in the society to keep them healthy.

100PLUS chose these sporting events to sponsor as it wants to reach out to more target customers in the event, also it suits their tagline ‘OUTDO Yourself’. Despite being the leading isotonic sports drink in both Singapore and Malaysia, 100PLUS still sponsors the 28^th National SEA Games as it has a potential audience of 600 million and with that more people will know more about 100PLUS and expanding into the overseas market would be easier as people would already know who they are. Being majority of the 100PLUS market only in Asia hence, creating brand awareness in such an event would allow more people to know about them.              

By sponsoring all these events, 100PLUS is able to create a bigger brand image towards Singaporeans and the foreigners as more people will know more about this home-grown brand be it overseas or locally. With 100PLUS releasing new products like 100PLUS Zero, they can test their products on the event participants to see if the feedback is good and if there is any improvement needed to be make to the product itself, which is known as product trial.

Sponsorship Recommendation and Justification

I feel that marathon or major sporting event would be the best match to the company’s marketing and sponsorship objectives, for example, Star Wars Run, or Olympics or Paralympics or any sort of minor to major sporting events. As all these events involves athletes and they will be needing hydration and electrolytes during or after the race or competition.

For Olympics, it is a world event and it consists of almost all the countries hence there will be a lot of people and many athletes also, this suits the brand mission to not give up and push to their limits

Currently Olympics are being sponsored by Coca-Cola and it has been the sponsor since 1928, however Coca-Cola is not a isotonic drink and more of a sweet drink and does not provide the energy replenish for the athletes after their competition so I feel that if 100PLUS is able to sponsor it will benefit both as Olympics is a world event and with that everyone would know the brand and also the athlete will feel more energized and hydrated after drinking 100PLUS as compared to drinking Coca-Cola.

Next is why I think Paralympics is another good choice for the sponsorship, also being same as Olympics it is a world event. This event suits best to the brand mission as the athletes participating in those events are all disabled either having lost a leg or hand, they did not give up and persevere to push themselves and made it into the Paralympics hence I feel this event suits best to the brand mission of 100PLUS. As mention above, the brand mission is push one to their limits and not giving up without a fight, therefore I feel this would be the best match for the company’s sponsorship objectives.  

Star Wars Run, this event attracted many participants all over the world as avid fans of Star Wars flew down to Singapore to participate in this event. Many brands were also part of their sponsor and partners, however their drink sponsor was UFC, where they sponsored coconut water for the runners to drink while running and after the run. This drink choice was not really a good choice as compared to 100PLUS sponsoring them coconut water does not replenish the energy lost and hydrated the runners as good as 100PLUS does and drinking too much coconut water also has bad side effect to the runners as they may get cramps on their legs, so I feel that 100PLUS sponsoring them would be a better choice as it provides a better hydration and energy replenish for the runners when they are running. 

With the aim to promote active lifestyle and healthy living to Singapore, 100PLUS can sponsor any upcoming health conventions to teach Singaporean different ways of healthy living and keeping themselves hydrated after working out by drinking 100PLUS. With more and more people changing their lifestyle to a healthy lifestyle nowadays, this event will attract a significant number of people as there is an increase in number of Singaporeans choosing to eat more healthier and going for regular workout or jog.

I feel that the above events that I suggest fits perfectly towards both 100PLUS marketing and sponsorship objective as it suits the products that they are trying to sell and it suits their company tagline and mission. 

References
The Official Isotonic Drink of the 28th SEA GAMES. (n.d.). Retrieved from http://www.fnnfoods.com/the-official-isotonic-drink-of-the-28th-sea-games/

 100PLUS Singapore: Brand Mission. (n.d.). Retrieved from http://100plus.com.sg/brand-mission/

Yeo Hiap Seng. (2018, April 30). Retrieved from https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yeo_Hiap_Seng 

100plus. (2018, May 07). Retrieved from https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/100plus

Aquarius isotonic drink soft launched in Malaysia (Updated – April 2016). (2017, February 04). Retrieved from https://www.minimeinsights.com/2015/06/16/aquarius-isotonic-drink-soft-launched-in-malaysia-updated-april-2016/

Aquarius (sports drink). (2018, May 12). Retrieved from https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aquarius_(sports_drink)