Petrol Station Design has been totally revamped and relaunched as Roadside Retail in order to capture the monumental changes within the industry over the last ten years, namely food overtaking fuel as the primary mission for customers and food providing the primary revenue generator in many markets. Further, petrol / diesel is no longer the sole fuel source on sale with bio fuels entering the market, electric hybrid cars common place and hydrogen around the corner.

Roadside Retail is on the one hand an overgrown Minale Tattersfield blog but on the other a shared on line resource for all industry practioners ranging from brand managers to designers to engineers, project managers and store managers. Content will primarily be sourced from Minale Tattersfield archives but key topics from others are included and will eventually form the greater proportion.

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Honda began operation of a next generation solar hydrogen station prototype at the Los Angeles Center of Honda R&D Americas, Inc., intended for ultimate use as a home refueling appliance capable of an overnight refill of fuel cell electric vehicles.

source from: Honda
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Minale Tattersfield Client

Ask any oil company or other chain store regarding the state of their network and you would be surprised to hear how little they really know especially when the network in question spreads across different continents and will include many decades of acquisitions, sales, re-brands, refurbishments further complicated by dealer owned sites, company owned sites and co branded sites.For this reason brand auditing is a necessary activity if a brand is to be effectively managed.

With larger constantly evolving networks all that is practical within a short space of time is a series of snapshots containing typical cross sections. As a designer commissioned to undertake remedial work, the prime fucntion of a brand audit is to see at first hand the good the bad and the ugly. There are many other secondary functions including the opportunity to get to know the in house brand managers, engineers, dealers and suppliers with whom you will be dealing with for the next few months / years. Let's not forget that navigating political minefields is all part of a brand/design consultants job! Its amazing how much you can glean about the real issues during informal discussions whilst travelling with the host client. Other secondary benefits of frequenting actual sites is the creative spark that can result as opposed to just brainstorming within the confines of the studio.

An audit is nothing without a conclusion and therefore a SWOT (strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats) analysis is required to summarise the findings. Certain findings within an analysis may seem like telling a client the time with their own watch however within a big organisation it is frequently necessary for an outside neutral consultant to achieve a consensus view.

Where a brand / design intervention has been decided upon designers would at least participate within an auditing exercise personally for the above reasons however where remedial work is not necessarily the outcome there also exist dedicated brand auditors such as newly set up 'The Brand Scout' which have in the past given the likes of Shell and Chevron the necessary insight to make more valued judgements on how to proceed.

David Davis
February 2010 © Minale Tattersfield

Bloom Energy Server provides 100kW of power, enough to meet the baseload needs of 100 average homes or a small office building... day and night, in roughly the footprint of a standard parking space. It is working it's magic at eBay's north campus.  

See the full story at 60 MINUTES

Morrisons Supermarkets install Philips LED lighting solution at Illingworth Petrol Filling Station - the first site in Europe that is 100% lit with LEDs

From a brand presentation stand point Morrisons is certainly the caveman of the industry however functionality wise Morrisons are leading with its Illingworth petrol forecourt which unveils its new LED lighting approach. The Philips LED lighting solution adopted by Morrisons shows the versatility which LEDs offer for internal and external applications. Over and above that it has allowed Morrisons to make substantial energy efficient gains without compromise to performance. Here we take a closer look at this unique project.

source from: Voltimum
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The Square was opened in London in 1991 by owner and chef, Phillip Howard and since then it has been rated consistently as one of the top restaurants in London.

Some commentators have said about Tiger Woods "He has more money than most people; he can do whatever he wants to do" and, of course, up to a point that’s true. But he can't buy happiness, or respect. However rich he is and no matter how much he pays for the best spin doctors the world now knows that Tiger is not just NOT a role model - but that he is a terminally damaged brand.

It is naive to say, as some have, that “This is a personal issue between Tiger and his wife and no else." Tiger is one of the two or three most famous people in the world. He ONLY has a life in the public domain - that comes with celebrity. Such fame brings enormous wealth creating opportunities and Tiger has milked them to the full. But the sponsors are not paying for Tiger the golfing genius - they are paying for Tiger the icon. Tiger the brand. Tiger's infidelity was inconsistent with the brand values implicit in the icon and not what the sponsors wanted – so they have walked away.

Tiger couldn’t have it both ways. Either he was just a golfer eschewing all the money making iconography – or he exploited his identity and his brand to the full. He chose the latter course which brought with it the obligation not to tarnish the brand. He has comprehensibly failed in this. Failed his sponsors, failed the game of golf and failed his family. No amount of spin doctoring can disguise all this! And the brand is damaged beyond repair.

