BrandCultureTalk

Few financial services brands have suffered the recent public spotlight with greater dread and discomfort than credit card issuers. In past cycles of scrutiny, the answer to credit card industry critics was “increased transparency” — if consumers could understand the terms and conditions of their credit cards, they had some chance of actually abiding by them. But transparency alone hasn’t worked, given the dire state of household consumer credit debt, estimated at $8,000 - $10,000 for every American family with a card or close to $1 trillion dollars in total. Even upscale customers find their mailboxes largely bereft of enticing offers and existing credit lines curtailed or canceled. There’s no doubt that consumers overspent, but the card industry also overreached, creating concepts like “universal default,” where card issuers hike interest rates when consumers made late payments to a different, unrelated lender. Double cycle billing to maximize interest charges for consumers who occasionally carry a balance. Fees for exceeding credit limits even when purchases have been authorized by the lender. Such practices culminated in President Obama’s signing the Credit Card Accountability, Responsibility and Disclosure Act (notice the clever acronym . . . Credit CARD Act) shortly before Memorial Day, promising a new era of better behavior by all parties. [Read more →]

In lieu of an epic Arthurian poem, consider this blog our ode to Sir Richard Branson. 25 years after establishing his Virgin brand, Sir Richard seems pretty content – we’d be grinning too if we were in his position – but never complacent. And for that, we extol our man as a master of perpetually growing the Virgin brand, a tricky endeavor even for the most adept mogul-billionaire.

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After hiking the splendid Bill Wallace Trail the other day, BrandCultureTalk stopped by the rather swanky Bacara resort in Santa Barbara.  Taking place among the customary cavorting of the smart set was a grand event reminiscent of more ebullient economic times — say 2006.  In addition to the run of the resort and hosted parties, there were sybaritic activities galore — golfing, sailing, riding, tours of Santa Barbara wine country . . . and more golfing — on offer to those who were members of something cryptically captioned the “Santa Barbara Pinnacle Club.”  Remarkably, no one involved with the event or on staff at Bacara would reveal anything about who or what the Santa Barbara Pinnacle Club was other than a “private organization.”  No signage other than the words “Private Event” betrayed the existence of such a group.  This cone of silence naturally piqued our curiosity.  On one publicly accessible table we espied a stack of brochures listing events.  Although there was no identifying name, BrandCultureTalk’s brand-centric eyes did notice a teeny, tiny:

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A recent New York Times article explores the role of research in Google’s (GOOG) design decision-making process. But what we find most interesting about this story has nothing to do with design. [Read more →]

For over 35 years, Federal Express (NYSE: FDX) has relentlessly delivered the most time-sensitive documents and parcels throughout the world. FedEx famously built its brand around a singular idea:  by coming through when something “absolutely, positively has to be there overnight” (an immortal line first deployed in 1979) as dramatized by John Moschitta, Jr. speaking at 450 words a minute in this 1982 television spot:

The earlier “Pass it on” FedEx commercial was even more explicit about the need for speed, featuring a package with the admonition, “If this package doesn’t arrive in Peoria tomorrow, it’ll be your job.”

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At BrandCulture, we’re vehement believers that brand is about a lot more than rigidly adhering to corporate identity guidelines. We love when organizations recognize that stakeholders are loyal not to colors or letterforms, but to the connections those colors and shapes evoke. And we absolutely swoon [Read more →]

If you’re reading this you’re likely one of the innumerable devotees of BrandCultureTalk. We just turned one year old, and what a year it has been! We look forward to even more lively debate of all things brand and culture in the years to come.

There is at least one of us here at BrandCultureTalk (and of course our beloved Dr. Terrance Deal) who believes emphatically that effective symbolic leadership is critical to an executive’s success and business performance.

It was a week where symbolic leadership was under assault. President Obama was criticized for an appearance on the Tonight Show

as a frivolous distraction from his real job of addressing the current economic calamity. [Read more →]

Is naming a science or an art? We’d like to think it entails a multitude of intelligences: an aptitude for poetry, a hefty internal word bank, and a knowledge of cultural and business connotations.

Choosing a name is fun, but it can be a tough and nuanced challenge. Every two-bit flack with a bottle of tequila and a white board thinks, “How hard could this be”? In reality, coining the perfect name is really, really hard. It must be memorable without being obnoxious; evocative, but not to the point of distraction; and emblematic of the company’s brand promise without reaching too far. Oh, and most importantly, available for use.

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What do laundry detergent, French Bordeaux, blue jeans and Martha Stewart have in common?  No, it’s not a handy home spun remedy on how to remove wine stains from your pants.  It’s that they’re all premium products sold under the single, amazingly elastic Costco Kirkland Signature brand.

Anyone who has ever been to a Costco (NASDAQ: COST) warehouse knows Kirkland Signature, the “house brand” first introduced in 1995 and named after original company HQ in Kirkland, Washington.  What is hard to believe is that Kirkland Signature has built its success by violating every rule of consumer packaged goods marketing dreamed up by a starry-eyed MBA or classic brand manager.  Not only is consumer segmentation out — no need for different Tide, Cheer, Gain, Era, Dreft, and Ivory Snow detergents — there’s no need even for different brands for different products like Duracell, Pringles, Vicks, Pampers, Clairol, etc. (all the foregoing, by the way are separate Procter & Gamble (NYSE: PG) brands). [Read more →]