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14 • FEBRUARY 8, 2016 ADVERTISING AGE

DID LOCTITE WIN AT GLUE?MAYBE, BUT GLUE WON MORE, PARTICULARLY GORILLA BY JACK NEFF

Loctite made a bold move last year, putting its entire $4.5 million TV budg-et and the vast majority of its paid media behind a single Super Bowl ad.

The somewhat surreal ad from Fallon showed people dancing to reg-gae hip-hop in Loctite fanny packs, pulling out glue and fixing stuff, includ-ing a magical winking unicorn brooch. And it featured the Henkel brand’s#WinAtGlue hashtag.

But did Loctite win at glue? A year’s worth of data shows the branddid a lot better after running the ad. Yet the glue category ultimately wonmore than Loctite. And rival Gorilla Glue won most of all, following avery different strategy by spending a little more than Loctite on a muchbroader media plan.

It’s hard to know exactly how much of a role Loctite’s single ad played.But it appeared to help the glue category, and Loctite specifically, both ofwhich were shuffling along before Henkel got into the big game last year.For the 52 weeks ended Oct. 5, 2014, overall category sales rose less than1% as Loctite fell 4.2%, according to IRI.

Loctite got a nice bounce after the Super Bowl, with sales up 8.6% forthe four weeks ended Feb. 22 versus the prior-year period. But strangely, thead seemed to give the whole category a nice bounce too, with sales up6.5% overall. Even stranger, Gorilla Glue, with no Super Bowl ad, did far bet-ter than Loctite: Its sales rose nearly 45% during Super Bowl month, morethan double its already robust prior growth rate.

For the full year ended Dec. 27, IRI shows Loctite sales rose a nice 6.7%.But it actually lost share, as the category rose 7.3%, led by Gorilla, whichsoared 36.2% and ended the year just shy of overtaking Loctite to becomeNo. 2 in the category, with sales of $44.1 million to Loctite’s $44.6 million.

Category leader Elmer’s, with sales up 2.7% to$148.5 million, saw its growth rate more than dou-ble vs. the previous year.

Loctite Marketing Director Pierre Tannouxsaid in an email that all-channel data includinghome-improvement stores show the brand doingbetter than IRI. The Super Bowl, he said, “definite-ly put us on the map,” increasing brand aware-

ness by 5 percentage points overnight. But he said “doing it again wouldprobably feel limiting,” adding that “we never intended to enter the‘club’ of guys who ‘have’ to be in the Super Bowl every year.” Explainingthe impact on the whole category, Mr. Tannoux said glue is rarely a“planned purchase,” and the activity around the Super Bowl showed retail-ers “if they just put Super Glue in front of shoppers, they sell more.”

Gorilla VP-Marketing and Innovation Mark Mercurio, a Procter &Gamble Co. alum, declined to comment on why his company is growingso fast, citing a preference to keep a low profile.

But iSpot.tv data show the brand spent $5.9 million on TV for theyear ended Jan. 21, more than the $4.5 million Loctite spent on the SuperBowl. Gorilla spread its buy over two lengthy stretches in the winter, springand fall, mostly on cable. Interestingly, Gorilla advertised during theDecember-to-February period last year, but not during those same peri-ods in 2014 or this year, so it seemingly extended its buy into the winterlast year to counter Loctite’s push.

Cincinnati-based Empower MediaMarketing handles media for Gorilla,which does creative in-house with help on a project basis on digital fromCuriosity Advertising Cincinnati.

Loctite’s Super Bowl ad scored 103.5 from Advertising Benchmark Index,which uses online consumer surveys to rate all ads on factors including like-ability and purchase intent. That put Loctite above the 100 average for allads, but below the 108.5 average for TV, and its purchase-intent score wasa well-below-average 90.4. In comparison, most Gorilla Glue ads scoreabove 120 with ABX, particularly on purchase intent; one showing a cou-ple talking about fixing an Adirondack chair scored 230.

Loctite’s Super Bowl ad “was a charming ad and cute creative concept,but it didn’t really break through,” said Jeri Smith, CEO of Communicus,which tested last year’s Super Bowl ads with consumers. Loctite’s wasrecalled by only 13% of people after the game, Ms. Smith said, versus43% ad recall for the average Super Bowl ad, and only 5% of people remem-bered what brand it was for.

It’s possible, she said, that “the commercial made a lot of peoplethink about glue and how handy it is to have around” but “Gorilla has donesuch a good job ... with its other communications that it was more stickyin people’s minds when they got to the point of sale.”

SUPER BOWL DELIVERS BIG FOR AVOCADOS, WEATHERTECHSuper Bowl advertising isn’t an exactscience but Avocados from MexicoPresident Alvaro Luque says the tradegroup’s 2015 ad helped sales soar33% for the fiscal year ended inJune. So he re-upped for this year.

Mexico has the U.S. avocado mar-ket cornered during winter, and theSuper Bowl long has been big forgrowers because of people making guacamole for the game. ButMr. Luque credits Super Bowl advertising with helping drive salesup 21% for the four weeks preceding last year’s game and another25% during the pre-game period so far this year.

Super Bowl ads also worked wonders for WeatherTech the pasttwo years, leading to a third buy this year. WeatherTech CEO DavidMacNeil pointed to a 46% year-over-year increase in visits toWeatherTech.com in 2015 and a 26% increase in phone inquiriesover the previous year. Sales grew by a double-digit percentage forthe second straight year, he added. The Super Bowl, though, onlyrepresents 7% of the company’s total marketing budget. —JACK NEFF,

WITH ADDITIONAL REPORTING FROM CRAIN’S CHICAGO BUSINESS

For a closerlook at the

gamble Loctitemade on the biggame, see ourfirst season of‘Anatomy of An

Ad: A SuperBowl Virgin’ atAdAge.com/

anatomyofanad1

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