Dental Marketing - Tyson Steele Associates - Advanced Dental Marketing Concepts

Written By: Tyson Steele on 2010-03-01

In the year 2000, the Food and Drug Administration granted the California Prune Board the right to market prunes under a new moniker -- "dried plums."

I won't comment on why the government has to "allow" anyone to market a dried fruit under it's real name -- a prune IS a dried plum for heaven's sake! However, the re-branding of prunes is a great example of market re-positioning.

Studies of women 35-50 years old showed that consumers preferred the "dried plum" brand. And the California Prune board clearly wanted to tap into this younger market, which is a bit, shall we say, "less ripe" than the usual prune consumer.

In 2009, the re-named California Dried Plum Board took it a step further and introduced Olympic Gold Medalist and World Champion swimmer Natalie Coughlin as it's spokesperson -- another inroad into the fruit's target market of younger women.

Is it working?

Although production varies in the U.S. and net sales are a bit hard to determine, dried plum prices have risen 73% since 1999. And that's just about enough to make your grandmother wish for the good ol' days when they were still just prunes.

So if you're thinking of re-branding your dental practice, you might contemplate the old fashioned "prune" and newfangled "dried plum." Maybe there really is something in a name.