BRAND THEORY REVISITED
2.5 Hybrid Vigour: Brand Partnerships, Feuds, Leaps and Properties
2.5 Hybrid Vigour: Brand Partnerships, Feuds,
perspective) for their new single and album, which propelled them straight to number one in the charts. It also warmed the world up for their Vertigo tour the following year, which is where bands make the real money these days. It was a credible link for the brand, the iPod being the latest in a line of high-tech stunts (like the enormous video and light show U2 put on in their Zootour). It confirmed U2’s currency – that they are still, despite being in their 40s, a band of the moment – by association with the popular craze for iPods. They also got to profit share in sales of the iPod special edition – which was a great product, in that it came pre-loaded with the band’s new album.
It is such a good deal it would be interesting to know how it came about. The rumour in the music industry is that Universal, U2’s record label, had tried to get the band to sign a more traditional sponsorship deal with Vodafone; but that it was the band who insisted on going with iPod because it was way cooler. That makes the whole exercise feel more authentic. Of course, the rumour may itself be yet more clever marketing!
Marriages are fascinating. So are feuds.
One of Virgin’s defining moments as a brand was the so-called dirty tricks feud with BA. It started in 1991 when Virgin moved its HQ from Heathrow to Gatwick, where BA was also based. There were allegations of BA poach- ing Virgin customers and tampering with confidential files. It was also claimed in Branson’s evidence to the High Court that BA’s PR people had been briefing the media and the City against Virgin. Richard Branson wrote an open letter to BA non-executive directors detailing these “sharp business practices”. Fighting back, senior BA directors, including chairman Lord King, publicly expressed the view that Virgin was simply making these alle- gations for publicity purposes. BA ended up settling and paying legal costs, to the tune of £4 million. At the time of the dispute BA was making around
£300 million while Virgin Atlantic was making an operating loss of £9 million. Whatever the material basis of the dispute it did function effec- tively, as BA had claimed, to make Branson and his airline look good: not only did it appeal to the public’s sympathy (David vs Goliath) but it also made Virgin Atlantic seem like a much more significant operation than it really was at the time.
Stretching a brand into surprising but relevant markets can also provide a fascinating cultural idea to boost the brand – the Caterpillar boots strategy.
Caterpillar is an industrial equipment group, the name deriving from the continuous tread on vehicles like bulldozers. Its rugged boots look like they could be worn on a construction site and make an imprint similar to cater- pillar tracks on vehicles. Caterpillar boots are sold in 152 countries world- wide. While they cannot rival the $30 billion industrial group they spun out of, it could be argued both have benefited from the association. It put the industrial conglomerate on the public culture map. And it made for a shoe brand with an unusual and compelling heritage.
Virgin, again, is a master of such brand leaps (brand extension sounds too continuous a term). While financial services, entertainment retailing and transport were natural extensions of the original music business, it is the wilder leaps that gave the brand sparkle – like Virgin Brides, launched in 1996 (cue: a picture of Richard Branson on the front cover of The Sun in a wedding dress). It was not a big commercial success, being scaled down today to a single store in Manchester selling apparel and accessories. But as a cul- tural idea to give a boost to the Virgin brand, it was up there with Branson’s around-the-world balloon flights.
Another strategy that the molecule model of branding acknowledges and encourages is creating cultural properties attached to your brand. These are ideas that are not about you, but set a more public agenda, like IBM’s eBusi- ness, IKEA’s Chuck Out Your Chintzor Dove’s Campaign for Real Beauty.
Nike wanted to encourage a stronger running culture in the UK. Com- pared to other countries fewer Britons go running and the market for running shoes was correspondingly soft. Because they wanted to reach a broader audience Nike went for a compromise between something that would feel a real achievement (like a marathon) and something that was achievable: a 10 km Run Londonevent. People were not only encouraged to register but also to invite friends to take part with them through “viral” invi- tations, which they could customise with their own picture. The original marketing campaign was conducted under the slogan I’ll do it, if you do it.
The campaign in 2005 went further, with Nike encouraging people to Run a Year, that is, focusing on the preparation. Practice runs were held regularly
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at nine locations and communications focused on keeping going through the winter months.
It is a good example of taking an existing idea (the fun run/jogging with friends) to the next level by using new community media such as the web and viral emails. Around 43 000 people in London take part in three events annually and the scheme has been such a success that Nike has rolled it out to other world cities. Apart from selling a lot of running shoes, raising aware- ness and demonstrating brand leadership, it is refreshing to see a brand doing some good (helping people motivate themselves to keep fit) with its mar- keting budget.