Maytag
trains entire sales staff on new product line for
less than $6000
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(Oct. 2003) Newton,
Iowa --
The appliance manufacturer Maytag, which owns the up-scale brand Jenn-Air,
announced the release of their "Luxury Series Built-in Refrigerator"
line. The refrigerator, which ranges in cost from $5000 to $9000, places Jenn-Air
in competition with other high-end brands such as Sub-Zero and Viking.
With the entrance into this highly competitive market segment, Jenn-Air
management was now faced with the challenge of properly training over 250
sales people across North America on this important product line. Traditional
sales materials, such as brochures and manuals just didn't seem to give this
"Luxury Series" refrigerator justice. The sales force simply needed
to get a good look at the appliance. However, the custom-built nature of these
units makes their availability scarce. Additionally, the costs to hold classes
and fly sales people to the manufacturer was not attractive.
Maytag and Jenn-Air arrived at a solution when they employed the talents of
Creative Video Services, a Bay Area Multimedia company. CVS suggested that
instead of bringing the sales force to the new refrigerators, they bring the
refrigerators to the people. CVS presented a plan that included the production
of a training video utilizing broadcast quality cameras. These
state-of-the-art cameras would provide exceptional pictures of the exterior
and interior of the unit, which would be integral in demonstrating the
important features and functions. The second piece to the solution would be to
author a presentation that incorporated statistics, technical specs and
information on the competition. This entire program would then be packaged on
a CDRoM that could be viewed on a computer using only a web browser.
The CVS proposal allowed Jenn-Air to provide their sales force with a high
quality look at the new refrigerator in a thirty-five minute presentation by
an expert on the product. Every detail, including warranty information is
covered in the session. The CDRoM will now be distributed to each sales person
for their viewing, and continued reference. There is now no need for
expensive travel and sales downtime. In fact, the final cost of the training
program broke down to approximately $24 per sales person.
