Mountain Dew Case Study

Name: Shafiq Lalani

Student #: 997464603

Email: shafiq.lalani@gmail.com
 Mountain Dew Case Study

A critical strategy for Mountain Dew’s campaign has been bringing together its original rural target

market with the large scale urban market that it would later go after. Mountain Dew was able to

effectively bring together the active sport lifestyle of the country, with the teen cool factor in

modern urban centers. They were able to achieve this success by consistently leveraging pop culture

as a tool to reach the teen market.

The “Done That” creative, while only trying to generate trials of Mountain Dew, had a more

significant impact. In fact, the appeal of the ad itself was so great that it was able to influence pop

culture and essentially brought the phrase “Been there, done that”, into common day language. This

was the first major victory that the campaign achieved by utilizing pop culture to its advantage. The

product’s real success however began with the launch of the Diet Dew campaign which interestingly

enough occurred at the same time as the surge in popularity of alternative sports such as

skateboarding, snowboarding etc. As Mountain Dew was transitioning into the urban market, it took

advantage of the increasingly popular extreme sports, and in turn helped it grow. By giving it even

more access to mainstream media and sponsoring the X games, Mountain Dew strengthened not only

the trend at the time, but itself in the process. As more people jumped on the extreme sports

bandwagon, more and more individuals found themselves able to relate to Mountain Dew and the

daring, fun lifestyle it represented.

Mountain Dew’s next success was also an example of how they have been able to use current

trends in pop culture to their advantage. As the GenX ethos of general cynicism towards corporate

lifestyle grew, the “parking attendant” creative exhibited the brand’s personality trait of cynicism

towards the uptight businessman. Once again this campaign showcased a trait that the target

audience would identify with. Thus, it can be seen that Mountain Dew used and contributed to the

pop culture trends at the time, and did so in a way that made the brand & product highly desirable.
 In order to assess the most optimal creative the following criteria have been used: 1.

Effectively Promotes Product Benefits, 2. Brand Image/Personality, 3. Appeals to Target Audience,

4. Works Well with Existing Campaign(s) and 5. Entertaining/Interesting. The rationale for

choosing product benefits as a key criterion is that the creative must illustrate the products functional

and emotional benefits easily without having the consumer thinking what the product really does.

Brand Image was also chosen because it is central to the success of Mountain Dew. Typically brands

stand for a certain set of values that appeal to their target group. In this case the brand image for

Mountain Dew is “fun, exhilarating and quenches your thirst”. Therefore, the creative should

include a story that effectively conveys this brand image and ensures that consumers can relate to

these different traits and the product itself. The next criteria relates to the fact that the creative

should capture the target market’s attention. The reason this criteria was chosen was because there is

a specific target that Mountain dew wants to target, males who are aged 18-39. Therefore ensuring

that the creative appeals to these audiences in particular is of utmost importance. Moreover, we must

consider the integrative nature of any brand and its advertisements over time. Consumers expect

consistency and will be confused if the message from Mountain Dew changes significantly in

different ads. As such, the “brand voice” of Mountain Dew which is represented by a variety of

items like the dew dudes and extreme sports, should be maintained especially since this strategy has

been so powerful in the past. The last criteria that was chosen was that the ad should be

entertaining/interesting. Any impactful ad needs to capture the attention of viewers and ensure it is

memorable, the only way this will happen it if there is a deliberate goal to making it entertaining and

interesting.
 Criteria Labor of Cheetah Dew or Die Mock Opera Showstopper
Love
Appeals to
Target (-) Appeals more (+) Has universal (+) Saving the (-) In general, (-) Synchronized
Criteria
Audience Labor of Love
to older audiences appeal,Cheetah
regardless Dew
world, or Die primary Mock
getting target Showstopper
movement style
and females than of race and gender. the girl, partying won’t recognize Opera performance may
actual target Interesting and are all elements Queen’s be unfamiliar
(-)market. 18 year
No Functional exciting to any
(+) Incorporates that
(-) 18
Noyear old
Functional Bohemian
(+) Conveys (+)Music is
(+) Energizing
old males
Benefits of cannot view.
energizing/exhilar males would
Benefits of Rhapsody.
thirst- but universal, target
and thirst-
relate to
energy/flavor/thirst- (+) Airing during
ation feeling identify with strong music may
energy/flavor/thirst quenching audience
quenching easily
can
childbirth
quenching and Super Bowl can (-) Serious still captivate relate to the as
group
Promotes through the intense -quenching benefits from conveyed the
Product (+)labor.
Shows emotional captivate an already
chase between the beginning
(+) Conveysmaysome(+) Super
lyrics Bowl sports aspect.
performers all
high-energy
benefit of excitement dew dude and the put off the high- audience
level of excitement “They’re is just drink Dew after a
Benefits audience energy Super diverse enough to
just before the flying cheetah. via the party scene thirsty tiring routine
(Functional baby arrives, as the (+) Integrates Bowl audience
in the cabin understand
dudes...” (+) Exhilaration
& doctor prepares thirst-quenching as parody(+) and excitement
Works with
Emotional) himself by catching the remaining Dew Exhilaration developed
existing the(-) More
baby about
with a (+) Action
Dudes packed
drink in the (-) Very (+) Concept
integratedof (+) Incorporates
through the
campaign the Dew Dudes
baseball glove. and incorporates
desert. different mood parody has been
through both action
upbeat and and
music
than about the sports theme well than usual, very usedextreme
in prior sports sports thoroughly
tricks throughout
drink, the with the bike chase, serious to begin. Mountain scenes.Dew through
the performance
experience, or in-line with (-) Limited Ads performance
(-)about
Manysports
people will campaign
(+) Daring Dew exhilaration,
(+) Dew Dudes (+) Clear sports in
(+/-) Parody (+) Daring
(-) Deviates in
take this negatively (+) Being
Dude as he chases more about
taking their duties tie-ingeneral makes lifestyle
mood, since the
because it is making unconventional
the Cheetah, puts(i.e. enjoyment and
to save the world (+) Use
fun of
of well-
the represented via
Brand setting is more chasing Cheetah)
the birth of a child not hand in mouth, all relaxing
lightly in the known music is
original. May the sports
Image soserious
sacred with a
and gives follows existing
for getting the drink cabin
(+) Having fun in also be consistent
perceived included in the
(Exciting, childbirth scene.
the image of the campaign
(+) Fun and the cabin instead with past
negatively by routine
Taking company as not adventure theme creatives
fans of the (+) Fun element
Entertaining
things caring about child shown through the original clearly present in
(-) Soap opera-
birth. (+) Immediate
dangerous situation (-) Complicated (+) Upbeat
(+) Daring/Fun (+)
theSynchronized
enjoyment of
lightly, like beginning is hook for viewer, storyline is music grabs movement
Fun) and location lifestyle the actors
not as interesting with the action- difficult to attention, as does performances not
depicted
to target packed chase scene. understand. Ad familiarity
throughwith usually done with
audience. Slightly (+) Unpredictable may go too long. the song
extreme sports sports, this unique
dull and serious beginning (the (-) Very serious scenes aspect will draw
start causes loss cheetah chase), introduction the attention of
of interest. progresses well and causes loss of viewers
(+) Moderately easy to understand interest
humorous if
audience watches
entire way
through
(+) = Pro
(-) = Con

Based on the justification above, my recommendation would be to go with the cheetah creative. The

communication strategy in this campaign involves symbolizing that drinking Mountain Dew is an exhilarating

experience. The ad captures this perfectly and scores high on most of the key criteria identified above.