According to this NPR article from our Nation’s recession just a decade ago, the Great Depression saw many losers, but some surprising winners. Hollywood stars like Mae West dominated the screens and continued to shine (and keep Paramount Pictures afloat); Entertainment companies like Martin Guitars diversified their products and began offering lower-priced models; but no company’s Great Depression story inspires us more than Proctor & Gamble’s.

In the 1920s, Proctor and Gamble primarily sold household soaps. When the Great Depression began, things looked dire as consumers cut costs wherever they could. However, the marketing geniuses at P&G realized that people still needed to buy soap.

So, they thought, why not encourage them to buy from P&G?

While other companies panicked and cut their advertising budgets as the economic crisis continued, P&G increased their advertising with creative marketing strategies (including daily radio shows) and ultimately ramped up their brand awareness so much so that a century later, P&G remains a household name.

The company increased their advertising, aiming to pick up the customers that their folding competitors were losing.

Additionally, P&G’s marketing team got even more creative and launched a daily radio show to advertise their products to women at home (otherwise known as “housewives”). The shows earned the brand daily exposure to its target audience, and was an ideal avenue for promoting their household soap products. These radio segments came to be known as “soap operas” and influenced the soap operas we still see today on daytime television! Sounds to us like one of the first forms of content marketing!

The cast of the NBC radio show Oxydol’s Own Ma Perkins in 1933. Ma Perkins was the first daytime radio serial sponsored by the Procter & Gamble Co.

And here we are, 100 years later, still buying our cleaning products and soaps from one of the world’s most trusted and well-known portfolios, Proctor & Gamble.

So while others panic and close up shop, the brands that win are the brands that double-down on their marketing during tough times.

Maybe your company can’t invest millions into an ad campaign, but you can be building your email lists, creating content, and revving up your marketing engine.

Now is a critical time to increase your market share, so take advantage of our current climate and use any downtime you may have to build your marketing program.

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