Now is a great moment to generate a legal definition of a brand. Mondelēz, owner of iconic brands such as Oreos, Chips Ahoy! and Wheat Thins, is suing grocery chain Aldi over “… Aldi’s look-alike product packaging. The suit says that Aldi “blatantly copies” Mondelēz signature snacks in a way that is “… likely to deceive and confuse customers,” as reported in The New York Times.
The FTC-Meta trial is in the judge’s hands right now. The case is a monopoly case. The FTC asserts that when Meta was Facebook, Facebook purchased Instagram and WhatsApp at excessive prices so Facebook would not have to compete with these two very popular social media platforms. In other words, according to the article in The New Times, Facebook wanted to “kill its competition.” These actions by Facebook, according to the FTC, violate a Federal...
I’ve been spending many, many years working with various sized brands – from huge multi-nationals to smaller scale ups. But one thing I find that holds across whatever size or age of business, is the idea that your brand is proprietary. That the brand is owned by the business.
The 2025 CMO Survey, conducted annually by Deloitte, The Fuqua School at Duke University, and the American Marketing Association, was published recently. While the survey offered some good news for marketers, concluding that marketing’s role in organizations has broadened and marketing’s influence has increased modestly over time, a deeper analysis of the survey results reveals some problems, especially for marketing’s contributions to brand building, growth, and profitability.
From all my years in research and consulting, I think I’ve learned a thing or two about marketing worth sharing. Enduring fundamentals, mostly yet often overlooked. So, this year, I want to share some snippets for your consideration. I hope they’re helpful.
