Tropicana Old Is New

This week The New York Times reported after much public disapproval, Tropicana decided to revert its packaging back to the old design. In my opinion Tropicana is at a crossroads that has implications for their business.

First the change in packaging suggest a change in culture at the company.  Tropicana did not need to redesign its packaging. It is a market leader in premium OJ.  What the rebranding suggest is that the company felt that they have lost touch with customers or were out of step with market conditions.

The real value of the rebrand (which led them back to their original packaging) was a need to help customers categorize their brand (is it cheap or expensive?) Ultimately people felt that the repackaging cheapened the brand, losing trust amongst loyal consumers.  What probably happened is that they saw a lost in sales coupled with ample evidence of disapproval on the blogshere.  What the new design succeeding in doing was confusing peoples’ perception of the brand (premium) and the reality of the packaging (cheap).

The real blow to Tropicana is the impact on their corporate culture.  They made a decision to reposition the brand as being value driven when in fact they were previously well esteemed.  The questions for Tropicana to answer now is who are they given this turn of events and what will they stand for moving forward? Do they continue to let customer define the brand or do they lead with their own vision for the brand?

Trademarking Numbers as Brands

Martin Lindstom of AdAge’s Brandflash highlights a unique naming strategy by the French automaker Peugeot.

Back in 1963 when the Porsche launched its new 901 model they received a legal notice from Peugeot. The French automaker informed Porsche that it had a trademark on the concept of auto brands comprised of a three-digit number with a zero in the middle.

Porsche was forced to change the name of its vehicle from 901 to 911.  In fact Peugeot has branded its cars with this kind of number structure beginning in 1929 with the Peugeot 201 which maintains this naming distinction to this day.

So what can we learn about Peugeot’s number trademark? Lindstrom points out three lessons marketers can take away from this unique naming structure.

1. Maintain sub-brands that have clear links to the parent brand
For example all McDonald’s products start with “Mc”.  Everything from “McFlurry” to “McSundae” always reminds customers that the product comes from McDonald’s. All Absolut vodka products from Absolut Citrus to Absolut Ruby Red are spelt wrong. Absolut owns the misspelling of the word. And finally Apple owns the “i” in front of all of its products.  So make sure you have a naming structure that links back to the parent brand.

2. Make sure you own it
Apple made this mistake just before launching the iphone and had to go into serious negotiations with the owner before securing the naming rights.

3. Keep the brand name consistent
Beware. If you adapt a new naming structure you risk destroying the brand link that could have been created.

As Lindstrom points out what’s interesting about brand names is that we can’t really remember a lot of information as consumers, therefore it is essential that we repeat ourselves.  That’s why its so important that everything we say links back to the original brand.

Invisible Brands

Recently I’ve stumbled upon some of Rob Walker’s work in prelude to his new book “Buying In”.  In one of his write-ups he talks about invisible badges.  According to Walker, badges are signals that suggest a tighter relationship with the brand producer and the brand consumer.

Walker observes that people no longer buy stuff to impress others, rather to impress themselves.  This means that logos are becoming less important indicators of status.  Look no further than the high-end fashion industry where logos are shrinking.

Christian Louboutin has made red soles the staple of his shoe line.  Bottega Venta bags are identifiable by their intricately weaved patterns. Rolex is known for the weight of its watches and Armani for the slender rounded shoulders of its men’s blazers.

Intended for small affinity groups rather than mass markets, these companies are creating brand undergrounds where consumers need to be fully indoctrinated in the brand cultures to fully understand their subtle signaling.

This is a liberating trend for brands with strong belief systems like Zappos that pays their employees to quit or Gourmet that believe that there is no conflict between mixing high fashion and streetwear pieces.  Companies with substance can now start to tell richer brand stories through the product themselves.

Moving forward the miniaturization of logos will become more prominent, where embedded clues, colors, fabric and materials will become the main brand identifier.

Clean Graffiti

Recently artist Paul Curtis teamed up with Clorox’s Green Works to produce a “clean” mural in San Francisco’s Broadway tunnel. Instead of adding paint, Curtis removes dirt and grime to create striking artistic forms.

This is a great example of an individual turning a maligned practice (public graffiti) into a public service, and a business attempting to move green cleaning products beyond niche stores to the wider world of supermarkets.

