If you had to promote a food product on TV which consumers thought was healthy and nutritious but ugly, wimpy and boring, how would you do it? Feature the product in clay and give it human features, sunglasses and dancing feet, that's how.

This was the technique Foote Cone & Belding used to promote raisins for the California Raisin Advisory Board. Results from pre-tests of the commercial using voice pitch analysis showed consumers loved it.

The clay animation technique, called Claymation, uses clay figures. In this case, the figures are in the form of raisins with human features complete with arms, legs and faces. The ad agency then added the "I Heard It Through The Grapevine" soundtrack and a story board - sequential drawings of scenes in a commercial - which portrayed the figures dancing to the music.

According to Carol Martin, planner, vice president, at FCB in San Francisco, the Claymation technique was instrumental in making the commercial "come alive."

Since the commercials began airing in September, 1986, the dancing creatures have become an instant success, increasing raisin consumption and changing the negative consumer image of raisins.

Short term

The idea for Claymation, a registered trade name of Will Vinton Productions Inc., evolved after a series of advertising efforts failed to sell raisins for long periods of time.

In the late 1970s, raisins were targeted to mothers as a snack for kids, says Martin. Their appeal, and a very successful one, was the raisin's natural qualities, making it a good alternative to candy. According to Martin, it was "a snack mothers could feel good about."

When that appeal began to wear, the agency saw an opportunity to increase raisin consumption by advertising them as an additive in foods such as salads, meat dishes and other foods. That campaign helped in getting people to eat more raisins but not enough to make a substantial difference in the amount consumed.

Still another campaign was initiated when, in recent years, the raisin industry was faced with an overabundance of the fruit. This occurred partially because an increase in imported wines caused U.S. vineyards to leave more grapes to dry into raisins.

"The domestic grape growers had their hands full with a lot of raisins to sell," says Martin. As a result, prices fell and the advertising angle played on the oversupply and low cost. Martin said that idea worked but when the news value faded, it was back to the drawing board.

Claymation campaign

Before the agency embarked on its current Claymation campaign, it wanted to find out why people used raisins, who used them and why others didn't and the causes for the loss in household penetration for raisins. The agency went back and studied research which showed the household life cycle of raisins.

As youngsters, says Martin, many kids were fed raisins by their mothers because of their nutritional value. As these kids grew into teenagers, they made their own food choices and mothers no longer had control over what the kids ate. Peer pressure had an impact on their food choices as well. Candy and salty, social snacks like potato chips became more appealing and raisins as a snack disappeared. When these teens moved into adulthood, raisins reappeared in their diet as an additive to cooking, baking and other foods and as a snack they fed their own kids.

Attitude study

Through purchase and consumption data and a usage and attitude study conducted by an outside research supplier, the agency confirmed three things about the way people felt about raisins.

The first, says Martin, was that people understood and accepted all rational product attributes about raisins. People believed raisins were sweet, nutritional and versatile.

The second was that people understood the way to use raisins; as a snack, an additive in foods and in baking.

The third point confirmed was that raisin consumption was underdeveloped in certain age groups, especially among teenagers and 25-54 year-olds. The study also revealed that the raisin industry was experiencing losses in household penetration for 35-55 year-old adults.

"What we found through this preliminary research was that raisins were used primarily for kids and in baking, but not for many adults just for themselves," says Martin. "At this point we were faced with figuring out how to sell more raisins."

Focus groups

The next part of the research involved focus groups. Eight groups consisting of males and females, 25-54 years old were interviewed in the west and midwest. All groups consisted of both raisin eaters and non-eaters. The purpose or the sessions was to find out what kind of image raisins had for the participants and their perception of the types of people who ate raisins.

As a stimulus, the participants were shown a series of pictures of people in different situations. The objective was to find out which of those individuals ate raisins and who didn't.

The first picture the groups were shown was of a "Marlboro Man," says Martin. When asked if he would eat raisins, the participants said a definite no, claiming he was too "macho" and masculine and wouldn't eat a "wimpy" food like raisins.

The next picture showed a young couple stretched out on a freshly polished hardwood floor. Again the participants said these two wouldn't eat raisins because the couple was too sophisticated. For the respondents, it wasn't "cool" or "modern" to eat raisins.

The third picture showed a couple relaxing in a ski lodge. The participants said this couple wouldn't eat raisins either because raisins were not a "social" food. Raisins, said the participants, were only to be eaten when others were not around.

When the group was shown the next picture, that of a sports caster sitting alone in a press-box, the participants said he would eat raisins. The fact that he was sitting alone and no one else was around was why he would be a raisin eater. Eating raisins in front of others, the agency found, was an element of embarrassment for some of the participants.

The last picture featured a female cross-country skier. The participants also said she would eat raisins because the fruit is a good source of energy.

"This exercise revealed a lot about peoples' attitudes toward raisins, one which is very limiting," says Martin. "The image of the raisin eaters, we discovered, were limited to children and active people."

Raisin personality

The objective of the second part of the research was to find out the personality of raisins.

To do this, the participants were given a piece of paper which listed a variety of six snack foods. These were: raisins, apples, granola bars, yogurt, cookies and peanuts.

The participants were then asked to think of these six snacks in terms of personality traits and people. How would you describe these foods, the agency asked, if they were people?

Raisin eaters described the raisin's personality as powerful, special, up-to-date, good, old and a person who would have a lot of friends. Non-eaters, on the other hand, described raisins as lonely, weak, boring, old and ugly.

Overall, both raisin eaters and non-eaters described the fruit as healthy and energetic but also considered them as misunderstood. Both groups lacked an emotional attachment to raisins and said the fruit evoked negative connections and negative imagery.

"These feelings showed there was a dissonance in peoples' mind about raisins," says Martin. "On one hand, the participants' logical side was saying that the product was healthy and had a lot of good qualities. On the other hand, their emotional side was saying that raisins are negative and unappealing and that they had no attachment to the fruit."

Broaden acceptance

In order to get more people to eat raisins, the agency wanted to develop a commercial that was effective at convincing the consumer that raisins are an enjoyable and acceptable food. The creative group at FCB thought the Claymation commercial would fit the bill.

Using mall intercepts, the agency asked 200 people to respond to a series of questions about the "Grapevine" commercial. As the respondent would answer the yes/no questions, the pitch of the respondent's voice was measured using a voice pitch analysis technique. The pitch was compared to the previously established base-line-voice pitch level for that individual. Through this comparison, the agency was able to figure out how much the individual responded to the commercial.

The voice pitch analysis technique is becoming widely used to gauge peoples' reactions to advertising.

Says Martin, "The voice pitch technique is used when it's hard for people to articulate their emotional response to commercials. The method measures the intensity of the response by isolating and analyzing the vocal cord reaction. When the response is compared to the base-line level, you know if there is a real commitment to that participant's response."

Big success

To the delight of FCB, the scores from the voice pitch analysis were incredibly high, says Martin, and the commercials portrayed raisins very positively in the eyes of the participants. Since the copy testing was conducted, two commercials portraying the dancing raisins have aired nationally and have received tremendous response.

"We have received a barrage of letters from people who tell us that the commercials have changed their attitude toward raisins and have encouraged them to go out and buy the fruit," says Martin. "One mother said that she bought raisins and now her teenagers are eating them. Some people have asked for pictures of the raisins and others wanted to learn how to do the raisin shuffle."

Martin says the increase in raisin sales confirm the improved perceptions of raisins. Adding the clay animation technique to the commercial proved helpful in changing the consumers' mind about raisins.

"Claymation was the ideal method to use, not only because it's new, but because it's a good way to give life and personality to raisins.