Elmer's Glue In A Sticky Situation

Elmer's Glue just recently announced its newest product, Elmer's Ultimate High Performance Glue. Yes that Elmer's, the white glue that is consumed by 2 million kindergarteners in the US every year.

A brief overview of the battle between Elmer's and Gorilla Glue; starting when the Gorilla Glue company took a stab at the roughly $30 million dollar glue market with their "Toughest Glue on plane earth" claim. Elmer's felt this claim misled consumers and took the argument to the Better Business Bureau. Gorilla Glue took the stance that the claim is so broad that no consumer would actually believe that the statement was based on actual facts. Eventually the BBB ruled in favor of Elmer's and "recommended that the tag line be discontinued from packaging and other advertising." Gorilla Glue stated that it would appeal the ruling, however, eventually changing its tag line to read, "For the TOUGHEST jobs on PLANET EARTH."

The original campaign, however, laid the ground work for the perception that Gorilla Glue is indeed the toughest glue on the market. And in the mind of the consumer, perception is reality.

At the 2007 Hardware show, Elmer's Product Inc. announced that it was stepping up its fight against Gorilla Glue and launched a consumer branded "Ultimate Glue" and complete line up of home repair adhesives. There is no doubt that the amount of R&D put into this new line of "Ultimate Glue" produced the strongest glue on the market, but perception is still reality.

Elmer's Glue holds the glitter on preschoolers' mother's day cards and is used to build log cabins with Popsicle sticks. This is the perception of consumers, not that Elmer's Glue is going to hold together their latest weekend project or is the best option when the weekend warrior is re-caulking their bath tub.

There is no arguement here against the advertising campaign of going directly at Gorilla Glue with verified research and data to back up the comparison advertising. The problem lies with leading the brand in two directions. Is Elmer's Glue the tough stuff? Or is it the glue you want to let your kids play with? - It needs to be one or the other, the latter.

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