Over the last 100 years, the paint category has been as exciting as watching paint dry. Little product innovation throughout the years meant brands were stuck in a colour and quality war. Paint for high humidity, paint with colour-lock technology, 200 different shades of white.

As the battle for share raged amongst the long-standing category leaders, PREMIER, an exclusive paint brand by Canadian Tire, was struggling to make its mark. Ranked #5 in awareness and struggling to make any ground with share, PREMIER needed an injection of colour to gain incremental share points which were critical as the Canadian home paint category represented a lucrative several hundred million dollars in profit.

The Challenge was to overcome low awareness and share to challenge the category leaders for a larger piece of the home paint pie.

The campaign objectives were to increase PREMIER paint sales by 9%, to increase PREMIER market share by 1pt, and to increase awareness of PREMIER by 2pts.

People only see the pain in painting. The paint industry was in desperate need of a makeover. In 2019, PREMIER invested in its product pipeline to develop new ways to improve the painting process. While competitors focused on what’s inside the can, PREMIER reimagined everything from the products to the in-store experience. Heading into 2020, PREMIER’s biggest innovation, Ready to Roll (RTR) “paint in a bag”, a market-first in North America, and an innovation that made the painting process easier, was ready to be unveiled.

To relaunch PREMIER, the agency tackled the human truth about painting that no brand in the category had addressed: painting is messy and a real pain in the ass. Research uncovered that every part of the painting process is a pain, from colour selection (25% say it’s overwhelming to pick a colour) to the outdated cans (60% are frustrated by how difficult cans are to pour, 45% frustrated that they don’t close properly) to the need to go in store to pick your colour.

With bag, brush and consumer insight in mind, they set their sights on millennials aged 24-39 for two main reasons. First, it was an opportunity to appeal to millennials who weren’t yet loyal to one specific brand and bring them into PREMIER. Secondly, Millennials have significant spending power as they represent several hundred million dollars in revenue opportunity for retail sales.

Take the pain out of painting. The campaign set out to reintroduce PREMIER to consumers and get people to rethink how they felt about painting, how they painted and how they viewed the leading brands in the category. Every part of the campaign focused on taking the pain out of the painting from the products, to where they showed up along the consumer journey.

The campaign launched on TV with a simple yet provocative question: “Ever wonder why so much time painting is spent… not painting?” It highlighted the juxtaposition between the “old” ways of painting (the can) vs. what the new PREMIER RTR product offered in terms of simplicity.

Within digital and social video, they addressed additional pain points: painting prep can be overwhelming, from drop sheets, to gloves, to paint brushes, people don’t know where to start. Their answer: introducing PREMIER’s RTR Accessories Kit, with everything you need in one convenient package.

Another pain point being picking up the paint in store can be such a hassle—their answer is PREMIER’s RTR new ship-to-home option, making the paint purchase effortless. The campaign was amplified with influencers to reach millennials as well as by a sponsorship with HGTV to reach millennial homeowners with a fixing affinity.

By solving the pains of the painting process, people were as excited about an easier way to paint as the creators were to talk about it. Sales increased by 39% (4x the goal), and 25% increase in PREMIER sales during the campaign period, despite a steep decline in paint sales following the initial COVID-19 spike in sales in the months prior. PREMIER market share increased by 3pts. Finally, PREMIER awareness increased by 6pts (3x the goal).