Marketing to a New Generation

He appreciated how both parents worked hard to provide for their family, but he wasn’t interested in pursuing either of their types of careers. Instead, he followed his early interest in trying to understand why people chose to buy different products – called ‘consumer sentiment’ – and followed his interest into a career to successfully revamp the advertising strategy for an internationally known product. 

FAMILY BACKGROUND

Ivan Menezes (IM) was born in India. His mother taught music and French. His father was chairman of the Indian Railway Board. 

CHILDHOOD 

Growing up in India, IM learned to speak English at an early age, but he did not immigrate to the U.S. until attending graduate school in his early 20s. 

While aware of his mother’s career in education and his father’s career within mass transit, the only parental career influence retained by IM was noting the dedication each parent brought to their different careers: wanting to do their best each day while continuing to learn how to do their jobs better. 

EDUCATION – PART ONE

IM earned a Bachelor’s degree in economics from the University of Delhi, then studied business policy and marketing at an Institute of Management. 

FIRST ADULT JOB IS NEVER A BINDING CAREER COMMITMENT

IM’s first adult job – in India – was as a junior staff person within the sales strategy division of the Nestle company, a Swiss multinational food and drink processing conglomerate with strong sales in the U.S.

EDUCATION – PART TWO

Editor – Completing high school and then working for a living before enrolling in the next level of education (e.g., two- or four-year college or a trade school) – called a “gap year” (which may turn out to last longer than one year) is neither unusual nor a negative development for anyone’s eventual career path.

IM’s early venture into the world of marketing various products manufactured by his employer, convinced him that he had found the right fit for his career interests. But he wanted to learn more about marketing strategies and decided his best opportunity for relevant continuing education was in the U.S., specifically Northwestern University’s highly regarded Kellogg School of Management, where IM enrolled and earned his Master’s degree. 

SECOND ADULT JOB IS NEVER A BINDING CAREER COMMITMENT

Now with a Master’s degree from a prestigious graduate school plus some real world business experience, IM took a job as a business and management consultant with the internationally well-known management consultant firm Booz Allen Hamilton, based in Chicago and London. 

MOVING FROM ONE BUSINESS TO ANOTHER NOW COMMON

After a few years as a business consultant to other companies – during which time IM continued to add to his own knowledge about how different businesses conduct marketing strategies among different age groups within different countries – IM was hired as vice president of group marketing for Whirlpool (best known for producing refrigerators and laundry equipment) in northern Italy, where he was employed for five years before moving to the Guinness company, a manufacturer and sales distributor of ‘spirits’ a/k/a alcohol drinks. 

While serving as Guinness’ strategy director, the company merged with Grand Metropolitan P.L.C., which owned Burger King and Pillsbury, creating a conglomerate of different international businesses involved in both manufacturing and sales. Despite product differences (alcohol, fast food, and baking products), their common thread was the need to create sales to cover costs of the production process, pay employees, fund advertising, and create profits for distribution internally and in stock dividends to investors. 

After the merger, IM’s dedication to creative marketing strategies and his overall business judgment earned his promotion to Chief Executive of the company’s alcohol beverage production and sales division, called Diageo.

CHALLENGE – MAKING PRODUCT APPEAL TO A NEW GENERATION

One of IM’s first challenges was making the company’s best-selling alcohol brand, Johnnie Walker, appeal to a new generation of consumers. It was not so much that young drinkers disliked the taste of blended Scotch, but rather that the drink’s traditional tartan plaid image felt fusty, Diageo’s market research found. 

Said IM, “We are losing older drinkers by the bucketful, but only gaining new ones by the thimbleful. So, we will all benefit from everyone focusing on building brands and making their brands relevant to younger consumers.”

As the head of his company’s beverage division, IM directed a huge investment in revamping Johnnie Walker’s image with the assistance of a major advertising agency. The campaign introduced the slogan “Keep Walking” and featured three tv advertisements, including one in which an actor walked into a coliseum filled with lions as he talked about overcoming stage fright; another showed a French tightrope walker proceeding precariously between buildings. 

“With this campaign, we hope to build an emotional bond with the consumer through the universal territory of inspiring personal progress,” said IM. A quarter century later, Johnnie Walker still uses the “Keep Waling” tagline while its retail sales values had increased significantly. 

Other business initiatives introduced by IM include:

• Removing a layer of regional management, which facilitated communication between the global company and country-based businesses.
• Shrinking its employee base from about 36,000 to nearly 28,000. (Editor: when a business terminates employee jobs to improve profits, the newly unemployed may be entitled to short-term ‘unemployment compensation’ mandated by government but the employee’s overall life is significantly affected until a comparable – or better – employment is arranged; this is how ‘Capitalism’ works so it’s always best to save money while employed and be aware of opportunities to prepare for the same or different jobs with different employers, which might be yourself!)
• Reducing his division’s carbon emissions.
• Pushing for greater work force diversity by adding more women at top levels. 

CAREER SATISFACTION

In addition to watching the sales of his company products grow substantially, for which he was well compensated by his overall corporate business managers, IM was recognized by a head of government (King Charles III – Britain’s new ceremonial leader) by being ‘Knighted” for his services to business and human equality.

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This career story is based on an obituary written by Daniel Slotnik, published by The New York Times on June 17, 2023.