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An estimated 125 million viewers watched Super Bowl LX on Sunday, finding a less-than-exciting game punctuated by set after set of crowded commercial breaks in which seconds cost millions. Amid all the noise, one brand broke through and created a powerful lesson for leaders.
PepsiCo, through its snack food brand Lay’s, aired a 60-second commercial detailing the story of a father’s decision to transition the family’s potato farm to his daughter.
The opening scene places the two on a front-porch swing with the father saying, “Might be time to hang it up.” As he begins handing his daughter keys to the operation, she declines and responds with, “How about one last time together?”
The question kicks off a beautifully orchestrated series of video clips of the daughter growing up on the farm. The series concludes with her father handing her the keys again. Through a warm smile, he tells his daughter, “It’s your farm now.” The two embrace, and text appears on screen that reads, “Real potatoes grown by generations of farmers across North America.”
The commercial is powerful in its storytelling. It evokes emotion and creates an immediate and deep connection between the bag of Lay’s potato chips and the farming family that made it possible, effectively collapsing the gap between production and consumer.
Nowhere in the commercial did viewers see product details or information on pricing or where to buy the company’s snacks. PepsiCo let the power of the artfully crafted story serve as the hero and let the emotional wake it generated become the magnet to draw consumers closer to its products.
While few brands hold the household name recognition of PepsiCo or Lay’s, all companies are built by people who make their products possible. Their stories are unique, and when told with precision, evoke emotion that creates relatability between a company’s products and the customers they serve. Great stories well told create differentiation and build a powerful bond between company and customer.
Leaders at every level have access to this. The art of genuine storytelling is available to anyone who invests time to understand both those who make products and those who buy them. It requires more than amassing facts about features, benefits and buyer demographics. It requires a commitment to deeply understanding the people behind the production of a product and what drives them to deliver excellence. It also requires a relentless pursuit of understanding what motivates and inspires a customer to purchase those products. In the case of PepsiCo, it required the company to move beyond selling a bag of potato chips and instead showcase the people, the hard work and the system that make Lay’s potato chips possible.
This opportunity to create a connection between products, the people who make them and the customers they serve holds tremendous opportunity in Indiana. With approximately one-quarter of Indiana’s gross domestic product generated from manufacturing, opportunity abounds for leaders to harness the power of storytelling to inspire connections between the people who power companies and their customers.
In every county in the state, there is a story to be told about people building great products. Let’s work together to identify and craft those stories. Let’s create a deeper bond between companies and the customers they serve. Together, we can inspire the next chapter of Indiana’s growth.•
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Frazier is president of IBJ Media.
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