Brand changes have to be earned says CEO

EARN IT: Foodstuffs North Island CEO Chris Quin gave branding insights at The Icehouse end of year lunch at The Old Church in Meeanee. PHOTO/DUNCAN BROWN

A campaign to re-engage existing Telecom customers seemed too expensive at first when rebranding as Spark "but good stories are a good way to change a brand", former chief executive Chris Quin said.

Now CEO of Foodstuffs North Island, he spoke at the fourth Hawke's Bay end-of-year-lunch for business incubator The Icehouse, of which he is the chairman.

After Telecom found itself a retailer without infrastructure arm Chorus, many Telecom customers felt they were being taken for granted, he told the crowd at The Old Church in Meeanee.

Quin said a campaign was run giving them random prizes, with one prize a refund for every Telecom bill the winner had ever paid.

It was won by 76-year-old Pam from Te Kuiti, who bundled newspapers at night and ran an animal shelter during the day.

A week after being named the winner she rang Quin to ask if the prize would cover the $500 she needed to fix her car.

"I said, I'm relatively confident, but the reason we took a week to get to her was we had to go through her records. It was $38,000."

It wasn't just the company's name that changed, Quin said.

"We had a $100 million cost problem. We solved about half of that by changing the size of the business and removing the roles of 1200 people in six weeks."

It was done with dignity and respect "because we did not spend weeks or years having people on edge about when the axe was falling, so people could get on with their lives".

Fewer roles sped up the speed of change "two or three times" as the company restructured and changed its market position.

The company change was needed so the company could "earn the right to change the brand".

"If we had relaunched with Spark on top of what we were - the uncompetitive products, with the poor service, with the attitude - we would have failed completely. It would have been a waste of time and money and potentially would have been the death of the company," Quin said.

Also speaking at the lunch was Pic Picot of Pics Peanut Butter.

Based in Nelson with exports to Australia, China, UK and US, he said there was a "power" to basing the company in a smaller community.

"If we were based in Penrose nobody would give a toss," he said of Auckland's most industrialised suburb.

Smaller communities gave "phenomenal support" to local product "and know they are part of the reason we have done so well".

The Icehouse regional manager Michaela Vodanovich said since The Icehouse opened its Hawke's Bay branch in 2013 60 per cent of business undertaking a programme had released a new product or sales channel while 73 per cent had created at least one new role.