The myth of the Kennedy Camelot was perhaps one of the most artfully crafted and executed examples of branding of all time.  With Ted Kennedy’s passing today, we have lost the last thread to the old, whimsical, romanticized vision of the Kennedy name.

And, while Teddy almost single handedly dismantled the brand in his youth, he matured into a steady patriarch who quietly upheld the brand equities throughout his long and lauded career.

It was the Kennedy’s who paved the way for a campaign like Obama’s; hung on symbolism and a vision of idealism, simplified and packaged for popular consumption.

Sadly, it seems that the Kennedy brand has been left to wallow in the inexpert hands of the next generation, as have so many carefully composed luxury brands of the past.

Goodbye Camelot, you were a lovely, sweet dream.

I am fascinated by the uproar about the transfer of the show Project Runway from the uber stylish Bravo to the more, um, subdued Lifetime (it premiered on the new channel last Thursday).  According to the blogs, viewers were sure that the show would not be nearly as good on Lifetime as it was on Bravo.  But while the channel has changed, the format, the hosts and the lingo will remain - so why was everyone so sure it would be bad?  Because the Bravo network has developed an incredible brand around “drama” TV that is so bad it’s great, for young-minded, style-oriented viewers – while Lifetime’s for…well, I don’t really know – women who stay home on Saturday nights?  (Even the name Lifetime sounds old!)  Fans trusted the show coming from Bravo as curator.  I’m inspired by Bravo’s ability to create this “in the know” persona for itself (even the logo suggests people are talking about it!). The most successful channels are brands – and while some are reaping the rewards of brilliantly managing this, those that don’t will be totally “out.”

I’m inspired by my friend Mike’s new renegade promotional efforts to stir up some commotion over his client/friend Rachel Nasvik’s handbag line. Inspired by the book The Pirate’s Dilemma, Mike decided to subvert the New York City street stand piracy game by beating those vendors to the punch.  Using Twitter, he alerted fans when a limited number of genuine Rachel Nasvik bags (normally sold at high end department stores) would be available at those ubiquitous street stands for a discounted amount – then sat back and let the excitement build.   Fans were delighted to be let in on the deal, and Mike strengthened the Rachel Nasvik community by giving loyalists a reason to stay tuned in.  Plus, by accessing an irreverent and fun new “channel,” the brand made a statement about its personality and, I’ll say it, joie de vivre.   Sounds like a brand worth staying in touch with.  More here.

Our Chicago office founder and MD recently turned 39 again, and in honor of his birthday, his loyal troops wanted to find a cool little t-shirt store and print up a customized tee (”39 4Eva”). It’s not too hard in Chicago (or any big city) to find these niche type boutiques, and none really seemed to stand out until they found the T-Shirt Deli.

One thing that inspires us at Egg is finding brands that really pay attention to their story. In order to be able to do that, they have to be obsessive about the details. The T-Shirt Deli’s story is about mimicking the best delis, offering t-shirt aficionados as many fonts as cheeses as well as the promise of something fresh and totally unique.

There are two elements of the story that they deliver so well.  One virtual, one real world.

First their T-Shirts are served up wrapped sugmarine/hoagie/hero style in butcher’s paper with the packaging held together with ironically contradictory stickers like “lean ham and kosher meat”. Great little details that show they care. Second, on their website the navigation looks like an old plastic deli board complete with miscolored letters and their mailing list invitation is a deli “take a ticket” stub. Nice little touches like this make a difference and suggest that if they care enough about these details, then their product will be similarly high quality.

A few weeks back, there I was waxing lyrical about getting a personal note from the pilot on a United flight which made me reconsider my lack of emotional connection with my airline of choice. Shortly after that post I also heard the first rumblings of a story that has gathered massive momentum online since. The popular “United Breaks Guitars” story has been everywhere with almost 4.5 million views on You Tube, coverage on the Today Show, Jimmy Kimmel etc. It certainly makes the United brand look shabby and tight-fisted. In a nutshell, musician Dave Carroll saw United baggage handlers tossing his checked bags around for fun, including his beloved Taylor guitar which was damaged to the tune of $1,200.  The song is about him trying to recoup that money from the airline.

