Marketing Communications

108 CHAPTER 3 HOW MARKETING COMMUNICATIONS WORK

Case 3:

Club Med: a ‘true creator of happiness’ fights non-consideration

Club Méditerranée: a strong brand with a

rich history

In 1950, Gérard Blitz, the son of an Antwerp diamond

merchant, introduced a new style of holiday for ‘developing

a taste for living outdoors and doing physical training

and sport’, and, together with his partner Gilbert Trigano,

founded ‘Club Méditerranée’ (Club Med). This idea gave

birth to the spirit: ‘Our purpose in life is to be happy. The

place to be happy is here. And the time to be happy is now.’

This phrase coined by Gérard Blitz received considerable

endorsement in the post-war context. By freeing people

from their restrictions, allowing them to get together,

recharge their batteries and return to original pleasures,

happiness by Club Med was born. Club Med invented a

new way to bring people together and an unprecedented

vacation style: all-inclusive holidays in resorts in the world’s

most beautiful venues, where every guest or Great Member

(GM) could unwind through contact with nature, sports

and others, surrounded by the friendliness of the staff, or

Gentils Organisateurs (GO).

In 2005, Club Med refocused its activity on high-end

global tourism to become the world specialist in upscale,

friendly, multicultural, all-inclusive holidays. This new posi-

tion placed Club Med in a new international competition

range comprising luxury hotels, holiday clubs, resorts and

tour operators. Club Med targets the clients of upscale

hotels who are seeking a friendlier atmosphere and the

guests of holiday clubs who require higher-quality service

within an upscale, all-inclusive formula.

To accompany its new upscale position, Club Med

adopted in late December 2007 a new signature and

launched a global communications campaign, bold and

poetic: ‘Where happiness means the world’ represented

this strong promise of happiness ‘by Club Med’. Deployed in

the 40 countries where the group was present, the new Club

Med campaign expressed powerfully, in the style typical of

the Club Med ‘label’, all the feelings, the happiness, that

can be experienced through the vast collection of offers,

activities and discoveries available in the resorts.

In 2011, the company operated 72 holiday villages in 26

countries around the world, where 1.2 million customers

were served by 15 000 staff members of 100 different

nationalities. The turnover of the company was €1423 million,

45% of which was in France. Club Med occupied a strong

position in the universe of luxury brands.

Consumers do not understand the brand

and do not consider it

For a number of years, Club Med has been in decline in the

Dutch-speaking part of Belgium. Compared with other tour

operators, the brand has not been very visible in that part

of the market. In 2010, its share was 6% in Flanders, while

Jetair had 35%, Thomas Cook 15%, Neckermann 11% and

Sunjets 10%.

In 2010 qualitative and quantitative consumer research

was undertaken. A qualitative study with potential customers

of higher social classes led to the following insights:

   The marketing challenge of Club Med in Flanders was

not brand awareness or the perception of high prices,

but the fact that potential customers did not consider

Club Med when they thought of booking a holiday

(mental zapping).

   People perceived Club Med as a ‘UCPA upscale’ (UCPA

is a low-end travel organisation) which turned part of

the target group off. People did not know the Club Med

concept very well, and associated it with noisiness and

forced intimacy.

   At the same time, the expectations of the target group

were consistent with the strong points of the Club Med

concept, such as openness to the world, and a level of

intimacy that customers could freely choose themselves.

In other words, the study revealed that the problem was not

so much brand awareness or price perception, but a lack of

understanding of the concept and the Club Med brand. To

corroborate these qualitative findings, a quantitative study

was conducted in a sample of 485 respondents: well-off

Flemish couples or families with children less than 12 years old,

the core target group of Club Med. This study largely confirmed

the insights from the qualitative phase. First of all, the study

showed that Club Med’s brand awareness was as high as that

of its main competitors (Figure 3.12). Also the price percep-

tion was in line with the competition (Figure 3.13). However,

the main problem was that the brand was not considered by

the target group as much as the competition (Figure 3.14).

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