The Description Of Dunkin Donuts Since Beginning

The story of Dunkin’ Donuts began in 1948 with a donut and coffee chain in Quincy, Massachusetts, USA called “Open Kettle” (Boston Globe Media Partners, 2013). Founder William Rosenberg offers 5 cents and premium coffee for the donut at a price of 10 cents. In 1950, Rosenberg renamed his restaurant 'Dunkin' Donuts' with the goal of “make and serve the freshest, most delicious coffee and donuts quickly and courteously in modern, well-merchandised stores.' This concept still applies today (Dunkin’ Donuts, 2014).

In 1955, Dunkin' Donuts authorized the first of many franchises. Since then, the brand has developed to become the world's leading bakery and coffee chain with more than 12,500 restaurants global in 46 countries (Dunkin’s, n.d.). After reaching this milestone, in 1972, Dunkin' Donuts launched its iconic Munchkins® donut hole. In the years that followed, Dunkin' Donuts extended its menu choice to include a variety of food and beverage preferences to keep guests running throughout the day.

In the past few years, Dunkin' Donuts has full-grown at an accelerated rate and has set an ambitious plan to double the chain to 15,000 stores in the United States. As of November 2011, the brand has a Dunkin' for every 48,400 people. It hopes to expand to Southern California by 2015. On Sep 26, 2018, Dunkin' Deletes Donuts from Its Name (Romo, 2018).

Malaysia's first Dunkin' Donuts opened in Bukit Bintang, Kuala Lumpur in 1987. Today, there are more than 80 branches in Peninsular Malaysia and Sabah. They are committed to providing customers with a happy taste by providing fresh and quality products and excellent customer service (Golden Donuts Sdn. Bhd., n.d.).

Dunkin’s current IMC practices

First and foremost, Dunkin’ using the power of advertising to promote their campaign. Dunkin’ will be communicated as a healthy snack. The campaign will cover the evolution of your favourite donut from just “delicious” to “healthy and delicious”. In the media mix personal selling, with the help of “Donut Express”, Dunkin’ would localize the distribution of donuts and ensure delivery of donuts on demand via a phone call or online orders. Dunkin’ would organize promotional events targeting families and working adults.

In public relations, more leverage would be gained through the use of aggressive promotion that will help in gaining earned promotion in social media, local news channels and newspapers. Besides, for sales and promotion, kids will be rewarded with an additional mini donut if they earn A Grade in school • Dunkin’ having a campaign which is “Go Nuts with Dunkin Donuts” , if someone completes the task and the picture is uploaded on social media, they stand a chance to won personalise a donut from Dunkin’.

On social media, online delivery and facilities to be promoted on Twitter and Facebook. Twitter & Facebook campaign starts with #GoNutsWithDunkin where people post photo of something crazy that they’ve done. This is followed by #ShareYourDunk to promote pictures of people buying the new variety. Some food Bloggers will communicate the benefit and novelty of new variety of donuts. People are invited to share their healthy donut recipes and the best recipe translates into a new donut variety every month. Dunkin’ also paid for media newspapers and magazine, this is because most of the prevalent medium to maximize reach among their loyalty customers and new customers with special discount coupons and attractive to promote the new offering.

Additionally, they have putting some advertisement on television to promote their brand. Television is a medium that effectively reach the family as a whole Commercials to be telecast during the slots of family shows, in order to attract the attention of both parents and children. Commercial showing the transition from “delicious” to “healthy & delicious” snack by depicting imagery of how moms are now encouraging kids to have donuts.

Proposed IMC strategies

Dunkin’ can reach a large number of audience through Public Relations. Public relations helps the company to maintain the relationships between the organizations and the public. Besides, public relations can promote the company’s product through press releases or corporate anniversary parties. Dunkin’ can generate a positive brand image through PR efforts.

Dunkin’ should use sales promotion to increase their sales in a way of giving the consumer a discount of 15% coupon. In order to get Dunkin’ coupons, people would have to take pictures of themselves with the ball pits that is full of donuts and post them on Instagram with #Dunkin’. With a time sensitive, discount offer can boost short-term sales, attract new customer and protect the company’s budget.

Advertising can reach consumer geographically and transmit message to a large group. Dunkin’ should place their poster at noticeboard to gain consumer’s attentions and interest. Dunkin’ use poster and social media to reach more consumer broadly. A beautiful and eye-catching poster can catch the consumer’s attention and make them come closer to know more about the information of Dunkin’.

Guerrilla marketing is an advertising plan that emphases on low-cost budget and deliver maximum results that can lead to high profits. Dunkin’ set up a photo booth at shopping mall to develop brand awareness and recognition. The purpose of the photo booth is not only for consumer’s to take pictures but also to introduce the brand to the passer-by. When people saw the color or elements of the campaign, it will remind them of Dunkin’.

Proposed IMC activities

Social media plays an important role in our daily life. In today’s society, almost everyone have at least one social media account regardless their gender, age or even their occupation. Social media allows user to post feeds and sharing, share photos, check-in, and others activity that involve interaction with other users. These functions create a phenomena or trends for every social media users especially the youngsters.

With the phenomena of checking-in at certain location on social media, Dunkin’ are suggested to do a Guerilla marketing. We suggest Dunkin’ set a photo booth at the main hall of certain shopping mall around Malaysia that have Dunkin’s outlet and let their customer take photos and check-in the location with the hash tag #Dunkin’ to increase Dunkin’s brand awareness.

The photo booth concept can be a ball pit (picture1) full with doughnuts floats (picture 2) instead of colorful ball as Dunkin’s main products is doughnut. The background of the photo booth could be in orange and pink because it is Dunkin’s significance color. Customers can take photo in the colorful photo booth and check in on their social media account. By the exposure of those photos and hash tags, Dunkin’ will get their name know by others.

