Brand Candy

LOGO LEGEND

In addition to creating legendary film posters and opening credit sequences for movies like “Man With the Golden Arm,” “Psycho,” “West Side Story,” and “Goodfellas,” graphic designer Saul Bass designed iconic American brand logos for dozens of companies. An analysis of a sample of Bass’s corporate logos in 2011 found them to have an unusual longevity. The most common cause of the demise of a Bass corporate logo (in the selection analyzed) was the demise or merger of the company, rather than a corporate logo redesign. The average lifespan of a Bass logo is more than 34 years, and counting.

Happy 96th Birthday, Saul Bass.

(includes excerpts from a Wikipedia entry)

DAMAGE CONTROL

“How do you keep the music playing…”

Reputations for brands, as for people, are everything, or at least a great portion of what tells the tale of who (or what) you are, what you stand for. So, what happens when that reputation is tarnished, shattered, obliterated? Are there second chances in business, as there often are for people?  Here’s an interesting - albeit brief - look at nine major companies that are on a slippery slope, either due to a failing management or product strategy, or (worse), scandal or legal issues. Will there be comeback kids amongst this group?

From a story at MarketWatch/WSJ.

AU NATUREL BARBIE: BETTER, OR BRAND-KILLER?

A perfect example of why you can’t always give the people what they say they want.  Too much reality here.

Has Ken seen this? LOL. (Barbie might be single now…)

Read more about reaction to this online photo augmentation of America’s blonde bombshell here.

OREO-IGINAL CHOICE

Well, we think we’ve discovered the Ultimate Online Time-Waster. The brand that has demonstrated their social media chops in recent months (a la the Super Bowl Blackout, playing tic tac toe with Twix, etc.) is back with an interactive campaign that bills itself as a “SuperImportantTest” (add the dot-com to that for your turn at bat). When users vote cookie or creme, their choice opens up a portal of congratulatory celebration: fancily decorated party cakes complete with sparklers and loud music; or, a group of graffiti-spraying grannies pouring on sweet accolades; or, a weird semi-nude one man band rocking out amidst psycho-trippy clublights; or, our favorite, an animated sloth who’s job it is to plug in a neon sign (and, um, Spolier Alert: this one’s in real-time…you’ll spend close to 4 minutes here).

The message changes with each click (“Yes!” “You did it!” “Way to Go!” “Nice work!”) and it’s a seemingly endless stream of vignettes — we clicked for at least half an hour and never saw a repeat. Some are lame, some are funny, but the curiosity of what will come next surely keeps people intrigued and engaged. It’s on-brand messaging in that it never chooses sides, never answers the question, because no choice is wrong: both parts of the OREO are equally great.

We imagine that in the last few months while most of the digital agency world has been engrossed in making “Harlem Shake” videos, this is what Wieden+Kennedy was doing. Hmmm…

Visit and vote Cookie vs. Creme at superimportanttest.com or see more of Wieden+Kennedy’s work with OREO here.

IF YOU BUILD IT…

What better way for a lifestyle brand to prove its’ mettle, than by giving its’ product life? Global home-furnishings giant IKEA takes a fair amount of ribbing from purists who would rather slumber on floorboards than use an Allen-wrench to self-construct a bed-in-a-box.  But IKEA has larger sights set on transforming urban spaces beyond decorating tiny one bedroom lofts in Williamsburg. Strand East is IKEA’s first step in a journey into urbanism, looking to utopian-ize former defunct parcels of land and turn them into the Swedish version of folkhemmet (literally, “the people’s home”). An exercise that can be viewed as part brand-building, part living laboratory for new products, IKEA has definitely gained attention on this project in which they’ve partnered with London officials who seek to fully realize the Olympic legacy and address housing inequalities in the East End region. If this town is a success, perhaps we can look to companies such as IKEA to contribute to other sustainable projects in housing, health, education, and more. We can only hope.

Read more about IKEA’s town project in “Swedish Modern Comes to Town,” in Fast Company’s March 2013 issue.

WHEN THE BRAND HITS YOU LIKE A BRICK

This. Is. Seriously. Awesome. To commemorate “55 Years of the Brick,” a Tumblr was created by just that name to showcase 55 posters designed by agency Brad in Montreal. The homage to the iconic LEGO brick presents some visual riddles in pop culture, representing various books, movies, song titles and more, providing clues, but no solutions.  So, although some might be pretty easy to solve, for the most difficult, the beauty of the brick is still in the eye of the beholder.