Clearly in this case, the big loser is United - apparently when this story became so big, United’s share price dropped $180 million, a caustic reminder that brand reputation does have a dollar value. Most news coverage on this has focused on the humble Dave Carroll who has been a maestro at playing the social media game, so he’s the obvious winner.  However, in my view, the biggest under the radar winner here is Taylor Guitars - the small Caifornia-based manufacturer of the eponymous guitar. Here’s a brand used by some of the most renowned musicians worldwide (Neil Young, Dave Matthews) and Sting, suddenly sitting on a piece of PR gold. Based on this response, I’ve got to think they didn’t really make the most of the opportunity.

As for United, they’re getting even more stick from other country musicians singing about how awesome their competition is.  Brand damage by country music song is a pretty sorry stage of affairs.

This spot has been getting a lot of play on the advertising blogs lately. It’s an Australian beer ad for VB, which is immensely watchable, even for non-Australians. I’m not a VB drinker and nor will I go out of my way to find it, but the spot created a really positive impression of the brand for me…and really that’s what matters. VB is a massive mainstream beer…effectively the Bud of Australia, with huge appeal to a broad audience. I can imagine the planner sitting down to try to write the “target audience” section of his brief and struggling to find anything really insightful for his creative team. Then, maybe the lightbulb went off that the insight was not about a focused target audience, but more about the brand’s huge everyman appeal. The fact that VB is enjoyed by a huge array of Aussies means that it must have something special about it. The way the spot celebrates this appeal across a range of stereotypes is a great creative leap. It reminds me of the brilliant Bud radio spots years ago celebrating Real American Heroes (all 110 of them here) .

More importantly, it reminds me that while we often strive to focus down to a tight definition of our audience, maybe we should look much more broadly at a larger pool of users and concentrate more on what they need, rather than just who they are.

I’m currently on a research project set across three cities in India. Over dinner with my client Abhijit in Delhi, we got to talking about the interesting dynamics of cell phone adoption in this massive country. The biggest player here is Nokia, who just “got it right” according to Abhijit. I pushed for a reason why and he rattled off a number of smart moves… terrific advertising, a stellar product, and early entry into the market. But what caught my attention was an anecdotal story of how Nokia connected with the working class. Abhijit said a key move was when Nokia won the allegiance of truck drivers (who, believe me, are everywhere in this country!). As Nokia was looking for new and innovative ways to improve their hardware, they stumbled across a deceptively small insight: truck drivers get out of their trucks a dozen or more times in the course of a long night on the road… and it can be really, really dark (you know… that thing that happens when the sun goes down). The answer? Add a little flashlight to the phone. Bingo! Instead of looking for some earth-shaking, never-before-seen feature on the bleeding edge of technology, Nokia went old school and added a light bulb. And just yesterday on my flight from Delhi to Mumbai, the Economic Times of India published the results of its Brand Equity Most Trusted Brands survey. The top brand for 2009 and now two years running? The guys with the light bulbs sparking up — in more ways than one.

I am totally inspired by the groundbreaking force-to-be-reckoned-with of social media it what is proving to be pivotal in the historic events in Iran this week.

It has catapulted a technology that I was previously entirely cynical about into the realms of the truly revolutionary with average Iranian citizens able to get their personal experiences out to the world despite media blackouts and internet censorship with simple micro-blogging.

Hooray for a media coming of age and finding it’s worth. I am brimming with ideas to incorporate Twitter methodologies into our work!

