Case: Brookside Chocolate Vineyard-inspired Snacks

Brookside Chocolate is owned by the Hershey Company and sells chocolate-covered snacks in many different retailers in Canada (Real Canadian Superstore, Wal-Mart, Safeway, London Drugs, etc.). It has enjoyed double-digit growth over the past years and successfully keeps introducing new product variations.

The staple product includes its fruit flavours wrapped in dark chocolate (raspberry & goji, acai & blueberry...) and the company even recommends wine pairings for enjoying your snack (e.g. Cabernet Sauvignon with raspberry & goji flavoured snack) on its website. Brookside's new product "Dark Chocolate Vineyard Inspired Chardonnay Grape & Peach Flavours" has just been launched into retail stores based on the idea of pairing the indulgent dark chocolate fruit flavour snack with a wine. It's an 180g pack for $4.48 (plus taxes). Its description reads: "BROOKSIDE heritage chocolatier partnered with an expert Sommelier to craft delicious combinations of soft, sweetened, wine and spirit flavoured centers dipped in dark chocolate."

Although previously introduced snack innovations were successful, sales of this new product have been disappointing. After conducting some research, Brookside was surprised to find out consumers were confused if there was actually any alcohol content in these chocolatecovered snacks. Consumers, who said they didn't drink alcohol and were very health-conscious, liked other Brookside snacks, but were hesitant to buy this one. However, once they did and tried it, they absolutely loved its taste and realization that there was in fact no alcohol content. Another issue these consumers had was that they felt the package size was too big and price too high to risk spending their money on something they didn't know they would enjoy. There were also no specific promotions for this particular Brookside snack flavour - only the ones for the regular Brookside snacks, like raspberry & goji.

Question: The manager wonders what happened that made consumers hesitant to buy/to try the new chocolate. Please explain to the manager how stereotypes contributed to this perception based on the current message "BROOKSIDE heritage chocolatier partnered with an expert Sommelier to craft delicious combinations of soft, sweetened, wine and spirit flavored centers dipped in dark chocolate.". First, explain what stereotypes are in buyer behavior and then how they were formed in the consumers' mind - choose 2 to explain from the 3 available.

Question: As a buyer behaviour expert, you believe that Brookside should use an experiential marketing campaign to change this consumer attitude that the new chocolate will not contain any alcohol. Please describe your idea for an experiential marketing campaign - make sure you clearly describe what specifically will be done to engage consumers, which senses it will address (at least 2) and how, and how it will create the emotional bond between consumers and Brookside.