Tsuki has been awarded the PR business for new out-of-home company Pump TV which delivers Seven and Yahoo!7 video content and advertising to consumers at petrol pumps.
Pump TV began its roll out in November across Shell Coles Express stations. It plans to be in over 400 petrol stations with more than 4,800 LCD ....

source from: mumBRELLA
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Some years ago the Managing Director of a communications agency which had recently successfully pitched for business with BP arranged a meeting with the oil company’s legendary CEO John Browne. After a few pleasantries the agency man posed a key question to Browne, “Who, within BP, would be responsible for Brand Management?” he asked. Quick as a flash Browne replied “I will”.

What Browne realised was that Brand Management was not some esoteric and highly specialised activity which could be delegated to a Department head and reviewed once a year – on the contrary managing the brand was at the core of what everyone in the corporation did -and it was certainly a prime responsibility of the Chief Executive. Browne knew that the BP brand was far, far more than its elegant new logo and colour scheme and far more, as well, than its petrol stations and its products. In an industry that is dominated by a technological and engineering mindset BP sought to position itself under Browne’s enthusiastic direction as different – in other words, in communications speak, it wanted to differentiate its brand from its competitors and be, as its tagline said, “beyond petroleum”. And crucially Browne also knew that for a truly global enterprise like BP, especially one which included recent acquisitions which themselves had recently been powerful, but very different, brands – like Amoco - an internationally applied and monitored set of BP brand standards was essential.

The first lesson for any corporation that wants to be seen as different, and as better, is to position its brand in a unique way – and to occupy ground that none of its competitors occupies. This positioning must, however, be authentic and it must be inculcated into all that the company does. There is no point in making claims about your corporation which are disingenuous and which your management can’t deliver. Tesco has a tagline 'Every Little Helps' and they know that that slogan has to apply throughout the corporation to everything it does, wherever it operates and whoever does it! As they put it “The philosophy of 'Every Little Helps' is behind everything we do - it's not just something we say, we really do mean it. Really.”

Consistency

What John Browne understood, and what is a cornerstone of Tesco’s business, is that Brand Management is above all about consistency of delivery of the brand promise – and that the drive for consistency has to come from the top. And whilst consistency applies crucially to all the visible manifestations of the brand, those artefacts that are traditionally seen as being the province of the brand manager like logo design and colour schemes, it is also and crucially about behaviour. In the latter part of my Shell career I argued strongly that the historic tagline “You can be sure of Shell” was not only memorable and distinctive with great historic resonance – but that it also could be, and should be, an internal behaviour benchmark. In other words if you applied the question “Would the man in the street think that this action of Shell’s shows that you can trust them?” and the answer was “Yes” then all other things being equal you should proceed. If the answer was more ambivalent then you should think long and hard about going ahead. Unfortunately my plea fell on stony ground and the tagline itself disappeared completely – a huge missed opportunity.

Commitment and measurement

It is important to make a definition clear at this point – when I use the word “brand” it is nearly always interchangeable with the word “reputation”. What John Browne was concerned about was to enhance the reputation of BP and to deliver benefits to all of the corporation’s stakeholders. I will return to this point in a later article in this series but if we accept the convention that “brand” is generally used in marketing whereas “reputation” has a more corporate connotation, which is true, we should not forget that they are two sides of the same coin. So the task of “Managing a brand” is absolutely synonymous with the task of managing corporate reputation. That is why brand management has to be driven from the top and why the Board should spend some time at meetings reviewing brand performance. An excellent way of doing this is to commission regular “Brand tracking” research which will not only tell you your brand’s position relative to your competitors but also allow you to track performance over time. A brand strength measure, which tests your brand’s power to deliver against relevant benchmarks, should be as important as the more conventional financial measures. What cannot be measured cannot be managed - so there needs to be a regular measurement of brand strength the results of which lead, as necessary, to action.

Brand standards


The brand policeman

The most carefully and clearly defined set of brand standards will only be effective if they are reliably and consistently applied. As we have seen this must involves regular consumer testing to ensure that brand advantages, relative to the competition, are being maintained – but it is also necessary internally to police the application of standards. Companies internal audit systems apply regular, systematic and detailed checks on financial and other performance. A similar process should apply to the brand. When I was “Global Brand Standards Manager” for Shell I was sometimes called a “brand policeman” and I did indeed conduct “brand audits” in Shell’s operating companies. For these audits to be credible – even for them to be welcomed – it was essential that there had previously been “buy in” to the brand standards that were being reviewed. One of the essential requirements for the successful management of any set of design and other brand standards is that those who must apply the standards must see the value of doing so – and the best way to do this is to involve key members of operational teams at an early stage in the development of the system.

