Drink targets joint stiffness—Elations, part of Sunny D, has ingredients to relieve bone pain
Cincinnati Business Courier - June 23, 2006
by Lisa Biank Fasig Staff Reporter
Sunny Delight®, the fruit drink that has built a following among carefree children, has a sister company targeting their more careful parents with a fortified beverage to fight osteoarthritis.
The drink, called Elations, will be tested in Louisville in July and is expected to enter Cincinnati-area Meijer stores in the fall. That physical rollout will lead to a market expansion of giant potential, since Elations targets consumers with joint stiffness and the population of baby boomers — 40 and older — is 77 million.
But Elations is not as young as some might think, either. The product, which operates as a separate brand and company (Elations Co.), was created and tested years ago by Procter & Gamble Co., the former parent of Sunny Delight. When Procter sold Sunny D two years ago to the Boston investment group J.W. Childs Associates, Elations was part of the deal.
The brand slumbered until late 2005 — that’s when the National Institutes of Health released study results showing that glucosamine and chondroitin may be effective in reducing pain from osteoarthritis. Since key ingredients of Elations are glucosamine and chondroitin, J.W. Childs jumped on the opportunity to announce a relaunch, but as a completely separate product from the youth-oriented Sunny Delight.
Billy Cyr, CEO of Sunny Delight, declined to specify the expected market potential or profit margins that could be created by the drink, but said it will deliver a good return.
“If we get just 2 percent of the population to use it and stay with it,” he said, “that's a sizable market.”
Especially since the juice drinks market, of which Sunny D is a part, is growing primarily though innovation. The industry generated sales of $6.9 billion in 2005, compared with $6.4 billion in 2004, said John Sicher, editor and publisher of the trade publication Beverage Digest.
“The U.S. is a very developed beverage market. One of the avenues for growth is extending a beverage company's portfolio to both additional age groups and additional times of day,” he said.
Sure enough, while Elations represents the most dramatic development for J.W. Childs, it is not the only effort. Sunny Delight in the past two years has launched a low-sugar Sunny Delight, a sports-oriented drink called Sunny D Intense Sport and a shelf-stable product, called Sunny Baja, that can be sold alongside Hi-C.
Such innovation is required as the company fights the rigors of rising commodities costs. Sunny Delight, with sales of $450 million, recently raised its prices for the first time in 10 years. Now it has to give shoppers a reason to pay more.
Elations, expected to sell for $7.99 for a pack of six 8-ounce bottles, had performed well in Procter tests. At its in-house store, where employees buy test products, Elations sold as well as the developing Crest White Strips, said Jeff Goldstein, vice president of marketing for Elations, and a former Procter brand manager.
“It got the second-highest purchase frequency ever recorded among Procter test products,” he said.
Elations will be in Kroger stores in Louisville and will enter Cincinnati through Meijer. It will be available in two flavors — cranberry apple and raspberry white grape — and will be positioned alongside vitamins and other adult health nutrition products.
Television and print advertising campaigns will accompany the rollout. The test marketing campaign can take six to 12 months, Goldstein said.
Copyright: Cincinnati Business Courier 2006
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