Thank you to national and regional BBC radio for inviting me on air to talk about Prime Mania on Friday. It was a fun one. If you missed it (as let’s face it, you may not be the target audience), Aldi supermarket shoppers are occasionally causing chaos as leading YouTubers KSI and Logan Paul’s hydration drink Prime hit the shelves for a limited time- ‘specialbuy’. They are sold out in minutes.
It’s interesting for four reasons:
💥1. Social first. KSI and Logan Paul are generating product demand through their social channels alone. They have a combined reach of tens of millions of highly engaged Gen Z and Alpha and have been promoting the product for a while. It’s taken months to become an overnight success. The resulting clamour for the product is then being covered on social and then by mainstream media, adding to general awareness inside and outside of the target audience.
👀2. Scarcity marketing. Influencers have been launching their own products for a number of years but this has been by far the most successful due to the combination of restricting supply and generating demand. It’s classic supply and demand economics. Creating product drop moments at supermarkets around the country with limited products, as well as a restriction on the number of bottles people can buy, creates a sense of scarcity – which is a classic marketing tool.
🔫3. Red Army. Last year, the mighty Arsenal Football Club announced that Prime would be the official hydration partner of the club. Considering the social first approach, a sports sponsorship felt like an unusual move for the business. KSI and Logan Paul are big Arsenal fans, so it may just be a vanity exercise. More likely, they have negotiated access to players and facilities which enable them to create highly shareable content, further extending the reach of their channels.
❤️4. Be careful what you wish for. With some canny entrepreneurs reselling a £2 product for over £20 per bottle on eBay, the demand for the product seems like it’s only increasing as Prime repeats its successful strategy. However, Prime and supermarkets need to be aware that creating a series of frenzied localised moments carries its own risk of injury or worse, which can potentially damage people as well as reputation.
Not that it matters, but if you have managed to get your hands on a bottle, what’s it like?
