Rexona takes fight to Nivea in Vietnam

To turn heads away from market leader Nivea, Unilever has eschewed the typical testimonial approach to launch its new Rexona deodorant roll-on variant.

As of May 2006, Nivea led the category with 36 per cent market share to Rexona's number two status at 13 per cent. According to Rowel Vljandre, VP of Personal Care, Unilever Vietnam, "the obstacle we face is low usage and awareness of deodorant products in general". While Rexona deodorant is not new to Vietnam, the roll-on administration is. "With this campaign we hope to position Rexona as a top-efficacy product among young adults in urban Vietnam."

To illustrate this, Lowe Vietnam leveraged the insight that "most Vietnamese people are shy and find it embarrassing to discuss personal hygiene, particularly underarm issues," said Marc Smith, creative director at Lowe Vietnam.

"Most of the brands in this category communicate with testimonials, but we turned this into 'confessions'," added Smith.

A series of commercials was shot as 'hidden footage' of celebrities and teens teasing each other about their underarm dilemmas.

In one TVC, shot in the bathroom of a nightclub, a female clubber advises her friend to use Rexona instead of using the bathroom's hand dryer. In another TVC shot in a taxi cab, a young urbanite teases his friend about his wet underarm spots, and introduces the roll-on concept by comparing its wetness to his ex-girlfriend.

Aside from the commercials, Unilever also launched a series of activation events inside coffee shop bathrooms.
mirrors and toilet stalls. with cheeky lines such as, "Dry to show. Wet to hide."