From Innocence to Irreverence — Marketing a Contradictory Brand

What is it about Chupa Chups which makes it so fascinating to kids and teenagers around the world? This paper will look at how Chupa Chups has developed itself as a ‘discovery brand’, always offering something new about itself to be discovered. Like people, brands live and mature in real time, and their communication with their public must also feel real and not appear to be trying too hard to attract attention to themselves. One way of achieving this is by allowing the brand to have contradictions. Chupa Chups is a brand which will not commit to a clear and uniform brand strategy — and this is what makes it so interesting to consumers (and researchers). But even a contradictory brand needs a strategy — and one of the challenges of understanding the brand is identifying where the tensions within it lie — in order that they can be developed and built upon in the future. The methods of researching the contradictory components of Chupa Chups will be discussed.