Think Global – act local

Global brands by definition operate in a wide range of very different business environments and there will generally be significant cultural variations between regions or countries. The involvement of representatives from around the world at an early stage not only furthers the likelihood of “buy in” but also allows the impact of change to be assessed in all markets. The truism that smart corporations “Think globally but act locally” applies especially to brand management. So although major brand enhancements, such as retail design changes, will be centrally driven it is important that there is an iterative process between the centre and the operating environments both to test the validity of a new design in multiple locations and to ensure that any special culture needs and sensitivities are taken account of early in the design development stage.


January 2010 © Minale Tattersfield

Some years ago the Managing Director of a communications agency which had recently successfully pitched for business with BP arranged a meeting with the oil company’s legendary CEO John Browne. After a few pleasantries the agency man posed a key question to Browne, “Who, within BP, would be responsible for Brand Management?” he asked. Quick as a flash Browne replied “I will”.

What Browne realised was that Brand Management was not some esoteric and highly specialised activity which could be delegated to a Department head and reviewed once a year – on the contrary managing the brand was at the core of what everyone in the corporation did -and it was certainly a prime responsibility of the Chief Executive. Browne knew that the BP brand was far, far more than its elegant new logo and colour scheme and far more, as well, than its petrol stations and its products. In an industry that is dominated by a technological and engineering mindset BP sought to position itself under Browne’s enthusiastic direction as different – in other words, in communications speak, it wanted to differentiate its brand from its competitors and be, as its tagline said, “beyond petroleum”. And crucially Browne also knew that for a truly global enterprise like BP, especially one which included recent acquisitions which themselves had recently been powerful, but very different, brands – like Amoco - an internationally applied and monitored set of BP brand standards was essential.

The first lesson for any corporation that wants to be seen as different, and as better, is to position its brand in a unique way – and to occupy ground that none of its competitors occupies. This positioning must, however, be authentic and it must be inculcated into all that the company does. There is no point in making claims about your corporation which are disingenuous and which your management can’t deliver. Tesco has a tagline 'Every Little Helps' and they know that that slogan has to apply throughout the corporation to everything it does, wherever it operates and whoever does it! As they put it “The philosophy of 'Every Little Helps' is behind everything we do - it's not just something we say, we really do mean it. Really.”

Consistency

What John Browne understood, and what is a cornerstone of Tesco’s business, is that Brand Management is above all about consistency of delivery of the brand promise – and that the drive for consistency has to come from the top. And whilst consistency applies crucially to all the visible manifestations of the brand, those artefacts that are traditionally seen as being the province of the brand manager like logo design and colour schemes, it is also and crucially about behaviour. In the latter part of my Shell career I argued strongly that the historic tagline “You can be sure of Shell” was not only memorable and distinctive with great historic resonance – but that it also could be, and should be, an internal behaviour benchmark. In other words if you applied the question “Would the man in the street think that this action of Shell’s shows that you can trust them?” and the answer was “Yes” then all other things being equal you should proceed. If the answer was more ambivalent then you should think long and hard about going ahead. Unfortunately my plea fell on stony ground and the tagline itself disappeared completely – a huge missed opportunity.

Commitment and measurement

It is important to make a definition clear at this point – when I use the word “brand” it is nearly always interchangeable with the word “reputation”. What John Browne was concerned about was to enhance the reputation of BP and to deliver benefits to all of the corporation’s stakeholders. I will return to this point in a later article in this series but if we accept the convention that “brand” is generally used in marketing whereas “reputation” has a more corporate connotation, which is true, we should not forget that they are two sides of the same coin. So the task of “Managing a brand” is absolutely synonymous with the task of managing corporate reputation. That is why brand management has to be driven from the top and why the Board should spend some time at meetings reviewing brand performance. An excellent way of doing this is to commission regular “Brand tracking” research which will not only tell you your brand’s position relative to your competitors but also allow you to track performance over time. A brand strength measure, which tests your brand’s power to deliver against relevant benchmarks, should be as important as the more conventional financial measures. What cannot be measured cannot be managed - so there needs to be a regular measurement of brand strength the results of which lead, as necessary, to action.

