MUMM'S SELF-DISCOVERY

Published: 23 July, 2008

By Jack Hibberd

Allied Domecq is aiming to reinvigorate Mumm Champagne and take it back to the glory days of the late '80s' with a new marketing plan and strapline: The Champagne with a taste for discovery.' According to Vincent Gillet, UK country manager for Champagnes at Allied, the brand will get new packaging, and will benefit from a 100% increase in the (undisclosed) marketing budget. Also central to the new campaign will be the launch of a premium cuve, due this summer, and a prestige cuve (with a probable launch date of autumn 2006). At the moment, 97% of our volume is Cordon Rouge and only 3% from the premium range [currently vintage and Cramant de Mumm],' said Gillet. Over the next five years, we want to try and lift that to 13%.' All activities supported by an extensive, mainly below-the-line campaign will celebrate a range of extraordinary human achievements across the fields of sport and exploration'. The emphasis of the new campaign was born out of the work of an historian who last year discovered that the Mumm family (particularly Georges Mumm) had a history of sponsoring explorers and pioneers, such as Captain Jean-Baptiste Charcot. Mumm suffered a 36% fall in sales by volume and 30% by value last year, mainly due, according to Gillet, to stopping trading with a number of customers where the brand was heavily discounted in the run-up to Christmas in 2003. Sales in the main multiples were healthy.'

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