Food often speaks for itself, but certain sorts of grub grab more attention when they have promotional support as a generous ingredient. Hidden Valley values the benefits of granting greater attention to products to produce profits and aimed to prove there is no messing with a prized dressing March 10, launching an eponymous ranch outlet store through flavourgallery.com.
The web-based homage to Americans’ favorite salad topper debuted on National Ranch Dressing Day, honoring the entity’s January-initiated Ranch Out campaign. The apparel-centric site finds Hidden Valley eager to encourage consumers to consider the inspirational item as a friend to more than fiber providers, including fries, pizza and wings, and merits a discussion on how blatant and blunt that companies, especially culinary-heavy ones, decide to be when strategizing how to hawk their goods.
Many industry presences, frankly, choose to go logo-heavy when presenting their commercial vision, but a visit to Flavour Gallery’s Hidden Valley section makes clear that associate director of marketing Jacquie Klein and her peers just want ranch’s fans to be fashionably at ease as they continue to “dip, dunk and drizzle.” While brand lovers can show their true colors by buying a $50 faux jewel-encrusted bottle of ranch or a $100 ranch fountain, both of which could draw either nods for originality or dismissive reactions over their very existence, they will likely look to the garb to display their allegiance.
“It’s still a challenge for brands, while they’re in the midst of doing everything, to see the value of putting a merchandising program in place because it’s just out of their wheelhouse,” Flavour Gallery CEO Alfredo Malatesta said of a by-product of business busyness. “However, it’s very effective because for the consumer, it’s something personal. If they’re going to put on a T-shirt, it represents a lot, and it’s something that they’re going to promote of social media.”
Through his company, Hidden Valley finds itself among Barilla and Rachael Ray, among others, in peddling exclusive apparel lines. With 15 ranch flavors and the Flavour Gallery bond, the enterprising site newcomer is looking to diminish the “flat-to-declining” description that its director of sales, Brian Steinbach, applied to the salad dressing category two months ago through campaignlive.com. One can always run the risk of making major missteps when promoting anything, with Malatesta so mindful of the difference between using a traditional logo and calling on a vintage one that he stated “People just don’t want to look like billboards.”
“We see a lot of ways that people love to express their pride and love for Hidden Valley Ranch,” Klein commented, with the online store, she hopes, to carry on indefinitely. “We’re really wanting to encourage people to get creative and inventive with ranch in all meanings of that, whether it be wearing a T-shirt, having a ranch fountain at their next party or get dipping with our 15 flavors of ranch.”
Thanks to a social media-driven sweepstakes through which participants could claim, among other prizes, a lifetime supply of Hidden Valley Ranch and a ranch resort getaway, loyal purchasers might reward Hidden Valley and Flavour Gallery for their partnership by not only dipping, dunking and drizzling, but also through perusing, purchasing and petitioning acquaintances to pick out a shirt or two. Here’s hoping those dips, dunks and drizzles stay off the threads.
