Dutch Lady: Product Positioning, SWOT, and Marketing Overview

This report provides a comprehensive analysis of Dutch Lady's product positioning and marketing strategies within the dairy industry. It begins with an overview of Dutch Lady's product offerings, brand commitments, and brand equity, highlighting its market leadership in Malaysia. The report then details the company's product positioning process, including understanding the target audience, identifying product features, and analyzing unique selling propositions. A comparative analysis of Dutch Lady with industry competitors is presented, followed by a detailed SWOT analysis that examines the company's strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and threats. The report also explores Dutch Lady's marketing and sales strategies, including its online presence, e-commerce platform, social media engagement, and customer interaction methods. The analysis covers the product life cycle, pricing strategies, and the company's efforts to maintain and improve its market position. Overall, the report emphasizes Dutch Lady's focus on healthy products, affordable pricing, and strategic marketing approaches to maintain its competitive edge and adapt to market challenges.

7.0 Product Positioning
7.1 Overview
The main thing that distinguished Dutch Lady from other competitors is the healthy products
that are offered. Dutch Lady offers a variety of products that range from Low Fat Yoghurt,
UHT milk, sterilized milk, pasteurized milk, creamers, joy juice, and growing up milk.
Originally, the brand name was called Dutch Baby, but they changed it to Dutch Lady in
1984 to increase the likelihood of favour in product positioning. The brand's commitments
are: "Goodness for Life", "To Gain Knowledge", and "To Gain Experience". In fact, the
company has won the brand equity awards for liquid milk. Hence, it increased the customer's
recognition of its product. Furthermore, it also facilitated its expansion into international
markets. Since there is a high level of brand awareness and loyalty, it has very high brand
equity. To prove this, it is apparent the amount of shelf space Dutch Lady owns in a
supermarket based on the picture below.
Dutch Lady Milk Industries Berhad is known to be the leader in Malaysia's quality branded
dairy business. With that, the company put in extra effort to create and market high-quality

products to satisfy customers' need. The company believes that there will be more strives to
improve its processes to deliver nutritious and high-quality products to its customers in
product innovation. Hence, the following product positioning process is implemented:
Step 1: Know the target audience
Step 2: Identify the product features
Step 3: Unique selling proportions
Step 4: Know your competitors
Step 5: Ways to promote the brands
Step 6: Maintain the position of the brand
However, every product launched by Dutch Lady has experienced a product life cycle:
There are four stages such as introduction, growth, maturity and decline. Although its
products are not long-lasting in the market, it has successfully earned some profits during the
growth stage. When Dutch Lady's product reaches the decline stages, it has to think of a
promotion strategy to maintain its product positioning in the market. If the sales still drop
after that, then Dutch Lady shall innovate and research new products to launch in the market.
Regarding that, the product life cycle occurs in every product; therefore, thinking of a way to
increase the growth period to maximize the profit is encouraged.

7.2 Comparison with the Industry
Product Offering Dutch Lady Other dairy products
manufacturer
Brand name Dutch Lady (high brand
equity)
Frisolac, Friso, Completa,
Omela, and Joy
Varieties of milk
There are many varieties of
milk for different target
markets such as children,
men and women. Varieties
as following:
-UHT milk (introduced)
-Sterilized milk
-Pasteurized milk
-Juicy milk
-Low-fat Hi Calcium milk
-Full cream milk
-Growing up milk.
-Family milk powder
-Milk and dairy products
with fewer varieties
Uniqueness
-Cheaper and affordable
price with the use of
penetration, psychological
and promotional pricing
strategy.
-Low fat and low sugar.
-Target market of any
gender, children and adults
-Mostly only use
promotional pricing strategy
when the sales of products
are underwhelming.
-Some use more sugar for
the audiences to taste better.
-Specific target market,
some specifically for
children; some for women
only.
Flavoured milk -Chocolate flavoured milk
-Strawberry flavoured milk
-Coffee flavoured milk
-Kurma flavoured milk
-Does not have much
flavoured milk; most
common would be chocolate
flavoured milk

