Ideas We Love: The Smart Can 🥤📺

Issue Number 23: Pepsi's Smart Can brings some digital dynamism to CPG

Hello. How are you?

It’s been a busy week at IWL HQ. The school term is winding down, so both Matt and Tom have been competing in various forms of dad-based-amateur athletics. Client projects and new business pitches are plentiful. And to cap it all off there was the small matter of a General Election in the UK this week, too. Summer Holidays are arriving just in the nick of time. We’re both a bit tired.

Anyway. Enough about us. Let’s look at something we’ve both been excited about this week.

The idea: The Pepsi Smart Can

Apositely announced at Cannes by SVP of Design Mauro Porcini and SVP Marketing Mark Kirkham, the Smart Can is a new innovation from Pepsi which in their words acts as “CAN-vas for creativity, a media that will unlock new ways of storytelling, a gate to access new experiences, for the new generation of people “thirsty for more”.”

The Smart Can is a flexible, high definition screen wrapped around a can - it is powered by a SIM card, which allows it to connect to the internet, displaying content that can be pushed to the device. Real detail at launch was scarce - but articles covering the launch have since provided a bit more info: “it doesn’t have a drink inside it, despite the name; it is purely for entertainment purposes and even has on, off, and volume up and down buttons out back. The company is not mass-producing the colorful Smart Cans; they are purely promotional and are being sent out to influencers in many of the spaces Pepsi focuses on, like gaming and music”

Why we love this idea

As Porcini and Kirkham said - this is a canvas for creativity - As media planners, we’re always thinking about how we can use different spaces to carry a message which is mainly why we like it so much….

#1 Everything communicates, everything is media

We’re big believers in Naked Communication’s principle that everything communicates. This idea leans into that dynamic very explicitly, moving the can from being a static brand asset into one which is digital. The on-pack equivalent of the transition from paper and post Billboards to Digital-Out-of-Home. With that enhanced capability comes the chance to think about more vivid and engaging forms of creativity on-pack, the opportunity to use the can as a means of delivering new news and the opportunity to react to different stimulus. As a result, it creates an altogether more interesting on-pack opportunity - both for consumers and indeed, marketers.

#2 Speculates about the future of the category

It’s easy to dismiss the Smart Can as a piece of marketing vapour-ware. The press-releases are explicit that this isn’t something we’re going to see within the aisles of local supermarkets any time soon. But, it’s interesting as a piece of speculative design. We’re all very familiar with other branches of design (architecture, industrial design…) creating things like ‘concept cars’ - these are not necessarily ever going to come to market, but their DNA will inform what the consumer does buy for a great deal of time to come. Digital technology is constantly improving - the cycle of smaller and cheaper continues: Could this technology impact the category in the near future if not today?

#3 It’s a bit of hype in a category that generally lacks in hype

Perhaps that’s a bit unfair. Liquid Death is a brand in an adjacent category that definitely is creating hype. But it’s doing so through the strength of their communications decisions. We like how this idea creates a bit of buzz around the sugar-water category and it does so in a way which feels quite ‘pure’ as a demonstration of what great FMCG marketing can look like. The model that Pepsi will employ for this innovation will see Smart Cans placed in the hands of key influencers across verticals such as Gaming and Sport. Expect to see these popping up in the background of your favourite twitch-streamers soon. As we know, scarcity creates value - and that scarcity could become an important strategic lever in it’s own right for this product going forward…. which brings us nicely to our next section.

What we’d love to do with it

Given the very nascent nature of this idea, it’s quite an exciting exercise to think about what you might do with it….

#1 Surpise and Delight

In the short term, whilst these devices are scarce Pepsi can use them as a means of contuining to create buzz for the brand. Use them as prizes in competitions, position them as easter eggs… Create the means for people to get their hands on these ultra-limited devices, creating cultural capital for the lucky recipients in the process. Turn the constraint of limited availability into a benefit.

#2 A Canvas for Collaboration

We could see how Pepsi might either enable ‘professional’ collaborators the opportunity to create limited edition content for the can, but similarly - they could hand over the reins to their consumer base - allowing them the means of creating their own art work (video, imagery etc) to adorn their cans. And whilst I think it’s fair to say that the hype surrounding NFTs has well and truly died down, the more that new screens begin to proliferate - the more opportunity there are for things like digital collectables to become an interesting and viable avenue for brands and creators alike to explore.

#3 Enhance the retail media strategy

One of the perennial questions asked by CPG brands is around the role that 1st Party Data plays for them. Historically, most CPG is sold via a retailer - and so 1PD is usually of limited value. A device like the Smart Can potentially upends that rule. Assuming in the future this device achieves some scale, it gives Pepsi a direct route to the consumer and would allow for the creation and distribution of sales promotions based on the information you know about them (geography, past purchases, favourite SKUs, hobbies and interests etc). This could then be tied back into purchase via Amazon, creating a much more varied and valuable relationship between brand and consumer.

If you like this, you’ll love….

This is a move toward something approximating Back to the Future 2. However, it did remind us of some other ideas we loved already

Amazon Dash Buttons

Lo-fi digital connection from Amazon, enabling you to ‘re-order’ some of the household essentials. An early iteration of retail media, when you think about it.

Coca Cola’s Share a Coke

Another great example of on-pack innovation in sugar-water related categories. This time from Pepsi’s arch-rival Coca Cola.

Berg’s Little Printer

Produced by now defunct digital design studio Berg, the Little Printer was a delightfully quirky device from an altogether cosier and nicer era on the internet. The printer connected to the internet: to twitter, to weather and the news etc - and turned the feeds of your chosen media into a ‘personal daily newspaper’. Perhaps a pre-cursor to the Twitter Clock

Until Next Time

As always, any thoughts or feedback you have are greatly appreciated.

Until next time,

Cheerio

Tom & Matt