Enduring Brands Are Made To Change
CEOs have become adept at saying “Sorry.” Most of the time the apologies are because some untoward or unexpected event occurred, such as an E. coli outbreak or rats in the store.
NEW THINKING
CEOs have become adept at saying “Sorry.” Most of the time the apologies are because some untoward or unexpected event occurred, such as an E. coli outbreak or rats in the store.
Current hot-button issues for consumers are genetically modified organisms (GMOs), the overemployment of pesticides, and the overuse of antibiotics in dairy. There are haters. There are skeptics. And a recent study showed that people were willing to pay more for a product labeled “xxx- free,” even when xxx was a made-up ingredient. So when a company who manufactures pesticides came to us to help improve their reputation, we knew it was going to be no...
Higher education marketing and communication seems harder than ever. Generational disinvestment, demographic headwinds, political dynamics, and never-ending angst over cost and affordability can make for a distressing picture.
Most businesspeople would be pleased to own a profitable business that was a pioneer in its category, had a stellar brand reputation, and generated more than a billion dollars in annual revenue. Yet, in 2012, IBM got rid of just such a business when it sold its retail point-of-sale (POS) business to Toshiba.
Whether the role of brands in people’s lives is for the better or for the worse is a long-running debate. The most influential anti-brand voice of recent vintage is journalist and social provocateur Naomi Klein, who shot to fame on the cusp of the new century with her bestseller, No Logo: Taking Aim at the Brand Bullies, in which she denounced global brands for distorting markets, culture, work and even consumerism itself.