Brand standards


The brand policeman

The most carefully and clearly defined set of brand standards will only be effective if they are reliably and consistently applied. As we have seen this must involves regular consumer testing to ensure that brand advantages, relative to the competition, are being maintained – but it is also necessary internally to police the application of standards. Companies internal audit systems apply regular, systematic and detailed checks on financial and other performance. A similar process should apply to the brand. When I was “Global Brand Standards Manager” for Shell I was sometimes called a “brand policeman” and I did indeed conduct “brand audits” in Shell’s operating companies. For these audits to be credible – even for them to be welcomed – it was essential that there had previously been “buy in” to the brand standards that were being reviewed. One of the essential requirements for the successful management of any set of design and other brand standards is that those who must apply the standards must see the value of doing so – and the best way to do this is to involve key members of operational teams at an early stage in the development of the system.

Think Global – act local

Global brands by definition operate in a wide range of very different business environments and there will generally be significant cultural variations between regions or countries. The involvement of representatives from around the world at an early stage not only furthers the likelihood of “buy in” but also allows the impact of change to be assessed in all markets. The truism that smart corporations “Think globally but act locally” applies especially to brand management. So although major brand enhancements, such as retail design changes, will be centrally driven it is important that there is an iterative process between the centre and the operating environments both to test the validity of a new design in multiple locations and to ensure that any special culture needs and sensitivities are taken account of early in the design development stage.


Paddy Briggs
January 2010 © Minale Tattersfield

The Commission for the Protection of Competition (CPC) has fined petrol station operator Verona 2002 for imitating the Petrol brand. Verona 2002 was fined 7160 leva, Bulgarian-language daily Dnevnik said.

In 2008, Petrol sold a petrol station in the village of Oreshak to Verona 2002. For 13 months after the transfer of ownership, the new owner continued to use the same brand-style as Petrol; a griffin, a stylized letter P and the word petrol, Dnevnik said

source from: The Sofia Echo
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Whislt many energy efficiency devices may require significant investment, there are some which don’t.
The eCube for example is a simple device that reduces the amount of electricity used by refrigerators and can according to the manufacturers ELS, savings between 15% and 35% can be achieved. The device is straight forward to fit, requires no maintenance and may even outlast the host refrigerator and most importantly pay for itself within one year.

The science is on the face of it quite simple. The eCube reduces electricity consumption by simply converting the refrigeration unit from measuring Air Temperature, which is highly volatile, to measuring Product temperature, which is far less volatile. It does this by encasing the temperature probe with a food simulent that has been designed to mimic the thermal volatility of fish and will last for at least ten years (probably many more). Once done the refrigerator unit now responds to the temperature changes of Product, not Air.
As a consequence of the above the refrigerator will work with a longer off cycle which will allow a pressure equalisation between the high and low pressure parts of the refrigerant within the refrigeration system, allowing a softer start from a cooler system, thus avoiding compressor trip caused by high pressure or an unbalanced system. i.e. lower amperage clean start obtains a maximum efficiency far quicker (with a further energy saving).

The electrical starting component and devices used on refrigeration equipment have an engineered life span, so the less maximum power use of these components will extend the reliability of the components, reducing refrigeration failure. Thus using eCube will extend the life of the starting devices and in turn result in the refrigeration equipment, experiencing fewer breakdowns and engineer call outs.

Start to finish construction of a petrol station.

The interior was designed to be a show place in which this prestigious development could be marketed and secondly to be  an office for the sales staff and project management team.

Other areas we designed included private offices, meeting rooms, kitchen and toilets.

Minale Tattersfield was asked to update the existing exhibition stands for the Italian silk fabric manufacturer, Mantero Seta. There were two projects working side-by-side, for the men’s silk accessories, which needed to be mobile and flexible to be used at three different events each year in Italy and Germany. The other was for their silk fabric divisions, to be shown at the Premiere Vision fair in Paris twice a year.

Our solution was to create ‘Galleria Mantero’ a gallery of the brands under a Mantero umbrella. For the silk accessories at Pitti in Florence the ‘Galleria Mantero’ solution promoted the brands, such as Gianfranco Ferre, Kenzo, Paul Smith and Donna Karan, for which Mantero is a supplier treating them as guest artists in the space. Items representing the range revealed from behind concealed wall panels to add theatre and complete the sales experience.

The Premiere Vision stand for March 2001 brings together the previously separate divisions under the Galleria Mantero banner. This is also symbolic of the new culture within Mantero.

Minale Tattersfield has concentrated on providing the vision with a tour of the different stories of the fabric ranges while finding innovative solutions to the problems of both displaying and stowing the large numbers of silk swatches. As with the Pitti Galleria the environment has been made more open and casual.

