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Question 2b: Develop a research design and explain what behaviors, demographics, and
lifestyle components you deem important and why.
Banks research design was very effective in getting her team to understand the possible
core values of Saxonville’s target audience but lacked some of the necessary quantitative
research to completely confirm what route should be taken. Structuring a study by doing
qualitative research first is sometimes necessary in the development of a proper quantitative
research design. However, most complaints with taking a qualitative research approach is that the
research cannot be attached to numbers and analyzed with statistics, and that the findings are
researcher-dependent and subject to human error. This problem is attempted to be eliminated by
the quantitative research supporting the findings of key concepts derived from the qualitative
research. Other complaints of Banks’ study is that focus groups are to homogenous and that the
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Saxonville Sausage Case
decision to pick woman only as the target audience leaves half the population of consumers’
values undiscovered.
A different but similar proposed research design would be to create a focus groups similar
to Banks’ study but would call for a more diverse demographic. Preferably a diverse group of
woman and men would be included in these focus groups. These groups will vary from male and
female groups, male only groups and female only groups. This is designed to bring out different
conversations and ideas in each of the focus groups and present other opportunities to surface
that might never have with a female only group. Other problems that often appear in market
research is that of regional or national stereotypes might influence the focus groups opinions. In
the case of Italian sausage a stereotype that the Italian foods are associated with family might
influence peoples opinions positively towards the Italian brand. The presence of this stereotype
makes any connections discovered more spurious. To eliminate this stereotype psychological
priming might be considered to neutralize people preconceived notions of Italian foods. Doing so
though increase the variables and once again begins to skew any potential findings.
Question 3: What were the research results? Select two different positioning territories
identified in case Exhibit 6. Trace back through the case, using Exhibit 4 and other
embedded information, to rationalize the development of these territory ideas.
The research done by Banks discovered that the territories “Family Connection” and
“Clever Cooking” represented the highest potentially successful locations where Saxonville
could position Vivio to optimize the core values of their target consumer. The two territories
arrived from similar origins but evolved through time and display the core values of the
consumers differently. Banks, after identifying the market opening through research and
assistance of her multi-functional team, used a Pennsylvania research facility to conduct a pilot
study to get a quick handle on what consumers were saying about Italian sausage. From this she
used the information to develop stimulus material and mentor guidelines to conduct a focus
group. She then cold called 437 woman and selected 103 to participate in focus groups located
around the country. All of these participates were woman because it was identified that woman
were the primary food purchasers and meal preparers. Banks structured these focus groups to
bring out various common feeling and ideals from the woman such as Italian sausage made life
easier and wholesome meals bring the family together but it isn’t worth the risk of disaster. She
then lead her team to analyze all aspects of the focus groups and identify key items and as a
result 11 values that characterized the woman’s ideals were identified.
Banks wanted to use a brand ladder to show how core values lead to the attributes of a
product. The team identify the core value held by the woman by noticing that the 11 values they
identified from the focus groups were all about the woman wanting to do a good job as a mother
and homemaker. “Job well done” was identified as the Core Values and the top of the brand
ladder. The team then developed 4 mock up concepts and exposed consumers to them and asked
them to vote on which one the like best. “Family Connection” and “Clever Cooking” were
clearly the favorites and were selected for future quantitative testing. The results were “Clever
Cooking” had the highest votes but “Family Connection” had a more evenly distributed score
with less “would not buys.” Each one of these stemmed from the same roots but took an
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Saxonville Sausage Case
approach that both gave woman the feeling that they were doing a good job as a mother and
homemaker.