Last week we looked at the role FOCUS played in the dramatic turnaround of the Crocs brand revitalisation. As a re-cap, the new brand strategy implemented in 2017 helped drive sales growth that was steady before accelerating in 2021. By 2023, revenue of $3billion was three times the pre-relaunch level. In this second post, we explore the brand positioning and digitally-led brand marketing of Crocs, drawing again on a Madfest keynote by Senior Marketing Director Yann Le Bozec (1).
1. BRILLIANT BRAND PURPOSE
We saw last week how Crocs zoomed in on a core positioning target of young people they called “Explorers”, interested in comfort and also self-expression. Blending insight on this core consumer and the brand, led to the definition of a new brand purpose:
To make everyone comfortable in their own shoes
Crocs brand purpose
This purpose is simple. It is also genius:
- “Comfortable” is both an important functional benefit and an emotional one
- “In their own shoes” again has a double meaning: being comfortable with who you and the desire to personalise
The the Crocs brand revitalisation flipped the negative of the shoe looking strange, some would say ugly, into a positive. It emphasises comfort and the self-confidence to wear something out of the ordinary, with your own personal stamp: the shoe becomes “a canvas for self-expression”.
2. DISTINCTIVE BRAND CAMPAIGN
The brand campaign inspired by the new purpose was called Come as You Are. This campaign “encourages people to share their uniqueness, kindness and generosity, something that is so important in our society today,” Terence Reilly, the brand’s Marketing Director, told Fashion Network back in 2017 (2).
The campaign brought to life the brand’s purpose, in addition to its fun, optimistic and colourful personality. The brand idea and campaign also tapped into the cultural trend of young people wanting to express their true selves, in contrast to the filtered, curated world of Instagram. The social media app Be Real perfectly captured this spirit.
3. CLEVER COLLABORATIONS
The brand campaign above played a role in the Crocs brand revitalisation, However, by itself this was unlikely to be enough to “re-wire” peoples’ brains and change the memory structure associated with the brand. To really challenge and change brand perceptions, Crocs harnessed the power of collaborations. This approach allowed the brand to benefit from the “borrowed memory structure” embedded in the collaborator, such as a celebrity.
A key success factor for a collaboration is having a truly distinctive product that a given celebrity feels a genuine connection to. This enables an authentic, extensive collaboration, rather than a simple, superficial ad campaign. This was the key that unlocked the first major Crocs collaboration, with fashion designer Christopher Kane during his spring/summer 2017 collection catwalk. “Crocs are arguably the most comfortable shoe, I love that they are slightly awkward and might be perceived by some as ‘ugly’. I wanted to bring my own stamp and DNA to Crocs’ classic clog,” the designer told Harpers Bazaar (3). The true passion of Kane for Crocs was reflected in the extent to which he used the brand’s shoes. “Almost every model was sent down the catwalk in a pair of the rubber sandals, embellished with gemstones,” Harpers reported.
The Christopher Kane colab was a first foundational building block of the Crocs brand revitalisation marketing approach. Seeing coverage of this colab in magazines including Vogue and Harpers raised the profile of the brand and encouraged other celebrities to consider a partnership. More than 60 collaborations have followed, including singer Post Malone. Again we see the power of finding a genuine connection between the brand and the celebrity. “I wear Crocs everywhere from the bar to the stage and I felt it was the perfect collaboration to get together with Crocs,” the singer explained (4). The special-edition Jibbitz reflected the singer’s personal taste, including one in the shape of the “Stay Away” tattoo he has above his eyebrow.
Beyond the high profile celebrity collaborations, the brand is also active with smaller influencers to raise the profile of the brand and make it aspirational (see below).
4. ACTIVE CONSUMER LISTENING
Yann Le Bozec talked a lot in his keynote about the time and effort put into listening to consumer feedback as part of the Crocs brand revitalisation. The key here is to not only listen but also act what you learn. And to do this quickly. One example he shared was responding to demand on social media to launch an adult version of the Lightening McQueen shoe, inspired by the character from the Pixar movie Cars (see below). Another was acting on the initiative of fans to create a Crocs day every October 23rd and then turn this into a month of celebrations called Croctober. During this month the brand runs special contests and reveals “drops” of new shoes.
5. RIGHT BRAND at the RIGHT TIME
Crocs revenues grew at c.10% for the three years following the 2017 re-launch. The step-change in sales didn’t come until 2021, when revenues jumped by almost 60%. Here, the brand benefited from the locked-down lifestyle forced on us by Covid. Suddenly, we were all stuck at home and comfort became a priority.“Once considered a fashion faux-pas, sales of Crocs soared in the first three-months of the year, as the brand celebrated record demand from shoppers seeking comfortable footwear during the pandemic,” The Guardian reported in 2021 (5).
Workers in hospitals were big buyers of Crocs, finding them comfortable footwear for days when they had to stand for long periods of time. The brand responded to this need with the Free Pair for Healthcare program. Crocs asked the public to nominate an incredible nurse or healthcare worker to receive a variety of free Crocs shoes. This campaign has now been running for four years with over 860,000 shoes donated (6). This is a great example of a social mission campaign that is rooted in the product. It helps a good cause whilst also driving trial with a key audience to “SMS” (sell more shoes!).
In conclusion, this second part of the Crocs brand revitalisation story shows the power of a clear purpose to inspire a distinctive marketing mix that drives reappraisal, including the power of authentic brand collaborations.
SOURCES
1. Madfest keynote by Yann Le Bozec
