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BRANDED
<
John Noonan (right), sales and marketing director at Flahavan’s,
with the company’s chairman, John Flahavan
Traditional porridge oats
maker Flahavan’s has
tapped into recent healthy
eating and convenience
trends to create a whole
hen high-profile personalities such as
new market for itself.
Sorcha Corcoran reports
W
Demi Moore, Naomi Campbell and Bill
Gates went public about their love of
porridge in recent years it was part of
what John Noonan (MMII), sales and
marketing director at Flahavan’s, calls
the “porridge renaissance”. Within a
few years the oat-based breakfast had shaken off its old-
fashioned image and gained appeal among a new genera-
tion of younger consumers.
Embracing this movement, Flahavan’s, which can trace its
OATS
history back to an oats mill in Kilmacthomas in the late
1700s and remains a family-owned company, repositioned
itself with a strong brand focus, market segmentation and
the introduction of 18 new products in drums, sachets and
pots, 16 of which are still available. The broader Flahavan’s
range includes a real fruit porridge range and a selection of
oat biscuit snacks.
“When I joined Flahavan’s in the late Nineties, the porridge
market was homogenous – there was one main type and all
brands were sold in the same format, a bag. There was also
very little segmentation taking place. The two challenges we
Volume 4 Issue 1 2010 Marketing Age 29
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