Here’s to the apathetic ones

Mental and physical availability, loyalty and light buyers

You have fans who love your brand. Not as many as you would like, and they’re not worth as much as you might think (in terms of revenue, not as people), but you have fans. They follow you on Instagram, they read your emails, they buy what you’re selling, they pick up what you’re putting down. They are your choir.

The problem with choirs is … they’re small. Your audience is not.

For example, Coca-Cola has 108 million Facebook followers. That sounds like a lot of people, and it is slightly more than the populations of Delhi, Shanghai and Tokyo combined. Yet compared to the wider audience — the billions and billions of people around the world who enjoy a Coke every once in a while — 108 million is barely a rounding error. And that’s assuming all 108 million of Coke’s Facebook followers are “fans.”

Don’t forget the people in the cheap seats. The ones who don’t care. The people who just want a fun experience or something that tastes good, works well, or shows up when they need it. You need to reach them, too.

Meet Tony’s Chocolonely.

Tony’s Chocolonely is one of the fastest growing chocolate brands in the world. They started in Amsterdam. You can find them all over Europe. Tony’s entered the U.S. market in 2015, and now they’re in Walmart and Target, which effectively means they are as close to everywhere as possible.

According to Fast Company, Tony’s has had “26% year-over-year revenue growth, surpassing $216 million in fiscal year 2024. Sales in the U.S. have more than doubled in two years, exceeding $55 million last year.”

Their branding is fun and playful. Their brand assets — name, logo, colors, font, packaging, bar design — are delightfully distinctive. They look nothing like their competitors. They’re memorable. Oh, and their chocolate is pretty gosh darn delicious.

You can’t tell by looking, but Tony’s Chocolonely is one of the most mission-driven brands on the planet.

While working on a story for the Dutch TV station KVM back in 2003, three journalists — Teun van de Keuken, Roland Duong, and Maurice Dekkers — discovered that most major chocolate companies source their cocoa from farms that rely on illegal child labor and slave labor.

At first, they did what any good journalists would do; they shared the story with the world. While it sparked a certain amount of outrage, it didn’t actually change anything. Van de Keuken realized fairly quickly that he wasn’t going to solve the problem by shouting about it.

So, despite not knowing much about the chocolate business, Van de Keuken founded Tony’s Chocolonely.

Tony’s builds relationships with West African cocoa farmers. They pay a real living wage, ensure fair labor practices and track their beans through the entire supply chain in order to make sure their cocoa is ethically sourced. You can read more about it here.

Their mission isn’t just to shine a light on appallingly horrible and exploitative labor practices. It’s also to show the entire industry that it is possible to treat human beings like human beings and still run a profitable business (and make great chocolate).

That’s why they also created Tony’s Open Chain. Competing brands are encouraged to use Tony’s supply chain to buy exploitation-free cocoa beans. All they have to do is sign on. Supply chains are mostly an open secret, but ethically sourced cocoa requires a lot more oversight.

Yes, it costs more to purchase exploitation-free cocoa, but the infrastructure is there, and it’s scalable. In the U.S., MrBeast Feastables uses Tony’s Open Chain, even though the two brands compete on the same shelves.

But you wouldn’t know any of this unless you looked a little closer. And that’s by design.

Tony’s doesn’t lead with purpose; they lead with chocolate. They’re playing the mental and physical availability game just like any other smart, fast-moving consumer goods brand out there.

To be clear, Tony’s is not shy about their purpose. Their mission is written on the inside of each wrapper. They talk about it on social media. The distinctive pattern on the bar is there to highlight wealth inequality in the cocoa supply chain. So when you share a bar of Tony’s Chocolonely, some people get a smaller piece, which is supposed to start a conversation.

But it’s absolutely okay if people never have that conversation.

Tony’s is not changing the industry by preaching to the choir. They’re changing the industry by changing the industry. They’re not growing market share by preaching to the choir. They’re growing by making their brand as easy to think of, easy to find, easy to like and easy to buy for as many people as possible.

What does that mean for you?

Don’t fight apathy, embrace it. Most of your buyers and potential buyers don’t care all that much about your brand, and they never will. You still need them. Light buyers are worth around 50% of your revenue, and they’re your only real opportunity for growth. So …

Focus on reaching more and more people through broad-reach, emotional, fame-building, brand advertising.
Capture immediate sales with performance ads that live in the same universe as your brand advertising.
Be distinctive with your logo, font, brand colors, mascot, etc. Use your distinctive brand assets everywhere on everything.
Grow your physical availability by expanding distribution and reducing friction points on your website.
Offer a fantastic product or service and a great customer experience, but don’t hang your hat on loyalty or retention. Customers are “polygamously loyal” at best, churn is gonna happen, and giving discounts to people who were probably going to buy anyway is not a solid growth strategy.

“Hang on,” you might say. “I’m not an FMCG brand. This has nothing to do with me.” Sure, except the same rules apply to any product or service in any category, B2C, B2B or D2C.

Make your brand as easy to think of, easy to find, easy to like and as easy to buy for as many people as possible. Easier said than done? Yep. It always is. We can help.

We’ll see you next time.

Sources!

How Tony’s Chocolonely made fighting exploitation in the cocoa supply chain a tasty proposition – Fast Company
Tony’s Chocolonely: More Than Just Chocolate – FoodUnfolded
How Brands Grow part 2 – Jenni Romaniuk and Byron Sharp