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•152 The 100 Greatest Business Ideas of All Time

2 Check the critical questions specific to the ad:
• Does this advertisement fit the strategy?
• Will it work?

Idea 86 – Correcting a myth (Kellogg’s)

Here is an example of a great business idea from the 1980s. From the middle of the
decade, Kellogg’s All-Bran had a problem. Although consumers still recognised the
benefits of fibre, they were switching from All-Bran to tastier foods, which they felt
contained as much fibre as All-Bran but were more exciting to eat.

An ad campaign was designed to address this by concentrating on the fact that
All-Bran contains more fibre than most of the other foods that people perceive as
being rich in fibre. For example, a single bowl of All-Bran contains as much fibre as
nine slices of brown bread.

The voice over of the ad went ‘It’s a fact that nine out of ten people still aren’t
eating enough fibre. So it’s worth knowing that in every bowl of Kellogg’s All-Bran
there’s about as much fibre as you’d find in nine nutritious slices of brown bread.’

The visual background to this is a hand putting the second slice of brown bread
into a toaster. The toaster eventually pops and nine slices of bread leap into the air.
The camera follows the toast then cuts to an empty cereal bowl beside a packet of
Kellogg’s All-Bran. The nine slices then land in the bowl and the frame is frozen.

Volumes, according to Kellogg’s, which were declining at the rate of about
10% per annum, increased by 8% in 1990 and 14% in 1991, the two years following
this great idea.

Idea 87 – Double doses (Alka-Seltzer)

The Austrian psychologist Herta Herzog was working for the Jack Tinker agency in