Little-known frying pan maker is big ad spender in Jan
THE brand spending the most on advertising last month, at Bt137.8 million, was not a familiar name like Toyota, DTAC, KFC or Coke, but the “Korea King” frying pan, according to Nielsen Thailand.
After airing on prime time by top-rated TV stations, this imported kitchen utensil has become the talk of the town and reportedly attracts tremendous orders.
Demonstrated by outspoken TV host Vuthithorn “Woody” Milintachinda, the commercial claims that this pan is suitable for health-conscious consumers because they can cook without using oil thanks to its nano-silver marble coating.
According to its website, Wizards Solutions is the importer of this product.
Nielsen found that in terms of brands, Korea King spent the most on advertising last month, followed by Toyota with Bt84.43 million, Total Access Communication (DTAC) with Bt78.89 million, Isuzu with Bt61.63 million, KFC with Bt47.11 million, AIA Life Insurance with Bt46.4 million and Coca-Cola with Bt46.12 million.
However, this year began with an unsatisfactory result as January’s ad expenditures dropped 4.9 per cent to Bt8.07 billion from Bt8.49 billion in the same month last year.
The downtrend was seen in major media outlets such as free TV, newspapers and magazines, and in-store media.
Last month, the incumbent analog TV channels faced a decline of 9 per cent to Bt3.86 billion, and even digital terrestrial TV channels slid 9.3 per cent to Bt1.3 billion.
Suffering sharp declines were newspapers – 12.5 per cent to Bt729 million – and magazines – 32.0 per cent.
Major consumer-product companies cut back ad expenditures last month – Unilever (Thai) Holdings, the biggest corporate spender, from Bt461 million in January last year to Bt323.5 million, Toyota Motor Thailand from Bt209 million to Bt179.6 million and Procter and Gamble from Bt146.7 million to Bt145 million.
However, radio, cinemas, outdoor, transit and Internet media still enjoyed rises last month.
Ratthakorn Surbsuk, a trading partner at GroupM Thailand, said recently that advertising in January slowed dramatically, but his company noticed many brands increasing their ad budgets for February and the following months.
