Strategic Marketing Management: Torres case

11 Junio - 2020

Torres is a family owned business with 150 years of history that had its international expansion in the 90's. Torres has the Familia Torres Foundation, which has a presence almost worldwide. Since the mid-eighties, the Foundation has collaborated with public and private organizations in over 400 cooperation projects around the world. Among all its activities, The Familia Torres Foundation activity has prioritized projects aimed at protecting children through building educational centers and foster homes for orphaned children at risk of social exclusion, but they are also concerned with eco & natural disasters.

Torres has received notable recognitions for their commitment to sustainability and renewable energy. Fair trade, innovation and sustainability are the company's pillars.

Ramón López-Doriga, Winer Marketing Manager of TORRES, and Nicole Kalemba, professor of the Marketing and Branding area at the UPF Barcelona School of Management, participated in this UPF-BSM webinar to talk about strategic marketing and how to socially position a brand can become an excellent competitive advantage.

For Torres, this position focuses on fair trade, innovation and sustainability as pillars of the company.

Ramón López-Doriga has explained us different marketing strategies companies follow and stated the main trends that are important for any consumer-centric company:

Health and wellness: for the wine industry, this related to people tending to alcohol moderation and avoidance, asks for natural and pure ingredients (flavor over AVB) & lighter/lower calorie options
Sensory and indulgence: companies have to create experiences, not just products. The social media experience is remarkable to: that's why companies need to make these experiences "sharable". Novel flavors & colors: as a business you always need to be innovative. Also, companies need to make life easier to the comsumer, saving them time and effort. This implies making webs easy and clean. Also, this applies to design and labelling: they need to be kept simple. Following this idea, companies also need to simplify their online purchase process
Personalization: brands need to make differentiated and unique products, to target specific life-style needs. Companies nowadays need to offer personalization. Ramon explained how they decorated bottles sold in Mexico with the most typical Mexican products and how this notably increased their sales in the country.
Trust and transparency: companies have to make their brands principles' known. These principals have to be easy to find in the website, be properly communicated and consistent.
Premiumization: this is related to making exclusive and unique products that differentiate from the mainstream, with trying to reach the consumer who is willing to pay more. This is achieved, essentially, through targeting and identifying those items that will make the product more valuable to this type of consumer. Things need to be communicated and done differently in premium business than in convenience business, and as a company, you can have different brands that target both types of business.
Sustainability and ethics: à companies have to make a true impact on the environment, and make it the rule, not the exception, minimizing the impact on the planet. Overall, the 46% of the consumer is interested in buying sustainable products, and the 22% of the consumer purchase is often influenced by how ethical, environmentally friendly and socially responsible you are as a brand. Millennials are highly concerned with sustainability and as a brand you have to be very careful not to do greenwashing but to be truly committed to the environment. Consistency is a key! If something is not perceived as real it could be very negative for the brand.