The story goes that the first reported exercise with the tactic of making the hole bigger, to increase usage, was when Colgate was trying to address growth using the three U’s model, which calls to grow demand by increasing usage, increasing users, or increasing users.

The story is that during a marketing planning meeting of all the product managers due to the flattening of the volume of toothpaste sales, in the era where their market share was calculated by tonnage of product used, a junior trainee asked innocently, “Why don’t we just make the hole bigger?”

The story goes that this stopped the meeting so a mathematically oriented person could quickly calculate and validate that a small increase in the size of the hole would significantly increase usage.

Shared with marketing students in their capstone subject in their degrees, this tactic has been repeated widely over the past 40 years and continues to spread. Dishwashing liquid holes got bigger, Tim Tam’s contents went from 12 to 8, and enlarged holes have been observed in MANY liquid products from bleach toilet cleaners and liquid soap to honey, sauces, hair care and more.

Unfortunately, this kind of product trickery is a tactic akin to heroin addiction. It is too easy a temptation for the greedy or ambitious to increase the hole just a little bit more… and then a little bit more again… and a little bit more again… And just like heroin addiction, the rewards become blurred and the outcomes less attractive.

What the operationally ambitious ignored, or failed to identify, is the long-term effect on post-purchase cognitive and subliminal responses from customers.

There is a segment that doesn’t care or notice. There is a segment that has learned to adjust to the greater volume when squeezing, pouring or applying product after they observe the greater quantity emitted.

But there are also a number of segments that exhibit diminishing loyalty and post-purchase cognitive dissonance as a result of less satisfaction from the experience of using the product… Consumers start to switch brands. Buyers who are not consumers looking for more economical or cost-effective substitutes. Loyal brand users become more tempted by price competition in the category. Brand equity diminishes and the covert attempt of trying to increase users, usage and users backfires on a segment that leaves the category altogether.

The long-term effect of these tactics is to shorten the product life cycle, enhance brand switching, decrease brand loyalty, and inspire trial of alternatives (house, own-label and private label products ) at the cost of branded products.

Just yesterday, I even found myself purchasing the Audi I label equivalent of Tim tams and being positively satisfied define the contents held 12 biscuits and did not 8 as had my previous Tim Tam purchase. What’s more, the Tim Tams equivalent tasted just as good as a branded product and so now Aldi has achieved a first purchase conversion which is likely to lead to a second purchase conversion and a cannibalization of Tim Tam’s brand franchise.

Maybe I will buy Tim Tams brand again, but probably only on a 50% off deal, and if I represent his significant segment for Arnott’s, Coles and Woolworths will identify that my peers and I only buy Tim Tams when they’re on a generous special, and put pressure on Arnott’s category management team to more frequently deliver price discounts or lose shelf space for not achieving desired return on real estate at retail.

If Coles & Woolies continue to promote their own labels, they’ll probably start to offer a similar product to Tim Tams and further erode the Arnott’s franchise.

While addicts of “making the whole bigger” may have made a small, short-term gain in cost saving on ingredients, the long-term effect is diminished brand loyalty, decayed brand equity, and a shortening of the Tim Tam brands life cycle.

But we all know heroin addicts don’t expect to live long.