Besides, as it is an IMC campaign, Dunkin’ are also suggested to give out coupons to the people who post photo they take at the photo booth and hash tag Dunkin’ a 15% discount coupon for their next purchase in Dunkin’s outlet. By doing so, Dunkin’ are increasing their sales as well. The social media users who took photo and hash tag Dunkin’ can redeem their coupon and use the coupon in any outlet in Malaysia.

The campaign will continue on for a month. With the time limit, Dunkin’ can boost their sales as well as protect their company’s budget. In conclusion, we believe Dunkin’ will achieve their objective, develop brand awareness and increase sales with the guerilla marketing campaign.

Proposed IMC objectives

To develop brand awareness and recognition

Dunkin’ can promote their product via giving out coupon so that the consumers can have a cash back on the product and by trying the product, feedback can be given to improve the quality of their product. On the voucher, Dunkin’ can provide more information about their product which what is the current and latest product which is having promotion. Then, Dunkin can double-down on social media for example instagram. Instagram is a social media platform with power. They say a picture is worth a thousand words, and Instagram lets them promote their story via the image and post the text which is narrated. It is a great tool for friends and family to keep up with one another, and it’s just as good for brands reaching out for their consumers. By sharing on social media, consumers can get more information on the social media while they hashtag the Dunkin doughnut page. If it effectively reach the consumers, it will be giving a greater return on investment.

Increases sales

The purpose of Dunkin’ giving out the coupon is to increase the sales of the company. It give the consumer a theory of they need to spend with the coupon to get more discount and if they didn’t use it, the coupon will be a waste to them. To get the coupon, the people have to take a photo at the photo booth provided and hash tag the Dunkin’ page. By following the instruction above, the people can get a 15% discount coupon. This campaign held for one month and the people can claim it at the particular outlet. An amount of 300 coupons will be giving out to the early bird at every outlet. This have make the consumer to spend on their products.

Communicate information about the brand

The coupon that is given by Dunkin’ had provided a lot of information. The first information that is provided is they gave the information about the discount given. People will get benefits from the company, hence they will spread the messages out so does their friends and family will share the benefits with them. This message will keep on spreading that there is a coupon giving out until the promotion month is over. There is also some product information printed on the coupon so that the consumer can call the service center when they want to know more about the product.

Target audience

From its humble beginnings, donuts or doughnuts have become a favourite snack, and Dunkin' is one of the institutions that made the snack food popular on a global scale. Dunkin' is America's favourite food and all-day stop for coffee and cooked goods. It is a leading retailer of hot and iced regular caffeine by the glass in America and it also the largest espresso and baked goods chain on earth.

Dunkin’ primarily focus on the group of the public who enjoys the quick services from their services. Their targeted group is the public who in the age group of 18-45 years old who are affluent or working professionals. Their ideal customer is someone with a family enjoys the doughnuts plus coffee combination before getting start for his or her day. Besides, children also one of the big target group for them to targeted. Children act as influencers for Dunkin’. Children attracted by 52 varieties they have and the parents assured as freshness and kids’ health is guaranteed (Saraf. N, 2014).

Characteristics of concentrate on consumer for Dunkin’ caffeine have three characteristics which is age 18-25 years of age, age 25 years old above and family. They target the group age of 18-25 years old people is because this complete group is teenager pupil and young staff member and they are limited budget while targeted the group people who age 25 years old above is because they are heavy restaurant individual group credited to occupied working lifestyles and they have relatively high incomes and will be more versatile in their budgets. When people hurry the time go to work but famished, they'll go to Dunkin because Dunkin easy take away and replenishing the energy of these. Dunkin’s coffee is what people drink on the way to work while on the car (Studybay, 2018).

Competitor

The competitors of Dunkin have to divide into two parts, which doughnut (food) and coffee (beverages). Dunkin’s direct competitors are Krispy Kreme and Big Apple Donuts & Coffee, as these two companies are both targeting the same audience and serving the same needs, which is doughnut and coffee. Starbucks and McD Café are considered as indirect competitors, as they are serving coffee to target audience, similar to Dunkin as well.

Justification for IMC campaign

Dunkin’ will implement the IMC campaign with guerrilla marketing, coupons and social media. The main purpose of the campaign is to develop brand awareness and recognition. Dunkin’ can increase their reputation through creating the photo booth for the consumer to take picture and post in on social media. Not only the public who take part in the campaign know about Dunkin’ but the passer-by would notice Dunkin’ as well.

With the bright colors of the Dunkin’, the elements will attract the public’s eyes and create an impression in consumers’ mind. Therefore, the next time the public see the color pink and orange, they might think about Dunkin’.

In addition of the photo taking session, the public will definitely help to promote the Dunkin’ brand. As the public have to hash tag #Dunkin’ on their account, the exposure of the brand will increase. It will attract different group of audience as everyone have different social circle.

Besides, Dunkin’ will give out 15% discount coupons to customer who hash tag Dunkin’ on social media. We believed the coupon will boost sales for Dunkin’ as the coupon encourage the public to make purchase on their outlet. Dunkin’ serves different kind of food and beverages therefore the public can get anything they like with a cheaper price.

The coupons that Dunkin’ disseminate should include some important information such as location of the outlets, websites, contact information and menu to communicate information of the brand with the public. The public who would like to know more about Dunkin’ will take the initiative to know and understand more about the brand.

The Dunkin’ campaign not only provide benefits to Dunkin’s current customer, it might attract the potential customer as well. In conclusion, there are many ways to promote a brand, but we believed the Dunkin’ campaign will bring maximum impact to the public.