| In 1911, the Procter & Gamble Company was | | | | for free to teach homemakers the features and |
| already a highly successful marketer of consumer | | | | benefits of cooking with miraculous Crisco. The |
| products. Its original Ivory Soap was the top selling | | | | product was positioned as a healthy food (we did |
| bar soap in the world. One of the key components | | | | not yet know about trans-fats). My mother, until the |
| of Ivory Soap is cottonseed oil. The Company | | | | day she died, would not think of baking a pie without |
| purchased huge quantities of cottonseed oil from | | | | using Crisco for her crust. Crisco became a staple in |
| agricultural product brokers. As sales continued to | | | | the cupboards of generations of cooks and |
| explode, and the need for cottonseed oil expanded, | | | | homemakers. |
| P&G began to have designs on controlling the | | | | This is a classic example of a consumer product that |
| market in cottonseed oil. | | | | has its root in another completely different product |
| By controlling this market, the Company could enjoy | | | | classification. Bar soap is not consumed or ingested. |
| economies of scale and drive down raw material | | | | That Ivory Soap would be the progenitor of Crisco, a |
| costs for making Ivory and other products. However, | | | | non-food baking and cooking ingredient, is a classic |
| with total market control over cottonseed oil, there | | | | example of an enterprise taking a component and |
| would be added inventories of the oil that P&G | | | | engineering or adapting to create a completely new |
| would need to utilize in some other product. The | | | | category or brand. |
| Company put their scientists to work to discover a | | | | Many consumers have discovered alternative or |
| new product use for their excess cottonseed oil | | | | multiple uses for common household products or |
| stock. | | | | ingredients. Heloise has made a wonderful career for |
| The result was a scientifically designed, laboratory | | | | herself by advising housewives in this type of |
| produced, white, fluffy substance that resembled lard. | | | | crossover product usage in her daily syndicated |
| Technically it was a foodstuff. In reality it was not. It | | | | newspaper column. Consumers are amazingly |
| had no smell or taste. And yet P&G began to | | | | adaptable and creative in discovering new ways to |
| ask consumers to bake and fry with the new | | | | utilize products that were originally marketed for |
| product, Crisco. This was a mass marketing milestone. | | | | other purposes. |
| Crisco was one of the earliest products sold by | | | | Look around your environment and you might find a |
| utilizing modern mass market consumerism strategies. | | | | new product or business idea sitting on a shelf, right |
| P&G positioned Crisco as a scientific | | | | under your nose. By remarketing, repositioning, |
| breakthrough. The Company's real genius, then as | | | | reengineering or reinventing something that is old, you |
| now, was in creating a consumer demand for a | | | | can create something new. Who knew that a basic |
| product that people did not know they even needed. | | | | raw material, simple cottonseed oil, could evolve from |
| Stores across the country were given free samples | | | | a bar soap to a consumable foodstuff before Procter |
| of Crisco. Recipes and cookbooks were given away | | | | & Gamble saw and marketed the need. |