Marketing Mix Strategies of Red Bull and Lucozade Energy Drinks Report

This report provides a comparative analysis of the marketing strategies employed by Red Bull and Lucozade, focusing on their application of the marketing mix (4Ps: Product, Price, Place, and Promotion). The report utilizes secondary research to evaluate how each brand targets its market, develops its product offerings, sets its pricing, distributes its products, and promotes its brand. The analysis examines the target markets of both companies, highlighting how Lucozade initially targeted mothers and athletes before expanding to a broader demographic, while Red Bull focused on young, active males and has expanded its reach. The report explores the product features, pricing strategies, distribution channels, and promotional activities of each brand, concluding that while both companies effectively utilize the 4Ps, Red Bull has achieved greater success through innovative marketing tactics and content creation. The report also includes references to relevant academic journals and online resources, and includes a visual representation of the product placement.

Principles of Marketing

EXECUTIVE SUMMARY
The report main purpose was to identify the marketing strategies of both Red Bull and
Lucozade and how they apply the marketing mix techniques to spread brand awareness. Also,
to find out this information the report has made use of secondary research method to gather
appropriate results regarding which brand has been successfully applied the 4P's. It has been
found that both made great efforts in applying the marketing mix but the one who has applied
it very effectively was Red Bull.

INTRODUCTION
This report aims at demonstrating 4P’s of marketing mix in Lucozade Energy
company comparing it with Red Bull. Lucozade is a soft drink manufactured by the Japanese
company Suntory and marketed as a range of sports and energy drinks. The company was
established in UK by name Glucozade by Newcastle pharmacist. On the other hand, Red Bull
energy drink is sold by Red Bull GmbH, an Australian firm and acquires the biggest market
share of any energy drink in the world, with 6.302 billion cans sold in a year. Further, based
on secondary research this report will cover marketing mix of these two companies.
Finding
 Comparison of target market :- target market in marketing refers to a group of
customers. These groups are segmented on the basis of various factors such as
demographic, psychographic, behavioural, etc. Companies segment these groups
based on the product they sell. The Lucozade drink is used to boost ill or unwell
children’s energy at first and the organisation’s target market was mothers, therefore,
its first ad in 1960. Later, it was found that the brand aimed at athletes and sports
people therefore date displayed Olympic decathlon Champion advertisement. The
company wanted to target at new Market segment which is Teenagers. In recent years
it has been discovered that the latest target customers of the company are men aged
between 18 to 30, since the brand bids to widen its audience beyond the sports
performance market (Ang and Rusli,2018).
Red Bull company took many merchandising ideas from an energy drink in Thailand
called Krating Daeng. The company’s strategy has not paid attention on promoting the
popular energy drinks, rather focuses on creating a brand image that symbolises a distinct
lifestyle and audience. Further, their advertisements purpose was to build a brand preference
for Red Bull within Generation Y’s young active males as the major source of revenue.
Moreover, to attract and maintain secondary target market of older males who requires
energy to maintain their heavy workloads.
 Product :- the product refers to a commodity or service that the market derives the
desired benefits from. This is considered as the basis for all marketing efforts as it is
by having it the company justify their existence in the market. Further, the product
refers to the features that are in it and that are used to satisfy customer needs.
Lucozade is a glucose carbonated drink which is highly intense source of energy

which is rapidly assimilated into the bloodstream. The company offers 4 product
lines; Lucozade, Lucozade energy, Lucozade sports and Lucozade alert. The firm’s
product is particularly designed to boost the energy levels among its customers. The
company also changed its tag from original to energy drink. Based on Akar’s brand
personality the organisation’s personality is sincerity.
On the other hand, Red Bull keeps it marketing mix little bit simple. For this the
company has introduced series of flavours to suit various customers preferences &
taste. It energy drinks are consists of caffeine, taurine, vitamin B, sucrose & glucose.
Further, due to decrease in demand for carbonated drinks and increasing shift towards
energy drinks, the organisation has achieved greater success. According to Akar’s the
company’s personality is competence (Beke and Bach, 2017).
According to Levitt’s product life cycle model there are 5 product levels:
Levels Lucozade Red Bull
Core benefits Carbohydrate with sodium
in drinks is the source of
energy.
Provides nutrients, B
vitamins, increases heart
rate to boost energy.
Generis product It’s product contains
carbonate water, glucose,
citric acid, flavours,
antioxidant and colours.
Carbonate water, baking
soda, sucrose & glucose
and magnesium
carbonate.
Expected product Provides rehydration after
sickness(Thieu, Hieu and
Hoang, 2017).
Three basic needs that the
company fulfils i.e.
physical, social and
individual.
Augmented product It provides energy through
tablets to make energy
provision easy.
The product delivers on
its value proposition.
Potential product The company efforts to
deliver beyond customer
expectation through Zero
Sugar.
The company set itself
beyond label and
transforming into a full
blown media company.

