In 1997, a new search engine calling itself AskJeeves was introduced to the internet. The website had adopted Jeeves, a character from the stories of P.G. Wodehouse, as a sort of mascot – seemingly the ideal symbol for a search engine. Like Sherlock Holmes or Dumbledore, Jeeves is one of those literary characters whose wisdom never fails.

“Here he was, with his head bulging at the back and on his face that look of quiet intelligence that comes from eating lots of fish,” Wodehouse writes in his novel Carry on, Jeeves. “I knew from experience what a wizard he was at removing the oppressed from the soup.”

However, upon closer inspection, the company’s use of Jeeves is anything but obvious. How many people nowadays read Wodehouse? How many have even heard of him? But according to Patrick Crisp, the Director of Public Relations for Ask.com, Jeeves’ genius side was never the real point.

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We’ve all done it – made an impulsive purchase in the most random of situations. We are innocently minding our own business while meandering through a store, when our peripheral vision is abruptly caught up by something out-of-place in the usual monotony of this habitual haunt. We stop dead in our tracks and we stare a bit. Then without thinking it through, we take the attractive abnormality to the check-out, remove our wallets from the safety of a pocket or purse, and beg for the person behind the cash register to spare us some dignity by letting us make this purchase as quickly as possible. With the item bagged and a receipt in hand, we scurry off to study in-depth what we’ve just purchased. Unique logos, striking text, bright colors, unusual shapes and textures – these are visual fixations that we can’t resist taking home with us, even if that product doesn’t really fulfill a need we have. We are addicted within a few seconds to the packaging of a product we may know very little about. The allure is all in the design. (more…)

The term “metrosexual” has not only become a juggernauting imprint to describe the emerging male consumer, but a booming 8 billion dollar a year industry. The numbers have unquestionably seized the attention of investors and conglomerates both domestically and abroad. This is not surprising seeing as how the US holds a 2.4 billion dollar share of those 8 billion dollar earnings and is expected to grow about 20% by the year 2010. In such a saturated market, how does one stand out with a new brand of skincare products introducing itself at every moment? I spoke to Pat Parsi, founder and president of Texas based male grooming company Billy Jealousy, and he believes that while beauty and skin care products are formulated to highlight the aesthetic, one cannot help but wonder: “why not blend substance with style?”
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As business owners we are often faced with a lot of daily obstacles. From something as small as organizing our messy desk, to major issues like budgets, staff and the all-important search for new and better paying clients. We grow in short and often violent spurts and before we know it, our once small operation is now a multi-personnel jigsaw puzzle of challenges. Somewhere along the way, many business owners become overwhelmed in parts of their business and let certain areas fall behind. Oddly enough, they are often the most important areas. No, we’re not talking about remembering to buy coffee filters. We’re talking about a business’ mandate. Their message…their original reason for being and more importantly, how the rest of the world knows it and understands it.

Somewhere along the way many small businesses will become to busy to continue to invest the same attention to their company’s identity as they once did. This is to be expected. After all, for your business to last long it needs this success and you the owner need to control all aspects of that growth and success in an intricate juggling magic trick. It is common with in these times of growth, that you will take a minute out of your day and look over your company with pride and then you will notice it…through all the growth, you have lost your visual edge. The look of your company has become dated or inconsistent or worse…maybe it was never really united to begin with. Many owners start their business the same way.
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If the thriving, ubiquitous presence of Dunkin’ Donuts and Starbucks locations around the USA is any indication, Americans sure do love their coffee. According to the Dunkin Donuts website, it is estimated that more than 100 million Americans drink a total of 350 million cups of coffee a day. That’s a lot of caffeine (and decaf) consumption going on from coast to coast. So how does that translate into profits for the country’s two most recognizable coffee purveyors? How well does each company’s brand capture their share of this sizeable market?

To any casual observer, the stark differences between Dunkin’ Donuts and Starbucks, and their respective demographic, is relatively easy to identify. While many Americans prefer the pleasant, flavorful blend of DD’s 100% Arabica coffee, there are countless others who crave the decidedly stronger, darker strains of high-quality, whole bean brews and Italian-style espresso beverages offered by Starbucks. The former, with its trademark hot-pink and orange logo and limited seating (at least in most locations) tends to draw in a “hit and run” type of crowd, looking for their morning shot on the way to the office. Starbucks, on the other hand, with its wireless connections, comfy chairs, contemporary fixtures and up-to-date musical ambiance, offers the perfect “gathering place” atmosphere, whether you’re an entrepreneur conducting business, a college student surfing the internet, or a hip guy or gal, looking for a “third home” to hang out and read the paper.
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Ever wonder where those cheap looking oil reproductions of Starry Night come from? Well, where else but the land of mass-producing of everything, China. In the southern city of Dafen, 60% of the worlds oil reproductions are produced by ‘companies’ or ’sweat shops’ to use the more accurate terminology. Art dealers from all over the world travel to this city of mass art production every year to swallow up paintings in quantities that equal millions of dollars. One company alone ships over 300,000 paintings a year overseas. Even more compelling is how efficient some of these artists have become. Many can churn out 20 -30 classic masterpiece reproductions a day.

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Colman’s has been mixing the strong stuff since 1814, and boy do the English love it! The thick and spicy English Mustard adorns millions of refrigerator shelves across Great Britain and has done alright for itself in more distant parts of the world, too. There was even a tiny glass jar of Colman’s in my parent’s house, right next to the oversized bottle of squeezy American-style mustard. On rare occasions, dad would crave something a little stronger than the squeezable, fluorescent yellow goo on his sandwiches and out would come the little jar, patiently providing tangy, eye-watering spread for years to come. That tiny jar was bottomless. Dad would dig a small smear of yellow out with a butter knife and carefully wipe it ever so thinly onto his bread, taking great pains to spread it evenly. He hardly put any on at all. Once, when the big squeezable jar was empty and I’d grown tired of trying to dress my bologna sandwich with the driblets that flew out with a loud ‘FFFT!’ sound, I substituted a good spoonful of Colman’s and mentally scoffed at my father for never using enough of the stuff. One generous bite and I barely knew what hit me. Tears were streaming down my face, my tongue was burning and there was a terrible bitter taste clinging to the roof of my mouth. My poor sandwich was ruined. What kind of a mustard was this?
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That is exactly what the firm, Guillermo Brea y Assciados was hired to do. Argentina was looking to re-brand its image as a forward thinking, modern country. One that has rebounded from the financial disasters of the late ’90s. It appears they are on the right track with this new branding…it is clean, appealing and conveys the signal of change the country is currently going through. Quite a score for the design firm, talk about exposure!

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Gavin Lucas and Mike Dorrian have put together a compilation of some of the most unusual and imaginative advertising campaigns, most of which are staged in public. The Trimline Security Glass is simply brilliant and how can you not love a nine-ton block of ice chiseled into a VW?

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BusinessWeek Online examines 7 failed brand extensions that we’re a REAL stretch. From high-end Barbie couture to Hooter’s Air, you’d think these businesses would have done a little market research, or pehaps they did and simply listened to their ego’s instead.

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