1.0 OVERVIEW

Vitasoy Group was established in 1940. Vitasoy aims to maintain the leadership in

promoting a superior quality of life through the production of high quality, great tasting

and nutritious products that will satisfy customers in all markets.

VITASOY has spread far beyond Hong Kong, and the group's products sell in over 40

markets around the world - including the USA, Canada, Mainland China, Europe, Papua

New Guinea, Australia, New Zealand, South East Asia, Guatemala, Trinidad and

Venezuela.

Now a listed company (0345.HK) on the Stock Exchange of Hong Kong with plants

located in Hong Kong, Mainland China, Australia and the U.S.A., Vitasoy International

is a dynamic, international organization setting new standards of quality and innovation

wherever its products are sold.

Vita is a brand under the Vitasoy Group.

Launched in 1979, VITA Lemon Tea - it was the world’s first ready-to-drink lemon tea,

which blends red tea with a subtle lemon flavour - is extremely popular in Hong Kong

and has secured a clear market leadership over the years, with a variety of teas, juices,

distilled water and milk. When you think of VITA, Lemon Tea immediately comes to

mind! 

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2.0 CONSUMER PROFILE2.1. Demographic

Age

The primary target customers of the Vita Lemon Tea are generally aged 15 – 30 who are

mainly from secondary school students to young working adults.

The secondary target customers also those younger primary school students range from

11-14 and those working adults from 31-45. These target customers may not buy the Vita

Lemon Tea drinks themselves regularly but may have chance to enjoy the drinks when

their family members did.

Income

The Vita Lemon Tea products suit for different income groups, from lower to upper class

as the price of it is affordable to most customers since it costs only few coins for one.

Occupation

Most of the customers are those schoolmates and the young working adults who mainly

consume the lemon tea during lunch or sport activities.

2.2. Geographic

Wide spread sales network as Vita Lemon Tea is available in various packaging formats

at different places, such as supermarkets, convenience stores, vending machines, etc. This

make it convenient for anybody to enjoy the fabulous sensation whether on the go,

together with friends…anywhere, anytime!

2.3. Behavioural

Product Consumption Rate

Consumption is mostly daily, depending on each individual drinking habits and the

occasions.

Brand Loyalty

Vita Lemon Tea’s consumers are mostly loyal to Vita’s brand since its irreplaceable taste

from other competitors, which is nearly the same as real lemon tea offered in Hong Kong

local café.

Brand Management 260 – Brand Audit Report (Vita Lemon Tea) Page 2

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3.0 MARKETING & BRANDING PROGRAMMES3.1. Marketing Programs

As a local brand with long history, Vita produces different types of marketing programs

such as television commercial, one-to-one marketing and outdoor advertising.

Television A dvertising

In the mid 2010, Vita launched a series of TV commercials of Vita lemon tea and Vita

Ceylon Lemon Tea. Vita invites a Hong Kong hip pop rapper– MC Jin as an endorser of

Vita Lemon Tea in both of three TV commercials. In the commercial, MC Jin is rapping

the song about the Vita Lemon Tea. Together with the animation of Vita Lemon Tea,

receiver is able to memorize the song and Vita lemon tea easily.

Television a dvertising is able to reach a mass public audience quickly. Most of the

television watchers can get a chance to receive the message from Vita lemon tea

commercial. This is how an effective and powerful way of TV commercials distributes

widely to the public.

O n e-to-one M a rketing

By using technologies such as the Internet, Vita target individual consumers with

individual marketing messages directly. For example, Vita’s official website and

Facebook fans page.

For the Vita’s official website, it shows lots of information such as the latest marketing

campaign of Vita lemon tea and television commercial videos. When visitor browses the

Vita lemon tea website, he or she gain the latest information of Vita and create a strong

customer relationship with Vita.

In the Vita lemon tea Facebook fans page, personal interaction between Vita and

individual can communicate each other. Each individual can express its feeling and

opinion by posting message to the Facebook fans page. Facebook is a powerful

communication tool and platform for Vita to conduct one-to-one marketing strategy.

Brand Management 260 – Brand Audit Report (Vita Lemon Tea) Page 3

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Outdoor Advertising

Vita held lots of event such as competition campaign, sales promotion event in the

outdoor area and shopping mall. The goal is to create brand awareness in the customer’s

mind.

