Evian is world famous for its viral videos featuring babies. Roller Babies, released in early July 2009, was viewed online nearly 25.7 million in its first six weeks. That was a headline making result then and two years later, with 65.5 million views it entered the Guinness Book of World Records as the most watched advertising video. Currently, its two main YouTube versions (US and international), have reached more than 115 million views.
But, during Roller Babies’ first year, Evian’s worldwide sales dropped 25%.
Evian has continued to make baby videos and most have scored highly on the viral charts. Baby & Me, launched in April last year, is sitting on 90.2 million views plus change. A Spiderman version of Baby & Me, launched in April 2014 to coincide with the release of The Amazing Spider-Man 2, has already had 20+ million views.
And parent, Danone, also produced a custom-designed Spiderman bottle to promote the Spiderman film. The bottles were given as gifts at the premiere and although they were not produced on a commercial scale, Danone reported at the time that it plans to launch more special edition bottles in the future.
During the Baby & Me campaign, Evian’s sales outpaced those of the global water market, which was down 3%.
During that period too, Danone also began updating Evian’s packaging. In July 2013, Evian was given its first new bottle since 1991 - a 'lable-less' look with a 'simplified, elegant reduction of the previous logo design.' ...and a bottle shape reminiscent of competitor, Smartwater.
This month, Evian has returned to the front of the packaging pack.
It created a small PET bottle with a water drop shape and neither a cap nor labeling. The ‘drop bottle’ has a peel-off lid and the Evian branding moulded on to the bottle.
To create the new bottle, 30,000 samples were appraised, 32 industrial trials were carried out, 38 suppliers were involved, and three patents were registered.
According to Frédéric Jouin, director of the Danone Research Packaging Center, the new bottle was not intended to replacing traditional mineral water bottles. “The Evian Drop does not canabilise what is on offer in the market. This bottle is a quick, light solution to instantly quench a consumers thirst while on the move.” It is currently available in France and will launch in the UK in weeks.
One of the main beneficiaries of the new bottle in particular, and Evian’s focus on more sustainable packaging in general, is the planet. Evian is now producing six million bottles per day and has reduced its packaging carbon footprint by 40% in eight years. With Evian bottles filled at the rate of one every three seconds, and 12 PET parallel production lines plus one glass line at the Evian plant in France, that is a worthy accomplishment.
Jouin commented, “We produce these new designs for the consumers and aim to excite them through our packaging innovation. We are striving to make sure what we are going to deliver is what the consumer is expecting to get. We were the first company to switch from glass bottles to plastic, and in 20 years our production has grown four-fold.
“We have reduced the carbon footprint of our packaging by 40% in eight years. We are always pushing for lightweighting but sometimes customers have certain specifications that set limits on the design.”
