Frank Sinatra was referring to New York City when he belted out the well-known refrain, ‘If I can make it there, I’ll make it anywhere,’ but lately it seems packaged goods companies have adopted the phrase for Canada, which has evolved into a hotbed for product launches.

In fact, a slew of innovative entries that have completely revolutionized their categories – Swiffer Wet Jet, Benylin Freezer Pops, Listerine PocketPaks, and Mr. Christie Cookie Barz, to name a few – have debuted north of the 49th parallel in the last couple of years.

Robert Levy, managing director of Toronto-based BrandSpark International, suggests there are several reasons our nation is viewed as an ideal test market. First, with an increasingly diverse population, it enables marketers to isolate various consumer segments. For instance, a company could opt for a different offer or positioning in Quebec, without the risk of spill from other regions.

There is also the ability to monitor performance in urban versus suburban, or West versus East Coast markets.

‘This would give you a sense as to whether something has the legs across multiple markets, or is just for an urban [crowd], which would be a pretty good proxy for the U.S.,’ he says. ‘If you look at a global launch …[testing in Canada] can reduce the risk and give [marketers] better insight.’

In part we’re witnessing more activity here lately because product innovation has become integral to growth in the packaged goods industry. According to the Productscan online database of new products, tallied by Marketing Intelligence Service in Naples, N.Y., packaged goods firms broke a record for introductions in 2001, with over 32,000 SKUs. While 2002 was just shy of that record, 8.8% of the items put forth last year earned a high rating for innovation, the largest percentage since 1989.

Tom Vierhile, general manager at Marketing Intelligence Service, isn’t surprised that his northern neighbours are the first to experience such inventions as Pfizer Canada’s Listerine PocketPaks.

‘When companies test product, they look for markets that have relatively low-cost media and can reach a lot of people, and Canada’s sort of laid out that way,’ he says. ‘Most of the population is in [major cities and within about] 100 miles of the U.S., so it’s a good test market.’

Plus, he adds, it means less money down the drain if a creation bombs. Vierhile cites Wahoos!, a crispy corn chips snack from General Mills that debuted across the United States last year, as an example of a product that has performed poorly.

In July, Advertising Age reported that General Mills spent US$94 million on Wahoos!, yet achieved less than US$20 million in sales.

‘This product could have benefited from test marketing,’ says Vierhile. ‘You learn how to hone the advertising and in some cases not to roll the product out. If you could spend US$10 million to avoid losing US$60 million, that’s a pretty good reason to test.’

With novelties like Listerine PocketPaks in particular, Vierhile believes debuting in a smaller market like Canada enables companies to smooth out wrinkles on the production side, with less risk. ‘I think [parent company Pfizer] realized it would be tricky to manufacture,’ he says. ‘If demand exceeded supply in the U.S., how embarrassing would that have been?’

For his part, Graham Robertson, category manager for oral care at Toronto-based Pfizer Canada, concedes this point. ‘It’s revolutionary, so there’s bound to be learning on the production side,’ he says. ‘If you compare Canada to other countries on the map, it seems big enough to make an impact and to see how the product really does. Yet it’s still small enough to make any changes if need be. That’s why it makes such a great launch market.’

With its sleek translucent packaging and Matrix-inspired advertising – starring a female action-hero who destroys hideous aliens – the wafer-thin breath-freshening strips have been a hit with the 15- to 30-year-old target in Canada, capturing $28.4 million in sales in the mini-mint segment in 2002, according to ACNielsen. Robertson adds that PocketPaks is the number-one SKU in that category, with 18% of market share in dollars, and that the product has witnessed similar success stateside.

The only alteration for the American debut of PocketPaks was in the advertising itself, with the U.S. firm deciding not to adapt creative from J. Walter Thompson in Toronto. Instead, the stateside TV effort features a waterfall that morphs into the PocketPaks container and has the tagline ‘Feel the clean.’

Says Robertson: ‘In Canada we built off the action-hero theme [from Listerine mouthwash] but that didn’t make sense for them. It wasn’t an equity that they had.’

In February, Pfizer unveiled its latest Canadian test – Listerine mouthwash with fluoride. According to Robertson, advertising will air this spring and will rely on ‘the trusted imagery of the action-figure campaign.’ The quirky, everyman super- hero of the Listerine campaign has been battling gingivitis up to this point and Robertson explains that fluoride will be treated as an added benefit in the marketing.

Pfizer Canada’s cough-and-cold division has also been experimenting with new offerings. This is partly due to the fact that the Canadian subsidiary is equipped with its own R&D department, and therefore is the brainchild behind original products like Benylin Freezer Pops and Benylin First Defense.

Another reason is that governmental regulations tend to be less stringent than those of the Food and Drug Administration in the States. But there are other factors in choosing this country, according to brand manager Calvin Hwang, who says the consumer segment here is both fickle and diverse, which provides a solid marketing challenge.

‘This… is an educated market,’ he explains. ‘It’s not the most affluent, but it is certainly one that is very developed and very marketing sensitive. People here are smart consumers, so that challenges you to come up with the right campaign. If you could win here, you could probably win elsewhere in the world with some local customization.’

The right campaign for Benylin Freezer Pops, which popped up on the scene in late August, included TV advertising from Bates Canada in Toronto, plus a robust in-store program handled by Accumark. The inspiration for the Mr. Freeze-like children’s cough medicine came from research, which indicated kids dislike cough syrup. (No surprises there.) In fact, the company discovered they would rather do almost any other despicable thing – eat broccoli, go to bed early or stay sick – than down their medicine.

A recent TV spot gets across the message that Freezer Pops are a viable alternative. Targeted at parents, it stars a dad who unsuccessfully hunts for a spoon in the kitchen. He finds out his young daughter has stashed them all away in an effort to resist taking cough medicine. At store level, the plan was to educate consumers with explanatory booklets, coupons and appearances from Benny, a giant purple grape who serves as the Benylin mascot.

The campaign worked, according to Hwang: ‘Before Freezer Pops, Benylin Kids was neck-and-neck with the competition [Triaminic]. Since launching, it’s put us over the top in terms of dominance. We have 40% of share on a dollar basis, and this season was rather soft.’ The product hasn’t flowed into other countries yet, but when it does, Hwang expects the marketing strategy to remain fairly consistent.

Similarly, the demographic makeup of Canada was Procter & Gamble’s motivation for testing the Swiffer Wet Jet here in 2002, according to Toronto-based spokesperson Win Sakdinan. It also enabled the company to get the entire marketing and sales staff behind the product.

‘It allowed us to work with our retailers on a nation-wide basis versus just a regional [basis],’ he says. ‘The success of Swiffer Wet Jet in Canada led to a strong launch in the U.S. and Europe.’ In fact, the brand is now a US$350-million business, according to the company’s Web site.

Despite the crowning of Canada as king of the test market, Vierhile warns that what’s hot in this cold country doesn’t always translate south of the border.

For example, Adams Confectionery (formerly a division of Pfizer, but now owned by Cadbury Schweppes) introduced its Body Smarts snack bar here before rolling it out south of the border in 2001. Despite being bolstered by a reported US$70-million marketing campaign, the nutrition bar was pulled from American store shelves early last year.

Explains Vierhile: ‘In some areas, the Canadian consumer is a bit more like the European consumer and this was perhaps one of them. American consumers have been lukewarm on functional-type products.’

Discrepancies are particularly evident when it comes to the snack category, he points out, because there are distinct taste preferences between Canadians and their American cousins. ‘You go to Canada and ketchup-flavoured potato chips are the cat’s meow,’ he says. ‘You come down here and nobody has ever heard of them.’