MARS Wrigley sees increase in sales despite circuit breaker in Singapore

Challenge

Due to the COVID-19 circuit breaker imposed in Singapore, most convenience stores reduced their operating hours and only opened from morning until afternoon. Consumers were also more inclined to patronize supermarkets rather than convenience stores during this period.

In addition to sales outlets in the Central Business District area having to close operations temporarily during the circuit breaker period, there were also reduced consumers and purchases at petrol mart outlets as a large portion of the population were working from home. Faced with these challenges, MARS Wrigley was looking at possibly recording much lower sales than in previous months.

Approach

Recognizing the various barriers, we worked with the DKSH Smollan Field Marketing (DSFM) team to help MARS Wrigley adjust the marketing coverage plan and to refocus its marketing efforts onto its key customer accounts. As timing was critical, the specific activities were quickly planned and implemented together with the client.

For the convenience store segment, we focused on the central business areas and important parts of the market where consumer activity was still strong and the demand for its product brands was still present.

Result

As a result of the new deployment strategy and the field marketers readily adapting to the changes, sales grew by more than two percent in the following quarter after introducing the revised marketing strategy as compared to the year before. This was an impressive achievement considering the market situation at that time.