Sunny Sales
David Erickson's sunscreens have a high SPF: Success & Profit Factor.
More than 3,750 new cases of melanoma skin cancer will be diagnosed
nationwide this year, say reports put out by the American Cancer
Society. The figure has climbed at a constant rate for the last
twenty years, but entrepreneur David Erickson is trying to do
something about it.
In 1989, Erickson founded Denver-based Rocky Mountain Skiing Co.,
which makes a high-altitude sunscreen that protects the skin from
94 to 96 percent of the sun's harmful rays at high elevations.
Unlike some of its competitors, Rocky Mountain is not concerned
with dark legs and bronzed torsos; one of the company's credos
is: "Sun protection is what we are into, not
tanning."
"Education is our marketing approach," says Erickson, 45.
"Not many people know that the sun's ultra-violet (UV)
rays are four percent stronger every thousand feet above sea level.
I want people to know that you don't have to burn your face off
when you ski at 10,000 feet."
Because of the premium placed on getting customers to use sunscreen
whenever they are outdoors, Erickson needed to devise a way to make
it as easy as possible for customers to carry it with them. The
result was an easy-to-grip, flat, refillable two ounce bottle that
conveniently fits in pockets, purses or fanny packs. "The
sunscreen will be available to you wherever you go. We've
designed our product for the outdoors, for the sportsman,"
says Erickson. "Our system is designed to go with
you."
Customers can purchase eight ounce or one-gallon refills so they
can replenish the supply in their two ounce plastic bottles. If the
consumer chooses not to refill the small bottle, it can be recycled
to reduce waste.
In order to provide maximum sun protection and minimal
inconvenience to its costumers, Rocky Mountain created a sunscreen
that increases resistance to the sun while using as few chemicals
as possible. The aloe-based formula also moisturizes the skin and
is waterproof and fragrance free.
Ironically, Erickson's background prepared him more for
educating people than for making sunscreen. He graduated from Adams
State College in Alamosa, Colorado, with a degree in music
education, and spent two years as a choir teacher in a junior high
school before going to work in promotions for a professional hockey
team, the Colorado Rockies. When the Rockies moved to New Jersey in
1980, Erickson used his savings to open his own business, Erickson
Marketing, distributing souveneirs to gift shops and kiosks at
resorts and national parks in the Rocky Mountain region.
He was peddling his wares to a shop owner in Keystone, Colorado,
when the idea for Rocky Mountain Sunscreen struck him. "There
was a large sunscreen display, but people kept coming up to the
counter and asking questions," relates Erickson. "All
this sunscreen was available, and no one knew what to
buy."
It occurred to Erickson that his position as a supplier provided
him with a distinct advantage in marketing his own products,
because he already had established contacts with the operators whom
he wanted to retail his sunscreen.
"Erickson Marketing supplies merchandise. We've got a
natural 'pipeline' to the national parks," comments
Erickson. "As long as we were already marketing other
people's products, we figured, why not market our
own?"
Using roughly $70,000 in profits from his marketing company,
Erickson set about building his sunscreen business. His first
decision was to hire Meaghan Walsh, whom he had met while she was
working for the Denver Chamber of Commerce, to handle public
relations. The two sat down and came up with a ten-year marketing
strategy for the company, which they put into effect in 1991, the
year the sunscreen actually hit the market.
One major problem was that Erickson did not know anything about
making sunscreen. He set out to find someone who did. "I just
started asking questions," says Erickson. "You have to go
to the sources. The library is a big resource, and I used it, but
mostly, I just talked to people."
Erickson's networking efforts led him to Florida, where he met
two chemists who agreed to develop the product for him. Each new
concoction was tested on friends and family, and two years of
experimentation resulted in the formula that became Rocky Mountain
Sunscreen. The chemists Erickson hired took care of getting the
formula approved by the Food and Drug Administration (FDA).
Even as the formula was being perfected in Florida, Erickson began
putting together the other components of his operation. He needed
to find bottle manufacturers, cap manufacturers, label designers
and makers, as well as personnel to help him market and publicize
Rocky Mountain. Asked how he found companies and people to help him
meet his needs, Erickson responds, "I just kept networking and
networking. You meet one person, and they know someone who can help
you with another need. Everything has come together when I needed
it. I'm not smart enough to do this all myself."
