With cold and flu season about to hit, the nation’s biggest tissue makers—Kimberly-Clark and Procter & Gamble—are about to go head-to-head in the growing lotion tissue segment.

Both companies are battling for a larger share of nose in the overall $1 billion tissue category. New TV spots for both K-C’s Kleenex and P&G’s Puffs Plus, touting product enhancements, break Sept. 29.

Kimberly-Clark is marketing its new, 3-ply tissue as the company’s biggest innovation for Kleenex Facial Tissues in four decades. The new Kleenex Facial Tissue with Lotion is softer and 17% stronger than its predecessor, the company claims. The new tissues began shipping on Aug. 25.

For P&G, it is the addition of shea butter, a moisturizer, to its Puffs Plus line of lotion tissues, plus new box designs for three of its primary Puffs products.

Lotion tissues make up about 20% of the facial tissue category and have grown 7% over the past two years, per ACNielsen.

Both competitors are staking out separate claims in the tissue territory, said Felicia Rogers, evp of market research firm Decision Analyst in Arlington, Texas. P&G, for instance, has decided to focus on the design and comfort aspect while K-C sees a bigger potential in comfort combined with strength.

Kimberly-Clark could use a boost for its Kleenex brand, which saw sales decline 5.9% to $495 million for the 52 weeks ending Aug. 10, 2008.

P&G, meanwhile, saw its Puffs product grow 3.2% to $258 million, thanks in large part to its Puffs Plus tissues with lotion, aloe and vitamin E. Puffs Plus grew 14.7% to $136 million.

Kimberly-Clark is getting the word out via a three-step approach: TV ads; a massive, 60 million free Kleenex giveaway campaign in October; and a print campaign in February. Instead of the typical one-page ad, K-C has bought out a four-page spread in consumer magazines that includes a life-size, 4- x 4-inch tissue. 

K-C will emphasize the emotional appeal of its tissues in the new effort, themed “It Feels Good to Feel.” Ads show a mother touching various objects throughout the day: an oven mitt, a soggy sandwich in the dishwasher. When she gets something in her eye and reaches for a box of tissues, she stops and says, “Wow, this is really soft. I can now really feel.” JWT, New York, handles.



“For all the years that we and our competitors have been in business, there has been a traditional tradeoff between, ‘As you get softer, you get less strong; or, as you get more strong, you get less soft,’” said Kleenex senior brand manager Angela Fisher.

Keeping in line with previous Puffs tissue commercials, TV spots breaking next week show a sore, red-nosed chap, Sam, taking a visit to the Puffs Plus factory with his mother. The owner of the factory shows them a conveyor belt with a giant lotion dispenser squirting the ingredients onto each tissue. “Plain tissue rubs, causing more irritation. Puffs Plus with lotion and shea butter has a soothing sensation. A nose in need deserves Puffs Plus indeed,” reads copy in the ad. Publicis, New York, handles. Print ads breaking in Good Housekeeping and Parenting support.

P&G’s focus on lotion tissue benefits stems from the company’s observation that “basic tissue sales tend to stay flat to down while what we would coin as ‘super premium’ are on the rise,” Puffs assistant brand manager Michael Loyson said.

P&G also is looking to gain an edge with new packaging designs. With the exception of Puffs Plus with the Scent of Vicks, which P&G launched in August, new packaging for its Puffs Plus, Ultra and Basic brands feature a series of new, nature-inspired and floral home décor designs.

P&G also plans to extend the designs onto its nonlotion tissues. The new  designs began shipping last week.

“If you went through and quantified it, design wouldn’t be the top driver; however, it does show up in the purchase decision tree,” said Loyson. “More often than not, it can serve as the tie-breaker.”

K-C acknowledged that while design is an influential purchase option (Kleenex’s Oval Tissues were created for this purpose), it’s product performance that ultimately matters. “If a consumer buys a pretty box of 130 tissues and they’re a bad experience, he/she is not going to buy it again next time. Tissues have to meet that need, which is to wipe that sore, red nose,” Fisher said.

Chris McCarthy, evp at TNS Landis, Palm Beach Gardens, Fla., a strategic consultancy, said both P&G and K-C are attempting to satisfy different need states in the consumer. “P&G is combining two known drivers of volume, aesthetics and comfort.” said McCarthy. “K-C is combining one known driver of volume—comfort—and an unknown driver, strength.”

As far as tissue category wars go, “a dual strategy is a good strategy. The more need states you cover on a product, the more sustainable and substantial the brand,” said McCarthy, who counts K-C as a client.

Ultimately however, McCarthy said, long-term success could come down to which tissue product is the hardest for private label to replicate.