Vita Forever Original Catwalk Competition

Vita Sales Promotion Event in the Shopping Mall

3.2. Branding of Vita Lemon Tea

Vita lemon tea emphasizes in its own branding and maintains a positive and energetic

image to the public. Vita lemon tea is a unique lemon flavor blended with red tea. When

customer thinks of the brand – Vita, Vita lemon tea comes up in customer’s mind

immediately.

Brand Management 260 – Brand Audit Report (Vita Lemon Tea) Page 4

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4.0 SOURCES OF BRAND EQUITY

There are several areas when evaluating the main sources of brand equity. According to

the following Asker (1991)’s one, brand equity can be separated into 5 dimensions as

follows:

Source: Aaker (1991)

4.1. Brand Loyalty

High level of brand loyalty can be obtained for Vita Lemon Tea with its irreplaceable

taste. According to the result of a short question, ‘Have you heard of Vita Lemon Tea and

if yes, will you choose Vita or other local brand such as Hi-C Lemon Tea?’ with 30 Hong

Kong youngsters on the street, there are 28 of them are existing Vita Lemon Tea’s

customers. And they will not switch to consume Hi-C Lemon Tea as most of them think

that the taste of Vita Lemon Tea is the most similar to those offered in local café one.

Brand Management 260 – Brand Audit Report (Vita Lemon Tea) Page 5

Brand Equity

Brand Loyalty Perceived Quality

Other Proprietary Brand AssetsBrand Associations

Brand Awareness

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4.2. Brand Awareness

(Aaker, 1991, P.61) defines brand awareness as “the ability of the potential buyer to

recognize and recall that a brand is a member of a certain product category” Vita Lemon

Tea is very success in this criteria when customers think of lemon tea, they will think of

Vita immediately in their mind. This is due to the success of Vita’s marketing campaigns

as it always places itself into high explosure in the market place. This can maintain the

buyers with a high degree of brand awareness.

4.3. Perceived Quality

Perceived quality is defined as “the customer’s perception of the overall quality or

superiority of a product or service with respect to its intended purpose, relative to

alternatives” (Zeithaml, 1988). Customers of choosing to drink packaged lemon tea will

perceive that they can enjoy the real taste as the one they can have with the real lemon. In

this aspect, Vita Lemon Tea can satisfy them with its irreplaceable taste which the

customers can not find in anywhere.

4.4. Brand Associations

A brand association is “anything linked in memory to a brand” (Aaker, 1991, p.109). As

mentioned in the above paragraph, when the Hong Kong customers think of drinking

lemon tea, they will come up to mind with Vita Lemon Tea. This is related to its long

history, more than 30 years and its successful of marketing campaigns.

Brand Management 260 – Brand Audit Report (Vita Lemon Tea) Page 6

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5.0 CONSUMER BRAND KNOWLEDGE

The value of the brand is essentially made up of two dimensions: Brand awareness and

Brand image. These two dimensions represent ‘How well known is your brand?’ and

‘What does your brand represent?’

Brand Awareness is an issue of whether a brand name comes to mind when consumers

think about a particular product category and the ease with which the name is evoked.

(Shimp 2007, 37)

Brand Image is the types of associations that come to the consumer’s mind when

contemplating a particular brand. (Shimp 2007, 39) When think of VITA, VITA Lemon

Tea comes up in Hong Kong people’s mind immediately. Launched since 1979, it enjoys

long-standing support of Hong Kong people, and has secured market leadership

throughout these years. Unique lemon flavour blended with red tea gives people a

memorable drinking sensation.

Vitasoy International received the Caring Company logo from the Hong Kong Council of

Social Services for the first time, which demonstrated the Group’s efforts in giving to the

community. Vitasoy always awarded by the organizations, Such as in 2008, Vitasoy is

presented with 3 Awards: “AmCham Hong Kong Brands Award”, the 9th Wellcome “Top

10 Favourite Brands” and “Rising Star”. These awards recognized Vitasoy’s efforts over

the past 68 years in providing quality and nutritious beverages for every Hongkonger.

Due to the fact that VITA Lemon Tea is regarded as a high quality product and it has been

awarded numerous industry awards, it become top of mind in the consumer’s heart with

great brand recognition and recall. Also, reputation increased.

Both brands are sold widely not only Hong Kong, but also China, Australia, New

Zealand, North America, Europe, South East Asia and other markets throughout the

world. Thus, all the people familiar with VITA Lemon Tea and creates a great exposure

for the brand to the public.

