Trap-Ease America: The Big Cheese of Mousetraps Conventional Wisdom One April mo

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Trap-Ease America:

The Big Cheese of Mousetraps

Conventional Wisdom

One April morning, Martha House, president of Trap-Ease America, entered her office in Costa Mesa, California. She paused for a moment to contemplate the Ralph Waldo Emerson quote that she had framed and hung near her desk:

If a man [can] . . . make a better mousetrap than his neighbor, the world will make a beaten path to his door.

Perhaps, she mused, Emerson knew something that she didn’t. She had the better mousetrap—Trap-Ease—but the world didn’t seem all that excited about it.

Martha had just returned from the National Hardware Show in Chicago. Standing in the trade show display booth for long hours and answering the same questions hundreds of times had been tiring. Yet, all the hard work had paid off. Each year, National Hardware Show officials held a contest to select the best new product introduced at that year’s show. The Trap-Ease had won the contest this year, beating out over 300 new products.

Such notoriety was not new for the Trap-Ease mousetrap, however. People magazine had run a feature article on the trap, and the trap had been the subject of numerous talk shows and articles in various popular press and trade publications.

Despite all of this attention, however, the expected demand for the trap had not materialized. Martha hoped that this award might stimulate increased interest and sales.

Background

A group of investors had formed Trap-Ease America in January after it had obtained worldwide rights to market the innovative mousetrap. In return for marketing rights, the group agreed to pay the inventor and patent holder, a retired rancher, a royalty fee for each trap sold. The group then hired Martha to serve as president and to develop and manage the Trap-Ease America organization.

Trap-Ease America contracted with a plastics-manufacturing firm to produce the traps. The trap consisted of a square, plastic tube measuring about 6 inches long and 1-1/2 inches in diameter. The tube bent in the middle at a 30-degree angle, so that when the front part of the tube rested on a flat surface, the other end was elevated. The elevated end held a removable cap into which the user placed bait (cheese, dog food, or some other aromatic tidbit). The front end of the tube had a hinged door. When the trap was “open,” this door rested on two narrow “stilts” attached to the two bottom corners of the door. (See Exhibit.)

The simple trap worked very efficiently. A mouse, smelling the bait, entered the tube through the open end. As it walked up the angled bottom toward the bait, its weight made the elevated end of the trap drop downward. This action elevated the open end, allowing the hinged door to swing closed, trapping the mouse.

Small teeth on the ends of the stilts would catch in a groove on the bottom of the trap, locking the door closed. The user could then dispose of the mouse while it was still alive, or the user could leave it alone for a few hours to suffocate in the trap.

Martha believed the trap had many advantages for the consumer when compared with traditional spring-loaded traps or poisons. Consumers could use it safely and easily with no risk of catching their fingers while loading it. It posed no injury or poisoning threat to children or pets. Furthermore, with Trap-Ease, consumers avoided the unpleasant “mess” they often encountered with the violent spring-loaded traps. The Trap-Ease created no “clean-up” problem. Finally, the user could reuse the trap or simply throw it away.

Martha’s early research suggested that women were the best target market for the Trap-Ease. Men, it seemed, were more willing to buy and use the traditional, spring-loaded trap. The targeted women, however, did not like the traditional trap. These women often stayed at home and took care of their children. Thus, they wanted a means of dealing with the mouse problem that avoided the unpleasantness and risks that the standard trap created in the home.

To reach this target market, Martha decided to distribute Trap-Ease through national grocery, hardware, and discount chains. She sold the trap directly to these large retailers, avoiding any wholesalers or other middlemen.

The traps sold in packages of two, with a suggested retail price of $5.99. Although this price made the Trap-Ease about five times more expensive than smaller, standard traps, consumers appeared to offer little initial price resistance. The manufacturing cost for the Trap-Ease, including freight and packaging costs, was about 59 cents per unit. The company paid an additional 19 cents per unit in royalty fees. Martha priced the traps to retailers at $2.38 per unit (two units to a package) and estimated that, after sales and volume discounts, Trap-Ease would produce net revenue from retailers of $1.50 per unit.

To promote the product, Martha had budgeted approximately $145,000 for the first year. She planned to use $100,000 of this amount for travel costs to visit trade shows and to make sales calls on retailers. She planned to use the remaining $45,000 for advertising. So far, however, because the mousetrap had generated so much publicity, she had not felt that she needed to do much advertising. Still, she had placed advertising in Good

Housekeeping (after all, the trap had earned the Good Housekeeping Seal of Approval) and in other “home and shelter” magazines. Martha was the company’s only salesperson, but she intended to hire more salespeople soon.

Martha had initially forecasted Trap-Ease’s first-year sales at 5 million units. Through April, however, the company had only sold several hundred thousand units. Martha wondered if most new products got off to such a slow start, or if she was doing something wrong. She had detected some problems, although none seemed overly serious. For one, there had not been enough repeat buying. For another, she had noted that many of the retailers upon whom she called kept their sample mousetraps on their desks as conversation pieces—she wanted the traps to be used and demonstrated. Martha wondered if consumers were also buying the traps as novelties rather than as solutions to their mouse problems.

