Meet No Frills, the Grocery Chain With an 8-Bit Game, an Anime Ad, and a Spotify Album
No Frills’ powerful campaign offers more than cheap thrills
Why would a writer in India pen a piece on a Canadian grocery chain?
The fact that I‘ve heard of No Frills and No Name Brands is itself a marketing triumph for a store that doesn’t have to stretch its marketing budget across the swathes of the internet. And while India has its share of marketing genius with online retailer Flipkart’s iconic kidult advertisements, few embody the spirit of marketing better than No Frills.
It’s almost as though the folks at No Frills decided to tick off every single option in the marketing checklist while championing a message of glorified smart buyers who saved on every purchase.
A Twitter handle that made Wendy’s blush? Check.
A full-blown comic strip with a diverse cast? Check.
A Spotify album with tracks on social distancing? You bet.
As a subsidiary of Loblaws Companies Limited (Canada’s largest food distributor with a heritage spanning a whole century), No Frills didn’t have to step up its marketing to earn its spot in the minds of Canadian buyers. Right from 1978, No Frills’ first store was built on a promise: the lowest possible price. Scores of generic No Name items in the now-iconic yellow and black packaging made ripples across Canada.
Despite being cheaper than national alternatives, a 1989 Toronto Star taste testing panel ranked No Name’s freshly roasted ground coffee fourth in the country. No Frills achieved the impossible. It fostered an unwavering brand loyalty to unbranded products.
No Frills won’t be beat
With a name like No Frills, an elaborate marketing campaign most certainly sounded like a frill. But its efforts have paid off, with strong engagement across several online platforms despite being in the clutches of a pandemic. Even without their significant digital efforts, No Frills has always been a mainstay of the Canadian grocery scene. Here’s how they stayed ahead of the pack:
- Nothing screams No Frills as much as their line of generic-branded products, aptly named No Name. It soon became a key differentiator in the grocery wars.
- With several national alternatives, No Name had to pull no punches in pricing to stay competitive.
- A rock-solid supply chain that lets No Frills save at every intersection.
- Canada hosts an incredible number of international students and immigrants who arrive with hefty student loans and a burning desire to cut costs at every opportunity. Their grocery chain of choice is no surprise.
- In the event that a product was cheaper in a competing store, No Frills would stomach the extra cost to sell a similar item at a lower price.
Despite these advantages over local rivals, No Frills faced stiff competition from a discount renaissance spurred by American stores in Canada like Walmart and Costco. In 2017, No Frills decided to swim with the sharks but on its own terms. It teamed up with John St. and launched a new campaign focusing on how the chain cut down on needless extravagance to give customers what they really needed — the lowest prices.
A year later, the chain that prided itself on unbranded goods gave its customers a new label: Haulers. The move paid off, with a meteoric rise in social engagement (over 91 percent) and a healthy 12 percent spike in sales. With limited-edition Hauler shirts at their HaulerShop flying off digital shelves, No Frills was on to something.
No Frills. No Name. No nonsense
With a creative approach rarely seen in grocery chain warfare, No Frills wore its identity right on its yellow sleeve. Getting the frill out of your bill didn’t just make you cheap, it now made you savvy. Amidst the onslaught of discount hunting across online stores, No Frills carved a niche for itself. But its unconventional methods wouldn’t have the kind of reach that a digital approach would.
No Frills decided to set its sights on the Gen-Z demographic, a group of individuals who craved identity without breaking the bank. With power moves like a quirky Twitter handle, an anime ad, and a Spotify album, they got my attention. And that’s despite living continents away from its target demographic. As a deal hunter who scours the internet for the best tech deals out there, I soon had a No Frills-shaped hole in my heart.
Here’s how the Canadian discount grocer approached the looming tide of social media:
- A brilliant Twitter handle with captions that were crisp while delivering a chuckle. It carried forward the no-nonsense philosophy of No Frills’ product descriptions.
- A hilarious Haulin’ State of Mind album on Spotify with tracks like Bag It Up and Low Bills reached thousands of avid listeners in their homes.
- A minimal 8-bit videogame let customers earn loyalty points for their next No Frills visit by avoiding frills like diamonds and gold in the game.
- A comic book-esque addition to the team in yellow, “The Haulerverse” turned regular shoppers into heroes in search of the cheapest loot. Inspired by pop culture, No Frills managed to entice customers into adopting a yellow cape to become one of four unique deal slingers.
- A nimble No Frills anime advertisement using the same protagonists featured in The Haulerverse firmly established the elite four in the minds of its customers. The ad nailed the suave and chic No Frills aesthetic.
While I wanted to go into these moves in-depth, I decided to take a no-frills approach and let you see No Name at work for yourselves. While I might not be heading to Canada anytime soon, I know where I’ll be doing my grocery shopping from. No Frills, you’ve got yourself one more customer.
Key Takeaways
- Own your brand. No Frills owned its identity and built its entire campaign around one core principle: to save is to be savvy. It differentiated itself from its competitors who were investing heavily into ambience and fluff that could indirectly affect prices.
- Stick to your ideals, no matter the cost. Even if competing stores offered products for less, none had No Frills’ policy of ensuring price parity.
- Pick your battles. Instead of hunting down the premium crowd who didn’t spend their lives looking for the best deals, No Frills chose to market to an audience that was actively involved in said deal hunts.
- Use every medium at your disposal. While not every No Name marketing move would have hit its stride, advertisements across platforms both virtual and physical concocted a potent mix that was hard to ignore. Even if one of their efforts went viral, the rest would keep the hype train moving.
- Tone is everything. With a quirky display of self-awareness, No Frills’ marketing comes off as effortless while connecting with Gen-Z customers across borders.
- Consistency is key. The yellow and black product descriptions paved the way for No Frills’ distinct branding, making its products recognizable from afar.
