RETROWURST: Hipp July 2005

 

Working on a brand that’s particularly relevant to your stage in life is usually a joy. When my son was a baby, I worked on Pampers at Saatchi, then on HiPP at TBWA. And this month, here are my musings on the subject of HiPP from July 2005.

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The subject of this month’s Extrawurst is the world’s biggest processor of organic food products. Or is it a leading baby food brand? Or is it the grandson of a Bavarian pastry chef? Claus Hipp and his brand Hipp is all of these. Herr Hipp was recently awarded the Stern/McKinsey StartUp prize for life achievement in the marketing of Organic products. This month, I’m going to take a look at the secrets behind his success.

 

Claus Hipp is a familiar figure in German advertising. He regularly appears in print and TV advertising- an elderly man dressed in traditional dark-green Bavarian jacket and hat, striding across beautiful rolling fields, rather like Heidi’s grandfather or a more ideologically sound Bernard Matthews. He always ends his TV spots with a line that translates roughly to “and I’m proud to give my name to it.” In addition to his commercial responsibilities, Herr Hipp is also something of an artist and oboe player in a Munich orchestra. The man seems to exude balance and harmony in all things; a distinct contrast to the usual image of the stressed, power and profit-obsessed, cultural philistine businessman.

 

Hipp is a family business that has remained in the family for over 100 years. The story goes that Claus Hipp’s grandfather, Joseph, who was a pastry-chef with a Konditorei in the little Bavarian town of Pfaffenhofen, produced a rusk flour mixed with milk to help his wife with their twin babies, who she was having problems breast-feeding. The babies thrived, as did five subsequent offspring and Hipp’s first “formula” became in demand. One of those five offspring, Georg, took over the business in 1932 and founded his own firm in Pfaffenhofen. Georg Hipp developed the business and introduced the concepts of organic farming and baby food based on vegetables in glass jars in 1956 and 1957 respectively. The current generation of Hipps- Claus and two brothers- took over in 1967 and over the last nearly 40 years have continued the development of organic farming and processing.

 

Hipp today is the world’s biggest processor of organic raw materials. Annual sales are €240m, 1000 workers are employed and 1m jars of baby food are produced each day. Hipp has 207 products, from Fennel tea (from 1 week) to young carrots (from 4 months) to a toddler meal of Spätzle mit Karotten und Rinderrahmgeschnetzlte (South German noodles with carrots and beef strips in cream sauce) through to a relatively new line of Müslis aimed at adults.

 

Hipp products are sold at a considerable premium to other baby foods. On the rational level, most people will cite the organic and quality elements. Baby food is a clear case where the end consumer is not the purchaser and, even more so than for dogs and cats (even fussy little ones!), parents need a brand where they can really put their trust. But there is also a strong emotional element to this price premium. It is well known that many adults (primarily young women who are not yet mothers) also buy Hipp for their own consumption in Germany. Part of this is a certain cult element but part of it is the same emotional magnet that draws so many parents into the brand.

 

It’s often said that buying into a brand involves buying into a world that that brand creates. The world of Hipp is very clear. It’s a rural idyll of green countryside, happy cows and chickens and fresh fruit and vegetables ripened under a benevolent sun, tended with loving care by the benevolent grandfatherly Herr Hipp himself. It’s a world of innocence and happiness, symbolized by the child-like, sunny logo with its paint box colours of pink, turquoise, orange and violet and its heart dotting the “i”. It probably wouldn’t be going too far to say that Hipp takes us back into a forgotten world of innocence - the original Garden of Eden. For a young mother in a Berlin apartment stuck indoors with a colicky baby on a rainy January day, one can see the appeal.

 

Of course, a lot of brands create equally seductive worlds and images but in the case of Hipp, this isn’t a dream world. It really exists. I have been to Pfaffenhofen which is approached via rolling green fields and fruit orchards, interspersed with little villages with coloured houses and onion-domed churches. In Pfaffenhofen itself you can still enjoy delicious cakes in the original Hipp Konditorei. The Hipp headquarters itself is more like a chalet for a skiing holiday than an office. There are wooden beams everywhere, crucifixes on the walls of the conference rooms and water from the Hipp spring to drink.

 

It is this integrity and consistency of brand and reality that is the key to Hipp’s success. In many ways, although the brand is now over 100 years old, it has more of a feel to it of more modern brands such as Body Shop or, more recently, Innocent Drinks. The brand itself (or at least the first product) arose from a real personal need. The company has grown and developed but never moved away from its roots, either physical or philosophical. It is a company with transparency and integrity and a clear point of view or philosophy above and beyond the product- the belief in “the best from nature; the best for nature.”

 

In addition, there is a lead figure that represents the company and its philosophy in the person of Claus Hipp. While Corporate Social Responsibility may be the latest bandwagon for many large companies these days, this was always there for Hipp as a normal and natural part of the company’s belief system. And while we are talking about belief, one cannot avoid the strong spiritual element in the Hipp philosophy, particularly when one thinks about all those crucifixes in Pfaffenhofen. The Hipp family, with Claus Hipp as no exception, is strongly Catholic and the company is run on un-ashamedly Christian principles. 

 

While it may not be everyone’s cup of organic red berry juice with spring water, Hipp as a company has a clear stance and clear principles. All of these elements add up to a brand ethos that cannot be copied. This, combined with a strong product range in terms of quality and breadth, make for a unique and sustainable brand.

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The little chap in the photo is about to turn 23 and has a proper job servicing and repairing aircraft. And what about HiPP? Well, really very little has changed. Stefan has taken over from father Claus as main spokesman and they’ve launched nappies. (I suppose the associations are slightly less yukky than Pampers introducing baby food.)

The organic credentials have stood the brand in good stead, although they have been accused of slight over-enthusiasm with their talk of “climate-positive.”

It’s also interesting to see how an openly Christian company fares these days - and the international website does make some rather pompous-sounding remarks about “the moral decay of society” which may not go down well in some quarters.

Do today’s young parents want to see the authentic sick-cloth-no-sleep-screeching-baby world that some brands like to use in their advertising? Or the reassuring green fields, apple orchards, avuncular Stefan and smiley tots of HiPP? That remains to be seen.