Martha knew that the investor group believed that Trap-Ease America had a “once-in-a-lifetime chance” with its innovative mousetrap, and she sensed the group’s impatience with the company’s progress so far. She had budgeted approximately $500,000 in administrative and fixed costs for the first year (not including marketing costs). To keep the investors happy, the company needed to sell enough traps to cover those costs and make a reasonable profit.

Back to the Drawing Board

In these first few months, Martha had learned that marketing a new product was not an easy task. Some customers were very demanding. For example, one national retailer had placed a large order with instructions that Trap-Ease America was to deliver the order to the loading dock at one of the retailer’s warehouses between 1:00 and 3:00 p.m. on a specified day. When the truck delivering the order arrived after 3:00 p.m., the retailer had refused to accept the shipment. The retailer had told Martha it would be a year before she got another chance.

As Martha sat down at her desk, she realized she needed to rethink her marketing strategy. Perhaps she had missed something or made some mistake that was causing sales to be so slow. Glancing at the quotation again, she thought that perhaps she should send the picky retailer and other customers a copy of Emerson’s famous quote.

Questions for Discussion

Critically analyze the situation given above.

Perform SWOT analysis.

Has Martha identified the best target market for Trap-Ease? What other market segments might the firm target?

How has the company positioned the Trap-Ease for the chosen target market? Could it position the product in other ways?

Describe the current marketing mix for Trap-Ease. Do you see any problems with this mix?

Trap-Ease America:

The Big Cheese of Mousetraps

Conventional Wisdom

One April morning, Martha House, president of Trap-Ease America, entered her office in Costa Mesa, California. She paused for a moment to contemplate the Ralph Waldo Emerson quote that she had framed and hung near her desk:

If a man [can] . . . make a better mousetrap than his neighbor, the world will make a beaten path to his door.

Perhaps, she mused, Emerson knew something that she didn’t. She had the better mousetrap—Trap-Ease—but the world didn’t seem all that excited about it.

Martha had just returned from the National Hardware Show in Chicago. Standing in the trade show display booth for long hours and answering the same questions hundreds of times had been tiring. Yet, all the hard work had paid off. Each year, National Hardware Show officials held a contest to select the best new product introduced at that year’s show. The Trap-Ease had won the contest this year, beating out over 300 new products.

Such notoriety was not new for the Trap-Ease mousetrap, however. People magazine had run a feature article on the trap, and the trap had been the subject of numerous talk shows and articles in various popular press and trade publications.

Despite all of this attention, however, the expected demand for the trap had not materialized. Martha hoped that this award might stimulate increased interest and sales.

Background

A group of investors had formed Trap-Ease America in January after it had obtained worldwide rights to market the innovative mousetrap. In return for marketing rights, the group agreed to pay the inventor and patent holder, a retired rancher, a royalty fee for each trap sold. The group then hired Martha to serve as president and to develop and manage the Trap-Ease America organization.

Trap-Ease America contracted with a plastics-manufacturing firm to produce the traps. The trap consisted of a square, plastic tube measuring about 6 inches long and 1-1/2 inches in diameter. The tube bent in the middle at a 30-degree angle, so that when the front part of the tube rested on a flat surface, the other end was elevated. The elevated end held a removable cap into which the user placed bait (cheese, dog food, or some other aromatic tidbit). The front end of the tube had a hinged door. When the trap was “open,” this door rested on two narrow “stilts” attached to the two bottom corners of the door. (See Exhibit.)

The simple trap worked very efficiently. A mouse, smelling the bait, entered the tube through the open end. As it walked up the angled bottom toward the bait, its weight made the elevated end of the trap drop downward. This action elevated the open end, allowing the hinged door to swing closed, trapping the mouse.

Small teeth on the ends of the stilts would catch in a groove on the bottom of the trap, locking the door closed. The user could then dispose of the mouse while it was still alive, or the user could leave it alone for a few hours to suffocate in the trap.

Martha believed the trap had many advantages for the consumer when compared with traditional spring-loaded traps or poisons. Consumers could use it safely and easily with no risk of catching their fingers while loading it. It posed no injury or poisoning threat to children or pets. Furthermore, with Trap-Ease, consumers avoided the unpleasant “mess” they often encountered with the violent spring-loaded traps. The Trap-Ease created no “clean-up” problem. Finally, the user could reuse the trap or simply throw it away.

Martha’s early research suggested that women were the best target market for the Trap-Ease. Men, it seemed, were more willing to buy and use the traditional, spring-loaded trap. The targeted women, however, did not like the traditional trap. These women often stayed at home and took care of their children. Thus, they wanted a means of dealing with the mouse problem that avoided the unpleasantness and risks that the standard trap created in the home.