Check out all 55 posters on the blog. (From a story by PSFK.)

ARE NAMES NOISY…OR LESS EXPENSIVE?

There’s a counter-movement to everything, trust. While hoards of busy-bodies lustily await every new tech release with long-lines and buzzing anticipation, there will always be those who choose to hit the snooze button on the latest and greatest. Usually seen as “hipsters” or “vintage” types, this is not always a correct assumption. Some simply want “quiet” in their choices: no blaring logos or brand statements, just good, quality products and performance.  

Enter Selfridges’ “No Noise” project, a season-long feature collaboration that “turns down the volume” on selected fashion and accessories by offering a minimalist point-of-view: no logos, no labels. Two collections at the UK-based department store, highlighting apparel (“Quiet Edit”) and lifestyle products (“De-Branded Design”) are actually stripped-down versions of very popular and best-selling designers and items, thus “quieting” the visual noise.

Now, in anyone else’s world, these would be referred to as generic versions or house / private-label lines. But Selfridges’ twist is that the items chosen are highly recognizable by other means: jar shape, stitching details, packaging, etc. So…is this REALLY “quiet?” When a brand is its’ mere presence and appearance, is the name needed? Is a pair of Levi’s less Levi-ish because it doesn’t carry the Levi label on back?  My mom would say “no,” but at 13, I would have argued you down. We’ve become used to a price-value relationship that helps define brands, and when signifiers such as labels and logos are no longer present, there’s a great many of us who find that suspicious.

I find this “curated collection” kind of ridiculous…the re-selling of old products under a new guise of “making a statement.” As a kid, this exact thing separated the cool kids from the whack ones: wearing gear without the famous label. If labels didn’t matter, the JCPenney FOX polo would have been just as cool as the Lacoste gator. But it wasn’t. And when you take all labels off, a polo is just a polo. So why would you pay the higher price for a blank polo? If I’m paying for Heinz Ketchup and beats by Dre, then I want the entire value of the visual brand “noise”: every bit that goes into package and logo design, tags, visual merchandising, marketing…all of it. 

Selfridges invites you to “celebrate the power of No Noise” through February at their UK store locations. Visit the site for more info on the collections and special store events.

THE SANTA CAUSE

Every year, some agency comes out with poll results about the world’s most recognizable brands. By now, we all know who to expect will top this list: Nike, McDonald’s, Coca-Cola. Sometimes, depending on the audience, we get a few new names thrown in the mix (X-Box, Abercrombie & Fitch, Facebook), but mostly they’re tried and true, based on marketplace dominance.

So why, then, has Santa Claus gone missing from these results? Arguably, the most recognized character in the world, outside of Jesus personified (yes, really), Santa has brand strength companies only dream about. Though the name changes as you travel the world - St. Nicholas, Pere de Noel, Kris Kringle, Father Christmas, Sinter Klaas and more - the brand story stays intact: a “jolly” old man wearing red rewards his target audience of the world’s well-behaved youth with gifts he delivers once a year all over the globe. A consistent tale married to a familiar image: ultimate brand recognition markers if there ever were.  

And Santa is so smart, he’s even licensed out his brand, employing scores of institutions, organizations, and individuals to act as ambassadors on behalf of his mission: ringing bells collecting for charity, listening to kids’ requests in malls, collecting toys for the less fortunate…all further strengthening the image and identity that is the Santa Brand.

Acting on a story with emotional ties, over the years, the extensions of the brand have gained popularity on their own, while still remaining a positive connection to the original product. We only think Rudolph’s overcoming his self-esteem issues is cool because of his service to the old man, and the elves were just a non-unionized team of laborers until their devotion to their yearly cause was highlighted in so many animated holiday specials.

Santa is no slouch when it comes to staying in sync with the times, either. While he’ll still accept letters via the old snail-mail method, nowadays, kids can reach out to Mr. C through email and text, follow him on Facebook and Twitter, and even track his Christmas Eve moves with an app! Like any great brand, Santa stays in touch with his audience, giving them access to engage and create community around his cause.

Indeed, Santa’s brand ties run deep, entrenched into the very fibers of societal culture and beliefs. Besides being a multi-dare we say-trillion dollar money machine, the Santa Brand dictates the way in which families relate to one another (just think, the myth of Santa is the “little white lie” told to children over and over by adults), the flow of the retail marketplace, topical media coverage and the importance of being nice vs. naughty. What other brand is as powerful? Take note.