8.0 SWOT Analysis
Beneficial Harmful
Internal factor
Strengths(S)
- Diversified product
range. It has formulated
milk powder, liquid milk,
and yoghurts with different
flavours, for example, full
cream, chocolate,
strawberry, low fat, date and
banana.
- Quality control and
assurance as it emphasizes
on health, taste,
convenience, and reliability.
The production is also
HALAL-certified and
complies with Halal
standards and JAKIM
requirements.
- It has a low-cost structure
as it uses the penetration
pricing strategy for market
acceptance.
Weaknesses(W)
-Although Dutch Lady is the
first to discover UHT
processing for milk.
However, it lacks product
awareness because most
Malaysians do not know
about UHT milk, and there
is minimal information.
-It does not have direct
market experience. They
cannot get feedback and
information from
consumers, so it is hard to
improve on what's lacking to
maximize customers'
satisfaction.
-There is also controversy
in social media. There is an
accusation of Dutch Lady
selling expired milk;
although it might be false
allegations, but it had
damaged the reputations.

External factor
Opportunities(O)
-Dutch Lady may expand
the nutritional benefit to a
wider range of products.
Only Dutch Lady is certified
with the logo of Malaysia's
Healthier Choice Logo.
With a broader range of
products, consumers who
emphasize healthy food will
be attracted.
-Dutch Lady has the
potential to be expanded to
other countries; it has
reached market saturation in
Malaysia. It can consider
exporting to other Islamic
countries such as Indonesia,
Saudi, Pakistan because it is
"Halal" certified.
Threats(T)
-Dutch Lady has fierce,
strong multinational
competitors. There are gaps
in the product range sold by
Dutch Lady; Nestle has ice
cream chocolates and
cereals.
-Dutch Lady faces
economic problems due to
the movement control order
(MCO). The workforce was
decreased by 33% in the
first quarter of 2020.
-Consumers are finding
alternatives to replace
Dutch Lady; some of them
are seeking for all-natural
products.

9.0 Marketing & Sales
Dutch Lady products are not only available in the retail stores in Malaysia but also accessible
online. It has provided convenience to the consumers who are lazy to travel. The products are
marketed and sold in physical retail stores and their e-commerce store. Dutch Lady has
collaborated with the physical retail stores to advertise its online e-commerce platform. There
would be perks for consumers who sign up in a limited time to promote.
Firstly, Dutch Lady has developed their own app named "Dutch Lady mobile", specifically
for delivery service and promotion updates limited only for app users. A Dutch Lady delivery
service would be appealing considering the current situation (MCO); this has created
convenience as many people have difficulties traveling to the convenience store to buy Dutch
Lady milk. Some people live very far from the convenience store. Milk is also very
demanded in the market as it is our need. With the delivery service provided, consumers may
no longer need to travel to buy milk; this will also reduce the risk of getting Covid-19.
Other than that, Dutch Lady has created personalized social media page on Facebook,
Instagram, or other social media and advertising through the pages created. As a result of the
large number of people browsing the internet and social media during the lockdown, Dutch
Lady's social media pages have reached four thousand followers and likes. Many people are
aware of the Dutch Lady brand online, even people from overseas. Also, Dutch Lady utilized
this advantage to create trends and promotions using "hashtags"; the users who like, share,
and comment on the "hashtag" topic to win the prizes, discounts, and rebates. With the
appropriate interactions with consumers, it is assumed to reach a million likes and followers
on the page. Consequently, this created brand awareness and more people will know about it.
Dutch Lady also posts the latest product news and updates regularly on their social media
pages so that the consumers will get updated of the special promotions or products launched;
this also helped increase its product life cycle.
In accordance with that, Dutch Lady has created a platform on its page specifically for the
consumers to leave their reviews and feedback. Like, share, and comment on the trend, but
also to review to earn prizes. With that, Dutch Lady knows the consumers' behavior and

preferences. Also, it is a two-way interaction between the Dutch Lady and the consumers, not
just consumers knowing about Dutch Lady. Consequently, Dutch Lady learned how and what
to improve on to produce a higher quality product for the consumers. For instance, Dutch
Lady is developing a "durian" flavored milk because most consumers like durians.
Overall, the Dutch Lady's main unique selling proposition is its cheap and affordable
products, the use of healthy ingredients, and reduction in sugar usage in their products.