To reach this target market, Martha decided to distribute Trap-Ease through national grocery, hardware, and discount chains. She sold the trap directly to these large retailers, avoiding any wholesalers or other middlemen.

The traps sold in packages of two, with a suggested retail price of $5.99. Although this price made the Trap-Ease about five times more expensive than smaller, standard traps, consumers appeared to offer little initial price resistance. The manufacturing cost for the Trap-Ease, including freight and packaging costs, was about 59 cents per unit. The company paid an additional 19 cents per unit in royalty fees. Martha priced the traps to retailers at $2.38 per unit (two units to a package) and estimated that, after sales and volume discounts, Trap-Ease would produce net revenue from retailers of $1.50 per unit.

To promote the product, Martha had budgeted approximately $145,000 for the first year. She planned to use $100,000 of this amount for travel costs to visit trade shows and to make sales calls on retailers. She planned to use the remaining $45,000 for advertising. So far, however, because the mousetrap had generated so much publicity, she had not felt that she needed to do much advertising. Still, she had placed advertising in Good

Housekeeping (after all, the trap had earned the Good Housekeeping Seal of Approval) and in other “home and shelter” magazines. Martha was the company’s only salesperson, but she intended to hire more salespeople soon.

Martha had initially forecasted Trap-Ease’s first-year sales at 5 million units. Through April, however, the company had only sold several hundred thousand units. Martha wondered if most new products got off to such a slow start, or if she was doing something wrong. She had detected some problems, although none seemed overly serious. For one, there had not been enough repeat buying. For another, she had noted that many of the retailers upon whom she called kept their sample mousetraps on their desks as conversation pieces—she wanted the traps to be used and demonstrated. Martha wondered if consumers were also buying the traps as novelties rather than as solutions to their mouse problems.

Martha knew that the investor group believed that Trap-Ease America had a “once-in-a-lifetime chance” with its innovative mousetrap, and she sensed the group’s impatience with the company’s progress so far. She had budgeted approximately $500,000 in administrative and fixed costs for the first year (not including marketing costs). To keep the investors happy, the company needed to sell enough traps to cover those costs and make a reasonable profit.

Back to the Drawing Board

In these first few months, Martha had learned that marketing a new product was not an easy task. Some customers were very demanding. For example, one national retailer had placed a large order with instructions that Trap-Ease America was to deliver the order to the loading dock at one of the retailer’s warehouses between 1:00 and 3:00 p.m. on a specified day. When the truck delivering the order arrived after 3:00 p.m., the retailer had refused to accept the shipment. The retailer had told Martha it would be a year before she got another chance.

As Martha sat down at her desk, she realized she needed to rethink her marketing strategy. Perhaps she had missed something or made some mistake that was causing sales to be so slow. Glancing at the quotation again, she thought that perhaps she should send the picky retailer and other customers a copy of Emerson’s famous quote.

Questions for Discussion

1. Critically analyze the situation given above.

2. Perform SWOT analysis.

3. Has Martha identified the best target market for Trap-Ease? What other market segments might the firm target?

4. How has the company positioned the Trap-Ease for the chosen target market? Could it position the product in other ways?

5. Describe the current marketing mix for Trap-Ease. Do you see any problems with this mix?

Explanation / Answer

Critically analyze the situation given above.

The situation is that the company have a product that is better than the rival companies but the sales do not show much improvement, the product is not attracting customers to purchase it even though it has won many awards for its outstanding performance.

Perform SWOT analysis.

Strengths:

Innovated product

Long lasting product

Less risk involved for the customers

Environmental product

Weaknesses

High price

Weak marketing plan

Weak supply chain management

Opportunities:

Unique product concept

Not many rivals on the industry

Threats

Traditional marketers

Chemicals and pesticides

Has Martha identified the best target market for Trap-Ease? What other market segments might the firm target?

She has identify the best target market because men don’t care about the mouse itself or the type of trap and women don’t want to kill the mouse due to the mess

Marth could try to focus on companies like supermarkets and food factories that because of the space they tend to have this kind of problems.

How has the company positioned the Trap-Ease for the chosen target market? Could it position the product in other ways?

The position of the trap is “Traps mice easily” but other positions could be “Is clean, safe and easy to use”

Describe the current marketing mix for Trap-Ease. Do you see any problems with this mix?

Product: Currently the company has 1 product, which is the mouse trap and the company can innovate by creating different versions of a trap

Price: The high price of the trap is consistent with the qualify differentiation of strategy but the company can explore different prices if they start selling different products

Place: National grocery, hardware and drug chains.

Promotion: the budget right now is $60,000.

$10,000 are spent on magazines and the other $50,000 on travel costs to visit trade shows.

The company should try to sell their products online, on Amazon or EBay and use social media like Facebook, Instagram, YouTube and Pinterest to advertise their products with photos and videos.

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