As we talked about the other day with my United Airlines experience, brand consistency often comes down to an individual’s delivery. With all people-facing brands we are at the whim of the brand representative. Thinking about it from their point of view for a second, they have to be incentivized to deliver that brand experience consistently.  If we imagine the most successful service brands in the airline industry, Jet Blue and Southwest come to mind in the US and maybe Virgin and Singapore on an international scale.  What gives those people greater pride in delivering a unique and consistent experience that elevates their brands?

Ponder that for a while and then overlay yesterday’s news from London where British Airways announced they were asking their staff to work for free for a month to help get them out of the financial hole they’re in due to the economic crisis. In truth, their voluntary pay reduction would be amortized over a 6 month period, but which ever way you cut it, the airline is asking its staff to deliver the brand for a lower incentive.  The CEO, Willie Walsh, is clearly behind the initiative as he was first in line to volunteer to work for free for a month.  As he’s on £735K a year, critics say he can afford to lose £61K for a month.

In my mind, this could  galvanize a “circling of the wagons mentality” and a determination to survive, which could result in a push for even higher levels of customer service. This would happen if the staff felt an affinity for what BA stands for beyond just their pay packet. I’m not sure if this is true.

A more likely result is a disaffected and pissed off workforce who lack the incentive to deliver the BA brand consistently in the air. This has massive implications for the BA brand, which has been determined to differentiate based on a a “full service” promise vs. low cost, no frills competitors. What looks like a short term cost cutting policy could result in longer term detrimental damage to their brand.

What do you think? Would you be prepared to work for your company for less money to help it out of a financial hole?

Note to Egg Strategy employees reading this post - this is not a cheap attempt at testing the waters for a “BA style” wage cut. We just hired more people, remember!

Last week I was traveling back from a 2 day ideation session. The session had involved a lot of work and some particularly long days + nights, so I was delighted to see my request to use my upgrade certificates confirmed when I checked in at 4.30am in St. Louis for my return leg on United. I’m extremely loyal to United, which is about 95% due to the fact that I’ve been a member of their Mileage Plus program for the past 7 years and get preferential treatment as a result. I am, however, not committed to United.  If another carrier flying the routes I travel most often, offered me the same status to switch and matched my accumulated miles - I’d be there in a second (at least for a decent trial period).  Yep, that’s a pretty big ask, but I do spend a lot of money on flights.

However, this United flight was a bit different. The pilot made all his pre-flight announcements from the front of the plane rather than in the cockpit, so I immediately connected the brand with someone beyond the flight attendants - sort of like meeting the bank manager rather than a teller (sorry flight attendants). Then about an hour before landing, the flight attendant brought me a card that was a personal note from the pilot.  “Dear Mr. Band”, it said, “It’s my pleasure to fly you to Vancouver”.  OK, so not exactly going way above and beyond - but certainly a small unexpected touch that made me reconsider my relationship with United a little bit and perhaps put my brand promiscuity on the back burner. Reminded me it doesn’t take much to shape brand relationships, even ones that are years old.  When I told my wife about this, she asked me if the captain had added his hotel room number and a winking smiley.  Thankfully no.  Stretching the brand to the overly friendly skies would have been a bit much.

In recent months we’ve seen a few mis-steps by major brands.  KFC’s free sandwich problems, aka the Oprah Tsunami, the Dr Pepper and Guns and Roses debacle and last year the Burger King employee taking a bath in the restaurant kitchen sink didn’t exactly endear people to that brand.

This video of a McDonald’s in Australia does take the cake though.  How bad is this?

Reminds us of a few truths:

1. Every single touchpoint with your brand creates an impression.  Good, bad or ugly.

2. The internet has an awesome power to convey dramatic ideas to many people over a very short space of time.

3. Don’t go to McDonald’s in Adelaide after 3am on a Saturday

Just planning an ideation session today and always get inspired by smashing two disconnected things together. Here’s my favorite smash up of late - All-Black Winnie The Pooh. Not sure where the apple on the head comes from…maybe they’re even throwing in a William Tell reference. But clearly that’s not the main thing here. Design by Hiroshi Fujiwara.