Dr. Oetker leads the way in the frozen pizza category with its Chicago Town and Ristorante brands but the market is highly competitive, with private label increasingly taking share.

The business had conducted several market segmentations but whilst the outputs were ‘interesting’ they hadn’t proved very useful. Our recommendation was to explore the market by occasion or, as the Ehrenburg Bass Institute would say, Category Entry Points.

An occasion-based segmentation enabled a robust market understanding and need state analysis. Brand planning enabled us to align the current range of products with occasions – identifying gaps for NPD to fill and opportunities for market communications.

For occasions with the most potential for the business, we conducted additional ethnographical and qualitative work to bring the segments to life.

By applying marketing science and a commonsense approach to the category, research provided the business with a competitive advantage.

Dr. Oetker: an increased slice of the market