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The Aarhus-based manufacturer was quick to recognise the value of branding and multi-channel marketing.
Otto Mønsted’s primary trademark was OMA, an early three-letter initial abbreviation for Otto Mønsted Aarhus, which Otto Mønsted coined in 1909. Many will still remember the familiar slogan: Say the name – OMA, as a simple testament to Otto Mønsted’s talent for branding and marketing. Just two years after OMA margarine went into production, it accounted for half of the company’s margarine production and was even sold in Danish pharmacies.
From the company’s inception in 1865, Otto Mønsted was a master at utilising the power of advertising and was personally involved in both the creative process and branding of the margarine, which he began producing in 1883. The product was intended as a cheap alternative to butter, which was quite expensive for most ordinary households at the time. Margarine as a product originally came from France, where it was sold as ‘beurre economique’ and in Denmark, margarine was also known as ‘artificial butter’ for a while, until butter lobbyists put an end to this play with value-laden words.
From cheap to healthy fat
Otto Mønsted was always quick to recognise new opportunities. He closely followed developments in advertising and therefore knew the value of having a strong brand and around the turn of the century he introduced different margarine qualities with the three trademarks; Elephant, Stag and Swan. Today, you might wonder about the choice of animal motifs, but animal motifs were generally very popular at the time. We also know this from pharmacies, which used both the lion and the swan as symbols.
Otto Mønsted’s choice of the three animal motifs was probably also due to the fact that all three are herbivores. Otto Mønsted wanted to give housewives the idea that humans could become just as strong if they ate his margarine products made from refined vegetable oil.
The exotic product from the unknown world
The perception of margarine as a cheap substitute for butter changed with the famous OMA plant margarine campaigns. The vegetable product was marketed with artistic illustrations of exotic animals and peoples as an association to the raw materials imported from the vast, and for most, unknown world.
The exotic affiliation of margarine could be seen in Otto Mønsted’s first OMA posters from 1909, where an armed Bedouin pulls his margarine-laden camel through a margarine-yellow desert. It was later produced in many variations, but always with the same consistent sun and margarine yellow colours.
The illustrations from the OMA posters and for the other brands were reused when Otto Mønsted began publishing collectible books around 1912. A collector’s series could, for example, be about ‘The Making of Plant Margarine’ and it consisted of labels showing the entire process from picking coconuts to cooking on Mrs Denmark’s frying pan. But he also published booklets with picture series of ‘Denmark’s Flora’ and other material compiled by scientists. It was popular and consumers were understandably eager to collect the stickers, which also triggered a bonus when the collector’s book was full.
Many different platforms
Otto Mønsted was also a pioneer in packaging and outdoor advertising with signage in cities, and the company was at the forefront of decorating trucks and later refrigerated lorries, which in 1912 attracted a lot of attention for being fast, travelling at 35 km/h, and they had a major impact on the company’s distribution network.
Otto Mønsted was also one of the first companies in Denmark to use illuminated advertising and ended up living up to this quote from the first textbook on advertising of the time:
“Ideally, the goal (of advertising) is only achieved when people smile at those who in their ignorance do not know, for example, Otto Mønsted and his margarine.”
Source: The pioneer Otto Mønsted – Say the name… by Jesper Strandskov, Peter Sørensen and Kurt Pedersen.
Photos of posters and stickers are courtesy of Permild & Rosengren.