Before the current economic crisis, the American stock projection website The Motley Fool declared Brazilian food processing and distributing brand Sadia a hot stock pick, giving it a five-star CAPS rating. But on May 19, 2009, it was announced that Sadia would be gobbled up by larger processed food company Perdigão, after the smaller rival posted the first annual loss in its 65-year history because of wrong-way bets on the Brazilian currency.

Founded in 1934 by Italian immigrants, Perdigão is one of the largest food companies in Latin America, employing more than 55,000 people. It ranks third in poultry slaughtering and ranks among the ten largest hog slaughtering companies in the world. It is also one of the leading Brazilian companies in milk collection. A brand with a considerable worldwide reach, its products are sold to more than 110 countries, and it acts as an umbrella to sub-brands such as Batavo, Elegê, Perdix, Chester and Cotochés.

We paid a visit to Sadia.com to see where the brand stands in comparison to Perdigão online.

To support its global presence, Sadia.com can be viewed in four languages: Portuguese, English, German and Russian. But from a branding standpoint, the look, feel and messaging leave much to be desired. Dry, static and looking like it hasn’t been updated since 1996, Sadia.com is sorely lacking in brand establishment, value-added content and innovation. It seems as if it was constructed with the sole purpose to serve as a receptacle for rudimentary brand information like corporate information and quality assurance, investor relations and brief product descriptions—not to provide consumers with an inviting brand experience.

But a visit to and study of Perdigão’s website portends that renovations may be in store for the Sadia online presence. Perdigão launched its global brand, Perdix, in 2001 because, according to that website, “Perdix was developed to have an easy to pronounce brand name as well as keeping all the qualities by which Perdigão is already known all over the world. In this way, it has the same prefix as Perdigão, resulting in an easy association, transmitting the values of the well-known brand to Perdix. And the suffix ‘x’ brings to mind modernity and technology. Therefore, Perdix products combine the tradition of preparing delicious food and always innovating for over 70 years, with high quality international standards.”

Also, visitors are invited to interact with the brand through streaming TV ads and a collection of easily searchable recipes for Perdix products. It probably would benefit the brand to delve deeper into the consumer realm, creating a community to tap into consumer feedback. But Perdix-International.com serves its corporate function well by providing comprehensive investor information such as mission statements, sustainability, accountability—even streaming stock info and an earnings update via webcast.

From a branding standpoint, Sadia’s online presence is in sore need of a revamp, and Perdix is a good fit to bring it into the 21st century. And not a moment too soon.