Brand Space: New Frontiers for Growth
In their ceaseless quest for growth, savvy brands are transforming themselves from tangibles to experiences. And then finding imaginative ways to enlarge their space of experience… to more deeply engage with their consumers… and to offer whole new, unexpected, worlds of compelling products and services.
Here are a few salient examples:
Nike
There’s perhaps no better example of this trend than how a running shoe maker became a digital technology company and opened up a new universe of possibilities.
Nike used the shoe to launch a cult of heroic individualism, personified in the Air Jordan and the deeply human insight expressed its immortal slogan: Just Do It. Along the way, Nike also broadened from a gear company to an apparel company.
Experiences today are increasing managed and mediated by technology… technology for viewing, playing, tracking and sharing. This is the age of the APP. Unless Nike had made the transition to digital experience, it risked being trapped as a product company ceding the ground of experience to others.
Nike’s new purpose is to “bring inspiration and innovation to every athlete in the world.” This is fuelled by a transformative insight “If you have a body, you’re an athlete.” This more democratized evolution of Just Do It, underlies Nike’s push into technology.
They’ve created a technology platform that enables companies to build apps from step counting to fundraising. Nike+Accelerator, a program is aimed at jump-starting the application platform. Nike handed 10 app developers, money, mentoring and office space in Portland with some pretty interesting results. Will Nike be in the Cyborgs space 20 years from now?
BMW
What’s the future of driving when the main arteries of the world’s major cities have become 24-hour traffic jams? What’s the future of carmaker like BMW when the future of driving itself is in doubt?
The Beemer’s branding as “the ultimate driving machine” could ultimately prove to be a cul-de-sac in a world where miles driven per auto are decreasing year-over-year, young people are increasingly sharing or renting rather than owning, pollution from autos is regarded as a bummer and the driverless car is coming.
BMW partnered with the Guggenheim to create a mobile innovation lab – a relationship that reinforces BMW’s elite status and extends the Guggenheim brand too. The Lab explored forward thinking visions and projects for city life, to better understand how people relate to cities and public space and perhaps invent new ways to be together.
The Lab is part urban think tank, community center and public gathering space. BMW Guggenheim Lab opened pods in Mumbai, Berlin and New York. At the very least, it’s a great PR move that helps people experience BMW differently. At the most, it could lead to an insight that leads to a whole new world of products or services branded with the BMW badge.
Camper
To bring its motto: “imagination walks” to life and take the spirit of its brand into new categories, design-driven shoe maker Camper has started up a series of boutique hotels in Berlin and Barcelona, Europe’s most creative cities. It’s even launched a weather app for your smart phone!
Of course, the weather app is not designed to build revenue. It’s all about building brand and presence. When you’re out for a walk, you naturally think about the weather and wearing shoes. So, the app is somehow apropos, and a lot more fun than a guide to arch support. Plus, you have something nifty to show friends.
The app urges you to “have a Camper Day.” It doesn’t tell what that is. But the rainbow rainstorm falling from inside the umbrella is a visual cue. The app lets users create musical notes on themed weather illustrations, offering an opportunity for personalized, experiential engagement.
Camper’s name is derived from the Catalan word, “campero” meaning peasant or farmer – an interesting twist for a product targeted to hip urban souls. What it speaks to is an anti-slick authenticity. Casa Camper, the boutique hotel, creates a fully dimensional Camper experience. While there is no mention of shoes at Casa Camper, everyone who knows Camper shoes knows to expect the unexpected. A room with a hammock and a red couch is a perfect touch.
Coke
While Coke’s new campaign is themed “open happiness,” things may be anything but happy in Cokeland. Market share for the brown bubbly – and the soda category overall – is in long tem decline. Consumers are switching to “healthier” drinks and Governments (NYC, Mexico) have implement taxes and regulations designed to take the fizz out soda sales. Soda, like cigarettes and cancer, is being demonized as society comes to grips with rampant obesity and its deleterious health consequences.
Cokes “Happiness” theme seems to harken back to its halcyon days of brand strength and optimism when it captured the youthful zeitgeist with the jingle “I want to buy the world a Coke”… and “teach the world to sing in perfect harmony.”
To strengthen the core brand’s “refreshment” attributes, Coke created the Ahh.com website.
AHH contains no sales messaging, benefits or marketing speak. It simply encourages youthful customers to interact with mini games filled with humour and music, and pretty pointless fun – which is the point of fun. But it is not clear how much AHH captures the deeper spirit of the brand, which – for a time – was about authentic (real), positive social experience. AHH is clever but not profound.
Is Coke simply fighting a rear guard action as the category gets overrun by change with its new “open happiness” position and AHH website? Does Coke’s naïve call to happiness ring true in a cynical, post 9/11, post “Great Recession” world? Can Coke credibly lay claim to deliver bubbly well-being? Pharmacology and recreational drugs would seem to offer more convincing claims to instant happiness than carbonated sugar water.
While the Coke brand offers many merchandising opportunities, it’s not clear whether it can pull off a Camper or Nike-like move into new categories. Coke’s infamous attempt at offering Coke jeans proved that it wasn’t at heart a fashion brand. Moreover, it is under attack on its home turf as a force for evil, not good. How do you extend that? The Coke name may be too identified with its product to transform itself into pure brand spirit and reconstitute in new categories.
Silvio Napoleone with Harry Cornelius
