The world’s leading producer of domestic appliances engaged our team to develop a strategy for launching one of their existing Chinese luxury appliance brands, named Casarte, into the European market, with a focus on the Kitchen Maker sales channel. The objective was to leverage existing platforms and products to ensure a swift market entry, capturing market share and outpacing competitors. Special considerations included Haier's relatively recent presence in Europe and addressing the specific needs and expectations of Kitchen Maker companies, ensuring a seamless and strategic market introduction aligned with European desires.
Duration
2 months
Location
Milan, Italy
HQ: Qingdao, China
Co-creators
Mark Penner
Process
In order to foster a positive and reocurring relationship with Haier and European Kitchen Makers we need to understand their own needs and desires as well as their customers.
After in-depth research, we proposed a three phase process to achieve these goals. Ultimately, turning Haier's new subbrand from kitchen appliance brand to a brand facilitating hosting that touches multiple areas of the home.
Current State
In the current market, we see high-end personas that approach kitchen makers, hardly ever cook, yet they desire a beautiful, functional kitchen to show off and to facilitate hosting. Within the ultra-competitive Kitchen Maker, we see the majority expanding their design reach into spaces outside the kitchen, and even outside the home.
With these insights, we mapped their current appliances' usability outside the kitchen by heating/cooking and cooling. It became clear we could utilize Haier's strengths in cooling products in the Casarte brand to reach further outside of the kitchen and help these high-end personas facilitate memorable moments hosted at their homes.
Extending the Kitchen Area
To entice Kitchen Makers and their customers to actively ask for Haier's Casarte products, they do not need to compete with the extremely competitive, yet non-factor, Cooking appliances of legacy brands that Kitchen Makers instinctively procure in their designs.
Casarte needs to offer new cooling products, along with premium and explorative services that allow Kitchen Makers to extend their designs and build more cabinetry to enclose these products, ultimately boosting KM's bottom lines while catering to their clients' desire to host.
Creating New spaces
After gaining placement within the consideration of Kitchen Makers and their clients, we want to leverage this notion of hosting and movement away from the kitchen space to allow for Kitchen Makers to expand their reach.
Casarte could leverage existing award winning products and concepts to place their appliances in living rooms and outdoor spaces paired with exclusive services to really speak to the upper echelon of clientale and establish Casarte as a mass luxury player in the European Market.
Summary
Leveraging existing cooling products, Haier can introduce Casarte as a luxury brand for Kitchen Makers by letting their products facilitate positive moments for KM's clients when hosting which also extends the reach of Kitchen Makers' work.
Pairing these new products with subscription services to incentivize continual use, and hiring services for hosting larger events will solidify their place in the High-end Kitchen Maker market.
