Reagan's Marketing In The News Blog Post

 Marketing In The News: Oscar Mayer enters the wedding business with Wienermobile of Love

I decided to post my blog about Oscar Mayers's new wedding service, a limited-time wedding chapel for quick elopements that will be available outside of Little White Wedding Chapel in Las Vegas, Nevada. I was interested in reading this article because it caught my attention immediately, which is just one indicator of good marketing.

    

    Oscar Mayer is diving into the wedding business under Kraft Heinz's newly launched brand platform "Keep It Oscar". "Keep It Oscar" is a transformative rebranding effort featuring the Weinermobile logo being added to many of the product's packaging. The brand extension was created to emphasize "unity and light-hearted fun" which the new Weinermobile undoubtedly upholds. The brand found that 72% of newlyweds experience extreme stress in the wedding planning process and in response, is providing a cost-efficient and silly alternative while entering into an entirely new market. The service provides a 30-minute wedding reservation at the infamous wedding chapel in Vegas, which is all expenses paid minus the travel. It includes a wiener whistle quartet, a hot dog-inspired cake, and a legal wedding ceremony. This is relevant to the market as other popular food brands have begun offering wedding services, including Taco Bell and Aldi, which Oscar Meyer has followed while simultaneously pushing their popular weiner-themed marketing campaign.

https://www.marketingdive.com/news/oscar-mayer-wedding-wienermobile-of-love/647238/

https://www.tacobell.com/

https://www.aldi.us/

In the lunch meat industry, Oscar Mayer is a leader in the industry and iconic for the affordability, quality, and convenience of their products. Oscar Mayer has competitively low prices while is known for using high-quality meats and taking great quality control measures. Oscar Mayer also provides quick and convenient products such as precooked bacon, sliced deli meats, and hot dogs. These can be defined as the brand's value proposition.

The Weinermobile of Love is selling a unique and cost-friendly approach to wedding celebrations, which fits into their goofy brand identity. The "Weinermobile" is a well-known marketing campaign that actually originated from nephew Karl Mayer in 1936. Oscar Mayer collaborated with Gerstenlager Company to bring the vehicle to life. Hot doggers, also known as the drivers, are known to pass out hot dog-shaped whistles. The successful campaign provides the company with several product and service opportunities in a variety of industries, now including wedding planning. Oscar Mayer even listed a wiener mobile Airbnb for rent on National Hot Dog Day! 

https://www.complex.com/sports/2012/07/the-history-of-the-oscar-mayer-wienermobile 

Following the pandemic, many companies including Oscar Mayer fell subject to supply chain issues with food manufacturers, which impacted their ability to maintain their low prices. To overcome this challenge, Oscar Mayer ventured into a brand extension by providing a remarkable and a once in a lifetime service. The company has also begun providing plant-based options and making attempts to reduce their environmental impacts to adjust to younger generations' consumer preferences. 

The company's marketing approach is unique and is one of the first to introduce the food industry to wedding services. Oscar Mayer is attempting to strengthen their brand perception by focusing on "Keep It Oscar" and pushing the fun-loving nature of the company's core values. The Wienermobile of Love was successful in appealing to the buyer persona, as the two-day reservation slots filled extremely quickly once applications opened for upcoming newlyweds. I would argue that the marketing strategy was incredibly successful in fitting the objectives of the campaign and is a quite remarkable approach to creating brand engagement. However, if I were a manager for the company, I would prioritize marketing efforts that highlight their new plant-based options to be marketed to that demographic, which is becoming more prevalent in food habits for many buyers. 

From reading this article, I learned a lot about how marketing campaigns like these can be strategically analyzed and critiqued. Applying the course concepts when reading this article allowed me to gain a deeper understanding as to why these brand campaigns really do work, even as ridiculous as they may seem. Lastly, I learned some fun history about Oscar Mayer!