Rocky Mountain found its bottle and cap manufacturers through a
Minnesota-based firm they hired to help with packaging. The label
design and silk-screening is handled by two Denver companies
Erickson came across in his networking efforts.
Erickson and company have devoted a great deal of energy to the
packaging of the sunscreen. "Packaging is everything,"
explains Walsh. "That's what will grab our
customers."
Stresses Erickson, "I can't be in every store where we
sell our product, telling people to buy it. It has to sell itself,
and I think our bottle definitely does that."
The bottle is both eye-catching and informative: The front features
both the sun and the Rocky Mountains, while the back of the bottle
offers instructions on how to properly apply sunscreen.
"People don't understand how to apply sunscreen,"
notes Walsh, one of the six people who make up the Rocky Mountain
staff. "Most people don't think to put sunscreen on until
they've been in the sun, sweating for a while, and it's too
late then. Sunscreen needs to be applied before you go in the sun,
when your skin is still dry, so that it can protect you most
effectively."
Walsh has the daunting task of promoting the company on a miniscule
advertising budget. Rocky Mountain recently began advertising in a
Denver-area ski publication, featuring her simple pitch: "Save
Your Face. Wear It. Rocky Mountain Sunscreen." This is the
company's first foray into print advertisement, though, and
most of the promotional efforts, led by Walsh, have focused on
old-fashioned free samples and education. The U.S. Post Office
purchased 800 bottles of sun screen for their carriers to try, and
employees in the National Park Service are among Walsh's other
targets.
"People really need to put it on their skin to appreciate
it," says Walsh, who often sets up tables at ski events and
applies the sunscreen to potential customers.
Echoes Erickson, "If we can get the product on your skin, we
feel that you'll use it."
The key to Rocky Mountain's future will likely be the success
or failure of its attempt to educate consumers about the need to
use sunscreen on a daily basis, especially at high altitudes.
"Five years ago, people would say, 'Are you nuts?'
says Walsh. "But look at the numbers." The American
Cancer Society predicts that 760 Americans will die of skin cancer
in 1996. Tests have shown that using sunscreen on a daily basis
before the age of 18 can reduce the risk of skin cancer by up to 50
percent. "If we can help educate, we can help people keep
healthy," states Erickson.
Sales suggest that consumers are coming around to Rocky
Mountain's way of thinking. The company began by marketing its
product only in the kiosks and shops Erickson still serves with his
marketing company, but has worked tirelessly to gain access to
other markets. Among the places one can find the soothing sunscreen
are Denver's two major outdoor sports' facilities, Mile
High Stadium and Coors Field. Home to the Denver Broncos and
Colorado Rockies, respectively, both stadiums sell out routinely,
exposing hundreds of thousands of fans to Rocky Mountain
Sunscreen.
Without a doubt, though, the most important achievement in terms of
increasing both visibility and sales was the decision of King
Soopers, one of Colorado's largest supermarket chains, to carry
Rocky Mountain in 1993. It took Erickson nearly a year to convince
the 69-store chain to stock his item. That year, Rocky Mountain
sold 20,000 bottles of sunscreen. That figure nearly doubled in
1994, to 37,000 bottles sold. Erickson's company placed behind
only Coppertone and Banana Boat in sunscreen sales throughout the
King Soopers chain. The company sold an estimated 70,000 bottles in
1995, and hopes to increase that number as it slowly introduces new
products.
To date, Rocky Mountain boasts two different product offerings: SPF
15 and SPF 30. An SPF 45 for kids sunscreen was introduced in March
1996, and a lip balm is tentatively scheduled to join the lineup in
April of 1997. In addition to new products, Rocky Mountain is
considering making larger refill sizes available at retail
stores.
"We're going to build this company one brick at a
time," Erickson says confidently. "We're
self-financed, so we have to do this slowly. We can sell out to
investors, but I don't want the pressure of paying dividends
when we need to reinvest that money. We make payroll and pay our
bills and put the rest back in. Maybe, in five years, I can look to
start taking a little out."
"I've been lucky enough to find good people, and I pay
them to do what they do best," says Erickson of his success in
the sunscreen. "This whole thing is a big team, one big unit
pulling in the same direction. We've created a good product,
and the consumers are responding to it."
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