Why Banana Boat debuted its first marketing campaign in five years

Banana Boat, the sunscreen brand whose brightly colored bottles have filled beach bags since its founding in Miami in 1976, is known for its playful and fun persona. But in the last five years, it’s gone quiet.

Over that time, it’s hardly faded from public consciousness—the brand sold 29 million units last year and has 84% brand awareness—but consumers were largely buying the brand “on autopilot” and its retailers were looking for the brand to “find our voice,” Jennifer Campbell, its senior brand manager of strategy, told Retail Brew.

It’s a common pitfall for legacy CPG brands (or as Campbell likes to call them, “iconic brands”) owned by large conglomerates. Banana Boat’s parent is Edgewell Personal Care, whose portfolio also includes Hawaiian Tropic and Schick.

“You’ve been given this tremendous voice and power and knowledge and ability to speak to people because they know you, and we really weren’t doing anything with the voice,” Campbell said.

Now, the slightly sleepy sun care staple is getting back on board with its marketing, introducing its first campaign in five years, “Get Outside Stat,” and debuting a new line of sunscreen it hopes will appeal to consumers even when the weather cools down.

Place in the sun: While sunscreen has seen a boom in recent years, Banana Boat found that the number of households buying sunscreen is actually “flat to down,” Campbell said. That means more consumers aren’t entering the category, but rather that current consumers are just spending more.

Edgewell realized it could do more to support the brand. Its President and CEO Rod Little said last year that the company’s marketing approach “did not fully support sustainable growth and led us to underinvest in core brands,” and said it planned to up its investment across those brands, including Banana Boat.

With a short three-month “sun season,” understanding consumer behavior around the suncare category isn’t easy, but Banana Boat surveyed 1,000 Americans aged 18–99 and found that consumers are spending less time outside, for a variety of reasons.

That’s the inspiration for Banana Boat’s campaign, which it debuted last month and features cheeky stats like “67% of bellies will go unflopped this summer” and “61% of tents won’t get pitched this summer,” alongside a few slightly more depressing stats, like “51% of people will spend the first warm day of the year inside” and “41% of people will experience more blue light than sunlight this summer.”

The campaign is supported by lighthearted content from influencers including Bachelorette star Andrew Spencer, wildlife influencer Gabby Nikolle, and dog account @AGuyandaGolden, which represent Banana Boat’s wide-reaching demographic.

“Where marketing tends to fall flat is where it doesn’t really have that cultural voice in relevancy,” Campbell said. “We had to stay true to who we are. We were never going to be the brand that comes out and starts talking about melanoma and avoiding the sun. That isn’t our voice, and that’s really not what people look to us for.”

Not just a summer fling: Every sunscreen brand, from Supergoop to Neutrogena, has its niche, Campbell noted, and for Banana Boat, it’s affordable, “high-endurance” sunscreen—a tenet it must stick to even as it innovates.

With its new Sheer Sensitive line launched in tandem with the new campaign, the brand is meeting growing demand for sensitive skin-friendly products, while keeping its product description simple and its prices low. On Amazon, all three products in the line are priced at less than $9 each.

“We can’t shift our center dramatically or people won’t understand us, and we’ll risk alienating people that have used us for years,” Campbell said.

The new line could, however, help the brand extend its use beyond the limiting sun season. The brand only launched its first facial sunscreen last year, with Sport Face SPF 50, a move that was an “eye opener” for Banana Boat, Campbell said. Now, with its Sheer Sensitive Line, which includes another face product, she said the brand’s marketing will focus increasingly on “regimen,” as consumers could integrate the facial products into their everyday routine in the spring and fall.

With the new campaign and product line, “I really want consumers to reappraise Banana Boat, think about us as more than their turnkey sunscreen that they trust,” Campbell said. “We want people to love this brand again.”