As Seen In The Wall Street Journal
Reprinted from The Wall Street Journal - Tuesday, March 28, 2000
© 2000 Dow Jones & Company, Inc. All Rights Reserved
MARKETING & MEDIA
Advertising/By Kathryn Kranhold
Rivals Leap Days After FDA Pulls Rezulin
Who said never kick competitors when they’re down?
Only days after the Food and Drug Administration shelved diabetes drug Rezulin, SmithKline Beecham, maker of the competing drug Avandia, is out with big, national newspaper ads urging patients to ask their physicians about switching prescriptions from Rezulin made by Warner-Lambert.
Under the headline, "Attention Rezulin - Users," the SmithKline ad says that "if you’ve been taking Rezulin to manage your type 2 diabetes, you probably know that it has been removed from the market because of severe liver problems." The ad continues: "In requesting its removal, the FDA noted that there are safer alternatives to Rezulin."
Yesterday, marketers of another Rezulin rival called Actos said they also are looking at advertising in major markets as a way to reach Rezulin users. A spokesman for the drug, which is sold by Eli Lilly and Takeda Pharmaceuticals America, a unit of Japan’s Takeda Chemical Industries, in the U.S., declined to provide details about the potential campaign. Until that decision is made, a spokesman said, Actos will continue to be marketed to diabetes patients through health-care professionals.
But he said Actos ads aren’t likely to be headlined "Attention Rezulin Users." "We’re going to be very careful that we are not scaring people. We want to reassure people," the spokesman said.
The Avandia ads, which have run in the New York Times, The Wall Street Journal and other daily newspapers, also tell Rezulin users about how many patients take Avandia, what it does and its potential side effects. "Avandia continues to be recognized as a safe and effective alternative -," the ad says.
Will the ads work? SmithKline says it has received a 100% increase in calls to its 800 toll-free consumer line for Avandia, in addition to a large increase of visits to its consumer Web site, Avandia.com.
A spokesman for SmithKline wouldn’t disclose the company’s advertising budget. He said the company has been advertising Avandia in mainstream magazines since June when the medication was launched. Quantum Group, a unit of WPP Group’s CommonHealth, is the agency of record for Avandia. It declined to comment on the campaign.
Marketing experts say the effort to attract Rezulin users isn’t surprising. Gil Bashe, formerly head of CommonHealth and now chief executive of Health!Quest Global Communications Partners, says he expects more pharmaceutical companies to increase their advertising and marketing budgets during the next several months in response to rulings on new drugs for a variety of illnesses expected to come from the FDA in Washington.
"You’re going to see a lot of reactive advertising to Beltway decisions in the next few months," Mr. Bashe said.
Mr. Bashe said the FDA’s rulings do more than give approval to drugs. Depending on how the agency writes a decision, it also may guide consumers when given a choice between two drugs, he said. He adds that with the heightened attention of diabetes around the Rezulin ruling, drug manufacturers have an opportunity in their advertising to reach those patients who aren’t regularly using any diabetes medication.
Allen Adamson, a managing director with branding consultants Landor Associates, said it is relatively rare for products to be pulled out of the market. But when it does happen, he says, companies should spend "every nickel they can. You want to go in and capture as much of that franchise as you can. As heartless as it sounds, there’s nothing smarter that they can do," he said.
Other companies have found themselves in similar positions. In 1997, when the FDA was weighing whether a key ingredient in Novartis’s Ex-Lax laxative brand was dangerous, a competitor, Correctol, made by Schering-Plough, launched a major ad campaign claiming that Ex-Lax could "cause cancer."
That same year, Schering-Plough launched ads touting its allergy drug Claritin over Seldane, when Seldane was being scrutinized by the FDA.