Pints of Coolhaus ice cream are labelled with bold logos declaring that the sweet treat is made from cage-free eggs, organic cane sugar and “real” California milk. But one logo gets a bigger reaction than the others: A dark pink W surrounded by the words “certified women-owned.”
“It’s been a huge success,” said Coolhaus co-founder Natasha Case. “Once we put that seal on there, the way it’s connected and resonated on social media, with buyers, with shoppers, with clients — it’s been massive.”
In fact, the “women-owned” label gets such a big response that the company moved it front and center when they revamped their packaging, Case said.
Coolhaus, an Los Angeles-based ice-cream maker known for on-trend flavors like avocado sea salt, added the women-owned logo about two years ago. It’s taken on new meaning in light of the #Metoo movement, Case told MarketWatch.
“Especially with what‘s been going this year with women putting their foot down on so many things, it’s been more powerful than ever,” Case said.
What the label means
Trumpeting a company’s woman-owned status may seem like a marketing ploy to capitalize on the cultural zeitgeist around women’s empowerment, but brands have actually been doing it for years.
The Women’s Business Enterprise National Council, the largest group that certifies businesses, has been certifying companies as women-owned for 20 years and launched the “certified women-owned” logo in 2014.
It’s now displayed on roughly 200 products, a WBENC spokeswoman said, from pet snacks to fancy chocolates to a drain opener sold at hardware stores.
‘Products with the women-owned logo were perceived to have high quality.’ — Walmart spokeswoman Tricia Moriarty
There are also some products on store shelves that use the phrase “women-owned” on their labels, but aren’t officially certified, according to data from Label Insight, a partner of market research firm Nielsen. Brands that use the certified women-owned label have been vetted by the Women’s Business Enterprise National Council, a Washington, D.C.-based nonprofit.
The group examines financial documents and visits businesses in person to make sure that a woman owns or controls at least 51% of the company. Businesses pay a certification fee from $500 to $1,250 based on the size of their budget. As of last year, WBENC had certified more than 15,000 businesses, up from 5,800 in 2007, said WBENC spokeswoman Jessica Carlson.
Being certified as women-owned is not just a marketing move. The certification also makes a business eligible for supply-chain diversity programs under which big companies hire women- and minority-owned businesses.
What consumers think about it
Do consumers care whether a business is woman-owned, and does the label affect sales? Research is limited on that question.
One 2014 study that Walmart WMT, -2.27% conducted of 1,200 shoppers found that 90% of female shoppers said they would go out of their way to buy a product marked as “women-owned.”
“We tracked the sales of certain feature items with the women-owned business logo in our stores and found that products with signage drove higher sales than the same feature without signage — it also showed products with the women-owned logo were perceived to have high quality,” said Walmart spokeswoman Tricia Moriarty. (Walmart partnered with WBENC to help fund the creation of the woman-owned logo, and the store carries many of the certified products.)
Onyx Brands
What the women-owned logo looks like on Onyx Brands packaging.
Given that women control most household spending decisions — although there’s debate on exactly how much — that’s not insignificant.
A 2017 survey of 1,000 Americans by Cone Communications found that 84% of consumers want companies to support women’s rights and 87% said they would buy a product because a company stood up for an issue they cared about.
One psychological theory on why people want to buy women-owned products: “People think women better anticipate their needs, and wouldn’t do anything to harm women or children,” said Elizabeth Vazquez, CEO and co-founder of WeConnect International, a nonprofit partner of WBENC that certifies businesses outside the U.S. as women-owned, then helps connect them with corporate buyers.
The woman-owned label may build customer loyalty...
Marsha Martin, CEO of Onyx Brands in Little Rock, Ark., is convinced the women-owned label on her company’s nail-polish remover and bath and beauty products keeps customers coming back.
Martin first got her business certified in the 1990s, an intensive process during which WBENC representatives verified that she was in charge by spending the entire day with her to make sure she was actually signing the company’s checks.
Onyx started using the logo in 2014 and its products sell at Walmart, Dollar Tree DLTR, +0.14% and TJ Maxx TJX, +0.06% At first the logo was on the back, but as ice-cream maker Coolhaus discovered, they moved it to the front in part because of the response from customers, Martin said.
Customers regularly send emails or message the company on social media to say they buy Onyx products because the company is female-led, Martin said. “Our customers are very loyal to our product, and I have to believe that part of it is because we’re a woman-owned product,” she told MarketWatch.
Onyx Brands
Marsha Martin, CEO of Arkansas-based Onyx Brands, says the 'woman-owned' label on her company's products has inspired intense customer loyalty....but it doesn’t necessarily help get financing
But those warm feelings don’t help much with another aspect of her business: Getting financing. The woman-owned certification and logo don’t make bankers more likely to give her loans, she noted.
(That’s an issue many women-led businesses struggle with: In 2017, only $1.9 billion (2%) of the $85 billion total invested by venture capitalists went to female founders, according to PitchBook, a financial data and software company, though other research suggests the situation may be improving.)
At meetings with mostly male bankers, Martin gets quizzical looks when she talks about one of Onyx’s signature products, a spinning and fizzing “bath bomb.” Essentially a ball of scented baking powder that fizzes when it hits water, they’re a popular item with kids at bath time. Onyx shipped 12.9 million of them in 2018.
Bankers usually have no idea what she’s talking about when she mentions the product, and the same goes for many of Onyx’s other female-focused items.“If I were selling cars, tractors or hunting products, bankers would be all over it,” Martin said. “But when you’re talking about lip gloss, they’re very apprehensive about financing.”
Some shoppers aren’t as interested in who owns the company
Saskia Foley, CEO of Radius, a Kutztown, Pa.-based toothbrush and toothpaste maker, says her company is “touted and loved” within the natural products industry for being women-owned. They’re certified, and have used the logo on their products. But it doesn’t seem to make much of a difference to customers.
‘If I were selling cars, tractors or hunting products, bankers would be all over it. But when you’re talking about lip gloss, they’re very apprehensive about financing.’ — Marsha Martin, CEO of Onyx Brands
In fact, in a recent package redesign, Foley decided to take the logo off their toothbrush packaging. Market research that Radius conducted found that customers were most interested in whether the product got their teeth clean — the company’s ownership didn’t seem to be important to them, and it wasn’t a factor when they were deciding whether to buy the product.
“Women-owned did not pop up as one of more important logos, which we found fascinating,” Foley said. “I would love it to be a more important trend for a decision-maker, but when we tested it, it was not.”
One national retailer requested the ‘women-owned’ label
But Jodi Scott, CEO and co-founder of Colorado-based Green Goo by Sierra Sage, which makes natural deodorants and first-aid products, had a different take. She didn’t think people would seek out the women-owned label when her company first added it.
But recently Green Goo struck a deal to sell at a national pharmacy chain, and the retailer asked her to make sure the logo would still be on their products after an impending package redesign.
“The [retailer] was happy it was on the label,” Scott said. “She knew we were doing a refresh and she said, ‘Make sure you keep that on there.’”
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