 Price :- as being historical organisation, Lucozade has achieved more experience
about how to decrease the cost of making, therefore, it is inexpensive as compared to
Red Bull. Whereas, because of high quality and dominant market position, Red Bull
charges a premium price for its products.
Lucozade company Red Bull
As the company offers lower prices to
its customer, this help it to attract more
customers. This states that the firm
understand the consumer psychology
which is very much important in making
sure that the pricing strategy comprised
leads to the generation of expected
outcomes.
Euro .70 to 1.30 per 100 ml
As, the company being on top can easily
charge higher premium price for their
drinks and buyer will even purchase it
for their quality.
Euro 1.35 to 2.02 per 100 ml
The comparison states that, the pricing strategy of Lucozade is economy or no frill
low price and pricing strategy of Red Bull is premium for its products (Fan, Lau and
Zhao, J 2015).
 Place :- the P of marketing is very dynamic and rapidly moving areas, as wide variety
of fascinating areas are covered in it that are largely concerned with the movement of
goods from A to B and what happens at the point of sale. Lucozade has an active team
of members that make sure that the goods are stocked in retail outlets such as
supermarkets, shopping malls, hypermarkets, including schools, gyms, sports centre,
etc. The company also acquires an efficient distribution system & this hold it’s
consumers satisfied with the brand. On the other hand, Red Bull has presence in over
171 countries and it was found that it managed to sell 61 billion cans worldwide by
2018. Its products are available at supermarkets, grocery stores, nightclubs etc.
therefore, by this way it becomes easy for customers to purchase the drinks by Red
Bull. The below image show the stock of both Lucozade and Red Bull drinks in retail
store (Khan, 2014).

Illustration 1: Soft Drinks in C-store
(Sources: The soft drinks space race. 2017)
 Promotion :- this is another important element of marketing mix and it majorly
includes the communication regarding the products to the market. Through various
way Lucozade promotes it’s energy drinks such as; advertising, promotional
campaigns, and direct selling. Further, they spread awareness through advertising by
using newspapers, and magazines (Festa, Cuomo, Metallo and Festa, 2016). Apart
from this, it also involves popular social websites on the internet in order to be more
effective across young people. In addition, the do celebrity endorsement. Whereas,
millions of dollars is spend by Red Bull annually on promoting it’s products through
proper mix of ATL, BTL and digital channels for spreading awareness. Other than
this, it was also discovered that the company has Red Bull House of art where is
inspires the artist to display their art in a time of 3 months at their exhibition. In
addition, the company has Red Bull TV present in PCs, mobiles, and tablets that
shows various music festivals, movies, & videos (Filbert and Anthony, 2018).
CONCLUSION
It has been concluded that among the countless energy drink brands, Red Bull stands
out both nationally and internationally. The company's marketing team has greatly utilized
modern marketing strategies such as social media & events in order to reach their customers.
On the other hand, as Lucozade has been the market leader in the filed of energy drink the

company has a history of bold, remember-able and iconic advertising. Lucozade has chosen
this way of implementing 4P's because it wants to create trust among customers. Whereas
Red Bull have applied the 4P's in this way in order to capture customer's attention. Based on
findings, Red Bull has been most successful in its implementation of 4P's. Red Bull can
improve its 4P's by using sponsoring or creating events and Lucozade can improve its
marketing mix by placing its products at more visible places. Therefore, the overall report
stated that both successfully cracked and used it well to communicate with their customers.
But Red Bull seems to be brilliant and content marketing has helped the brand to achieve
heights and make a loyal customer base.

REFERENCES
Books & Journal
Ang, C. and Rusli, H., 2018. The Impact of Marketing Mix 4Ps and Consumer Behavior
toward Purchase Decision of Adidas Products. iBuss Management. 6(2).
Beke, G. and Bach, C., 2017. Demystifying McCarthy’s 4 P’s Of The Marketing Mix; To Be
Or Not To Be. Industrial Marketing Management. 26(1). pp.1-13.
Fan, S., Lau, R. Y. and Zhao, J. L., 2015. Demystifying big data analytics for business
intelligence through the lens of marketing mix. Big Data Research. 2(1). pp.28-32.
Festa, G., Cuomo, M. T., Metallo, G. and Festa, A., 2016. The (r) evolution of wine
marketing mix: From the 4Ps to the 4Es. Journal of Business Research. 69(5). pp.1550-
1555.
Filbert, A. and Anthony, W., 2018. The Impact of Marketing Mix of 4Ps (Product, Price,
Place, and Promotion) towards Repurchase Intention with Customer Satisfaction as the
mediator: In the Case of Uniqlo. iBuss Management. 6(2).
Khan, M. T., 2014. The concept of'marketing mix'and its elements (a conceptual review
paper). International journal of information, business and management. 6(2). p.95.
Thieu, B. T., Hieu, N. T. M. and Hoang, N. V., 2017. Linkages between Marketing Mix
Components and Customer Satisfaction: An analysis on Google in Hanoi,
Vietnam. Journal of Economics & Business Research. 23(1).
Online
The soft drinks space race. 2017. [Online]. Available on:
<https://www.conveniencestore.co.uk/advice/products-in-depth/the-soft-drinks-space-race/
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