As a branded effort by Clorox, Curtis’s “clean graffiti” also effectively demonstrates that consumers don’t have to sacrifice cleaning power for eco-ethics. Click here to see more photos.

Microsoft’s Dilemma

There was an interesting article in the June issue of Fast Company about Microsoft giving its $300 million consumer branding account to Crispin Porter.  The article does a good job of doing the following:

1. Highlighting the Problem:
Microsoft’s problem is not simple ad messaging.  It’s over extended the brand by trying to be all things to all people

2. Highlighting What Shift Needs to Occur:
Meaning Microsoft may have to do more than just make customers aware that it is a massive force behind much of the digital tools in their lives

3. Highlighting the Impact on the Customer:
What needs to happen is that Microsoft must make people willing – even eager to cede that much control to a single company

7 Things We Can Learn About Branding From the Mafia

The Guardian reports that when the letters of jailed Cosa Nostra boss Bernardo Provenzano were found they were full of insights into his leadership style. The 7 rules he applied to his business could be used as a how-to-manual on how to manage brands.

Rule 1: Submersion
When a company is failing, the first step is to take it below the radar. “Our aim was to make Cosa Nostra invisible, giving us time to regroup.”

Brand Implications
Sometimes specifying what a brand is not, is as important to the integrity of the brand as specifying what it is.

Rule 2: Mediation
“Be calm, clear, correct and consistent, turn any negative experiences to account, don’t dismiss everything people tell you, or believe everything you’re told. Always try to discover the truth before you speak, and remember that, to make your judgment, it’s never enough to have just one source of information.”

Brand Implications
When repositioning a brand different people with different interest will need to be consulted before a course of action can be taken. Understanding the implications of a new position must be measured, weighted and given the consideration to align numerous interest.

Rule 3: Consensus
“Let me know whatever [the people] need,” he wrote to his adviser, “they must expect nothing but good from us.”

Brand Implications
Part of rehabilitating a brand is to open the lines of communication with your consumers. Persuade people that they need you. JetBlue was successful at this when they listened to customer complaints and issued a passengers bill of rights. The CEO made himself accessible through social media channels and as a result JetBule enjoys the #1 customer satisfaction ranking among U.S. airlines despite their missteps.

Rule 4: Keep God on your side
Part of the Mafia’s bid to reclaim the people’s trust and rehabilitate Cosa Nostra with its traditional followers was to assume a mantle of piety.

Brand Implications
When reintroducing your brand present it in a pastoral role – trustworthy and authoritative. Part of winning consumer confidence is attaching your brand to a higher calling. Clorox is doing that with its GreenWorks brand and Haagen-Dazs is doing the same by calling attention to the importance of bees to the making of ice cream.

Rule 5: Be politically flexible
“Links were to be forged behind the scenes with politicians who had no trace of connection to scandal or sleaze.”

Brand Implications
Changing alliances gives brands the flexibility to grow. Nike recently launched an eco-friendly shoe, Jordan XX3 which required a new manufacturing process, materials and partners. The result is a change in business practice but not philosophy. Nike still delivers on the promise of performance and technology but now in an eco-friendly way.

Rule 6: Reinvention
“When I got out of prison,” Giuffrè recalled, “I found Provenzano a changed man; from the hitman he once was, now he showed signs of saintliness.”

Brand Implications
Once known for low prices and even lower worker wages, environmental issues has become a chief initiative of Wal-Mart CEO Lee Scott, who laid out three environmental goals for the company: to be supplied 10 percent by renewable energy, to create zero waste; and to sell products that sustain not only company resources, but the environment. To achieve this, last month Wal-Mart formally introduced an environmentally minded packaging scorecard that evaluates suppliers based on the sustainability of their packaging and rates them against their competitors.

Rule 7: Modesty
During his career, Provenzano transformed himself from a hired thug, to business investor, political mastermind and, ultimately, strategist and leader. To emphasize his humble character and present himself as a simple man of the people he would write letters full of spelling and grammatical mistakes, and always signed off with the same humble apology: “I beg your forgiveness for the errors in my writing …”

Brand Implications
When a homemade commercial posted by a high school student for the ipod touch started getting major hits on Youtube, Apple executive bought the rights and aired it as an official Apple commercial. When you credit others for the success of your brand you engage people in ways that they seek you out, hence advancing your bottomline.