Brand Management 260 – Brand Audit Report (Vita Lemon Tea) Page 7

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6.0 RECOMMENDATIONS AND EVALUATIONS6.1. Critique of Current Marketing Campaign

Currently, the marketing campaign of Vita Lemon Tea is “澀得起就係我”. Vita Lemon

Tea invites celebrity - MC Jin, a Hong Kong hip hop rapper, to be the endorser.

VLT produces different TV commercials (see Appendices 9.1-9.3) with MC Jin rapping

the idea of “澀得起就係我” . In the advertisements, MC Jin and other celebrities rap

and emphasis the uniqueness of VLT - the proportion of red tea and lemon of Vita lemon

tea are perfect, the bitter taste of the tea will stay in your mouth after you taste it. In other

words, the taste of Vita Lemon Tea is good, special and unique. What Vita wants to

create is the special, unique brand image in consumers mind. This arouses a feeling that

people who choose Vita lemon tea are also special and unique. People also feel that they

are special from others who do not choose Vita Lemon Tea.

“Irreplaceable Taste” also arouses a feeling of the unique and irreplaceable position of

Vita lemon tea in the market and consumers mind. It implies competitors may not be able

to replace its special and unique tea taste. This persuades consumers think Vita lemon tea

is the best.

Advertisements carry the same campaign are also apply in print advertisement, bill board,

website, online banner, and social media such as Facebook. Moreover, Vita also

implements sales promotion such as “澀得起 Summer Hits Lucky Draw”, 澀得起就係我 – short movie competition.

Through this marketing campaign and the brand image strategy, Vita Lemon Tea

successfully builds a strong and memorable identity to get consumers attention and build

emotional bond towards the brand.

Vita actually implements a good and memorable marketing campaign. When you think of

VITA, Lemon Tea immediately comes to mind! Whenever think of MC Jin, Vita Lemon

Tea also immediately comes to mind!

Despite of the success, we recommend Vita to invite another famous celebrity, Sammi

Cheng, who is the most popular Asian singer together with MC Jin be the endorsers and

implement a series of new advertisements.

Brand Management 260 – Brand Audit Report (Vita Lemon Tea) Page 8

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As Sammi Cheng carries a trendy and unique image, and she is also popular among the

teenagers and the youth. This matches with the target customers and the products.

Together with MC Jin, this must create a gimmick and arouse a pride, self-esteem, unique

feeling and brand image in consumers mind.

6.2. Recommendations for Better Brand Management

The following brand value chain of VITA Lemon Tea shows the brand equity and

marketing activities that create brand values.

Since the name of VITA has spread far beyond Hong Kong, and the group's products sell

in over 40 markets around the world including the USA, Canada, Mainland China,

Europe, Papua New Guinea, Australia, New Zealand, South East Asia, Guatemala,

Trinidad and Venezuela. But VITA Lemon Tea still only sells in Hong Kong. Thus it is

recommended that VITA Lemon Tea distribute outside Hong Kong, such as the markets

which VITA entered before.

VITA should increase communication in each nation that enhances brand awareness and

image. For example, create marketing campaigns to greater brand exposure and let more

people know. The increased distribution of VITA Lemon Tea will enlarge sales in order to

create large profits.

Brand Management 260 – Brand Audit Report (Vita Lemon Tea) Page 9

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6.3. Building Brand Equity

Source: CBBE Pyramid (Keller 2008)

Firstly, salience dimension of brand equity is existed as when consumer thinks of Vita,

Vita Lemon Tea comes up in their mind immediately.

For primary characteristics of Vita Lemon Tea which is with a unique lemon flavor

blended with red tea that builds the performance dimension of brand equity.

Also, imagery dimension of brand equity is also found. Vita Lemon Tea is very easy to

buy as it is always available in any convenience store and super market.

In addition, Vita Lemon Tea which launched since 1979, it enjoys long-standing support

of Hong Kong people, has secured market leadership throughout these years. And its

unique lemon flavor blended with red tea gives consumer a memorable drinking

sensation. Thus brand superiority of Judgment dimension has been created.

Brand Management 260 – Brand Audit Report (Vita Lemon Tea) Page 10

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Vita Lemon Tea builds fun and social approval image of feeling dimension of brand

equity. They used Rap presentation to deliver the idea of marketing campaign “澀得起就係我”. And they also aroused a feeling that people perceived that they are special from

others who do not choose Vita Lemon Tea.