Brand Imprint

This image reminds me of the impressions brands leave on the mind.  Good or bad an imprint is left on in the subconscious that helps us form an opinion on things.

Chewing Gum, Sculptures and the World

Chewing gum as we know it today is an antiquated form that harkens back to the caveman era. The chewing gum industry hasn’t changed much since machine shaped and wrapped bubble gum was first introduced in 1906. Since then consumers have been confined to choosing between stick, ball or square forms of gum, reminiscent of Henry Ford and his black Model T’s.

Yet the sculptor Maurizio Savini shows us that the malleable nature of gum does not have to be subjected to the common square form of yester-year when it has the ability to live on as an expressive art form.

Aside from functional benefits like taste, size and quantity, is it possible to invoke emotion into a product that has historically lacked it? Can the character of gum be fundamentally shifted?  Can Wrigley or Cadbury share an opinion of the world through gum?

Image buying a pack of gum that has a visual grammar that people can read, taste and touch. Maybe the evolution of gum is not in package design but in the shape itself. There seems to be an opportunity to develop a new brand of gum with a conscious. A brand of gum that speaks about and to the world through design.

I wouldn’t mind buying a pack of gum that contained a condensed form of Savini’s sculptures. The impact of the brand might be to bring smiles to people or cause them to think about the world in a new way.

Yes even something as mundane as a gum brand has the potential to influence and maybe even change the world.

Touchless Remote Control Concept

Bang and Olufsen has created a remote control concept that is intended to keep devices bacteria free.

The remote responds to finger gestures and lifts and falls when the volume is adjusted.

What’s nice about this concept is that B&O’s approach maintains the brands tradition of providing high performing products that look and sound great, while keeping in mind that technology should work for people.

Although the prototype needs some work, the potential to add value to the entertainment experience could raise the profile of the overall brand. If they can deliver on the promise of hardware as functional art, the brand idea could lead to sustainable future innovation initiatives.

Video clips of the remote concept and an actual prototype are below.

Concept of remote

Actual prototype

http://www.vimeo.com/833656

GTOWN KICKS

The soon to be released Air Jordan XV (15) SE has gotten a Hoya makeover that works on many branding levels.
1. You don’t need to see the schools name to recall the brand. The checkered pattern and blue and grey colors are ownable only to gtown. It creates instant recognition of the school, the basketball program and elite athletes that have walked its halls. When you think gtown basketball, you think of the legacy that Ewing, Mourning and Iverson left.

2. It raises the profile of 2 brands to endorse a 3rd. Nike uses the success of the gtown program to reinforce the name and status of the Jordan brand. This is a mutually beneficial partnership between gtown and Nike that ultimately will translate into the sales of the Jordan brand. Nike can sponsor any program but only the elite programs can say Jordan represents them.

3. The Jordan logo doesn’t supercede the gtown pattern. This is important because the Jordan brand is no longer the hero of the sneaker but rather the platform to project status. As a consumer, I’m buying the sneaker because of the gtown name but also for Jordan’s design. Nike does a good job of blending those needs.

4. When you think gtown, you think JT3. Gtown doesn’t have any marquee players but rather a proven system that works. Two big east regular season championships and a final four appear. JT3 finds the best players for his system and in return the players find success in his program (Jeff Green and now Roy Hibbert).

5. The name on the front of the Jersey is more important. The recent ruling by the NBA that players must wait one year after graduating high school before applying for the NBA draft has made college basketball programs secondary to the athlete themselves. This year’s freshman class has dominated the sports pages including Kevin Love, Michael Beasley and Derrick Rose amongst others. These are super athletes who will no doubt leave early, which means the school must constantly replace one star name for another.

Georgetown’s recognition by Jordan is significant because it is a school where no one player averages more than 15 ppg. The slowdown and deliberate offense of JT3 is the star. Kids come for the coach and they come to play in the system. This year four seniors will gradate with one of them already accepted to attend Georgetown Law School. Georgetown basketball is more than a program it is the new symbol and spirit of college sports, with smart athletes, a good coach and great fans (avg. over 15,000 in attendance).

I am happy to say that Hoya Paranoia is back and I will be buying a pair of those Jordan’s not just for myself but also for the rest of college basketball