Vita Lemon Tea‘s group was created in Facebook which is a popular social network

service and website in recently years. Group member have attained to around 9,300.It is

easy to show that active engagement of resonance dimension is achieved.

In order to maintain the high level of brand equity, we suggest Vita company should more

concentrate on the communicate strategy in the Facebook social network. For example, to

create discussion, design fun game program and news update all the time. It can help to

get more group member attention and let them know more about Vita Lemon Tea through

this direct communication. The most import thing is to attract more people to become a

group member of Vita Lemon Tea.

6.4. New Product and Brand Extension

Vita Lemon Tea is a quite strong brand with high brand value and developed image in

Hong Kong market after analysis, thus it can help to maximize profit and enhance brand

equity if Vita launches a new product and brand extension.

For the idea of new products such as Vita Lemon Tea Power and Vita Lemon Tea Bag,

which belong to beverage category, both are good concepts for Vita Lemon Tea line. It

can let consumer have more choice and reason to choose Vita Lemon Tea product, hence

market share can be increased through implementing this marketing strategy.

For the idea of brand extension, we suggest to launch a food category such as Vita Lemon

gum and Vita Lemon sweets. Brand equity can be increased and leveraged by using this

marketing strategy. At the same time, it increases awareness of Vita and profitability from

offerings in more than one product category.

Brand Management 260 – Brand Audit Report (Vita Lemon Tea) Page 11

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7.0 CONCLUSION

Vita Lemon Tea is established in 1979 which has over 30 years of history, the brand of

Vita has already deeply developed into Hong Kong customers mind. When people think

of lemon tea, Vita Lemon Tea will immediately comes up to their minds with its

irreplaceable taste and energetic brand image. Both of the youngsters, teenagers and

students would not think Vita Lemon Tea is an old product.

Since at the present moment, there are no great challenges and strong competitors in the

Hong Kong lemon tea drinks products market. Therefore, it may not be essential to

revitalize Vita Lemon Tea’s brand. Giving the fact that Vita is extremely popular in Hong

Kong and has secured a clear market leadership over the years, it may consider to expand

its marketing campaigns to the overseas countries besides Hong Kong and China so as to

maintain a sustainable sales growth and to maximize its profits.

Brand Management 260 – Brand Audit Report (Vita Lemon Tea) Page 12

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8.0 REFERENCES

Aaker, D.A. (1991), Managing Brand Equity. New York, NY: The Free Press.

Keller, K.L. 2008. Strategic Brand Management: Building, Measuring, and

Managing Brand Equity. 3rd ed. Upper Saddle River, New Jersey: Pearson Education,

Inc.

MC Jin x MC KT x 高輝 x 陳光榮 Vita Lemon Tea Commercial.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=COsLJZxnOeQ (accessed October 26, 2010)

MC Jin 歐陽靖 VS 尹光 Vita Lemon Tea Commercial.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=StBOB-hEMKQ&feature=related (accessed

October 26, 2010)

MC Jin - Vita Ceylon Lemon Tea Commercial

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DFVCcEhGUDQ&feature=related (accessed

October 26, 2010)

Shimp.T. Advertising Promotion, and Other Aspects of Integrated Marketing

Communications. USA: South West Cengage Learning, 2007.

Vitasoy HK. http://www.vitasoy.com.hk/eng/company/company.html (accessed

October 24, 2010)

Vitasoy International Holdings Ltd. http://www.vitasoy.com/ (accessed October 23,

2010)

Vitasoy International Holdings Ltd annual report 2009-2010.

http://www.vitasoy.com/viewpage.php?

page=investorrelations&section=annualResult&subsection=archive (accessed

October 24, 2010)

Vita Lemon Tea. http://www.vlt.com.hk/index.php (accessed October 24, 2010)

VITA Lemon Tea - PR and marketing for new packaging of VITA Lemon Tea from

Oct 2006. http://www.aqcomm.com/official/photo.asp?aevent=news302 (accessed

October 24, 2010)

Brand Management 260 – Brand Audit Report (Vita Lemon Tea) Page 13

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Yeung-Gwong Lemon Tea. http://www.yeung-gwong.hk/2010/ (accessed October 30,

2010)

Zeithaml, V.A. (1988), “Consumer perceptions of price, quality, and value: a means-

end model and synthesis of evidence”, Journal of Marketing, Vol.52 No.3, pp.2-22.

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