The first ‘Galleria Mantero’ accessories stand successfully completed its first ‘cycle’ of exhibition events in Cannes in September, where it received positive responses from all divisions of the Mantero Group. a

Minale Tattersfield was asked to create an environment for Motorola's 700 sq. m stand at the Office Machinery and Equipment Exhibition SMAU 2000 in Milan that would promote the four main market segments of their new WAP mobile phone range.

The stand was also to promote their new technology initiatives and their business infrastructure systems, and to include a bar area and private office spaces.

Our solution used 4 large cones of light abstracted from the Motorola 'M' logo and suspended from the ceiling to highlight 4 areas of the stand forecourt, representing Motorola's home and family, business, youth and high end market areas.

Phone displays included 'quirky' solutions such as the water cooler in the office, a terrarium on the home coffee table and phones stitched into the sail of a sail board.

The stand was very successful and was even commented as the 'real big news at the SMAU'.

A service aimed at middle-income women who prefer to simply show up rather than make a traditional appointment, the brand is modern and friendly, and decidedly mass-market, although outlets are located in upmarket malls, airports, and other high-traffic areas.

The colors are vibrant, to communicate quickly in cluttered environments, and the simple, European-feel graphics allow for easy extension into personal-care product ranges.

Its phenominal success has seen expansion and opening of a further twenty-five outlets within the first fourteen months of business. In addition to the brand’s core offer, further expansion is being developed in its own brand nail care products. Currently, a Manicure Express Deluxe version is being tested for ‘upmarket’ office developments.

Brands – they impact upon our lives almost every moment of the day and they have become so ubiquitous that as consumers we take them for granted. When all is well they give us value and reassurance and they make us feel better. When they are really cherished by us they become almost like a member of the family – we like using them and being seen with them – and we even defend them to the hilt when they falter, just like a family member who slips from the straight and narrow. These are the towering brands that illuminate our society – the brands that “Saatchi and Saatchi” called “Lovemarks” – brands to which we are “loyal without reason” and which “deliver beyond your expectations” and “reach your heart as well as your mind, creating an intimate, emotional connection that you just can’t live without”

Saatchi’s language is flowery and passionate and corporate man – especially the ones who hold the budget allocations in their tight grasp – might think that it is all a bit too fluffy. “What’s your brand really worth – in hard dollars and cents?” the accountants often ask - as if the brand asset is like any other and can be measured in the open market or traded on Ebay. But they shouldn’t really need to ask because the hard evidence pops up from time to time. Would Kraft really have paid nearly $20billion for Cadbury Schweppes if it had just been factories they had been acquiring? Of course not – Kraft wanted Dairy Milk and Roses and Twirl and the dozens of other brands that add incremental value over and above their pure utility value - and therefore allow premium prices to be charged.

But for every brand success story, stories about products which became cherished brands because consumers were given and accepted reasons to prefer and even “love” them, there are dozens of stories of brands which fall from grace , lose their advantages and disappear. And it is not just about brand names – it’s about how a brand performs. “Delivery” in the modern jargon. Take Woolworths. Now there’s a brand that has created a distinctive market edge, offers quality products at competitive prices in well laid-out stores with friendly staff and with a distinctively excellent customer focus. Isn’t it? Well in South Africa it is and it is the polar opposite of the failed chain of stores with the same name in Britain. Of course brand names are important – but even the most valued names will lose their edge and even fail if insufficient thought goes into their management and insufficient investment into maintaining their edge. Woolworths in Britain became synonymous with shoddiness and confusion and it failed. Woolworths in South Africa offered more and delivered – and prospered.

Of all the many destructions of brand value that we have seen over the years few have been more shocking than that of Rover Cars. Those of us of a “certain age” remember when a Rover was the ultimate aspirational car for the successful professional man. In the mid 1960s there was no doubt at all that in Britain Rover was perceived of at least the equal of BMW, Mercedes or Audi - and probably ahead of them. This was for two main reasons. First the brand had a comfortable resonance and history as British and as standing for quality. Secondly the company actually began to deliver a range of cars which performed reassuringly well. And brand extension was also handled well – the Rover 2000, a superb family saloon, was utterly different from the countryman’s Land Rover – but each was at the top of its class and the parent brand was enhanced by having both in the family. Then disaster struck. Rover was subsumed into a huge unwieldy car-making conglomerate called British Leyland in 1967 and gradually decisions about Rover cars and the Rover brand were being taken in a totally different corporate context. And when the British Leyland colossus lost its way years later an attempt was made to try and wrench some residual brand value from the premium “Rover” name and the whole company, with its myriad of failing products, became the “Rover Group” – and that, of course, was the end for Rover as a distinctive up-market brand. Had Rover remained independent, had proper and focused investment in its products occurred and had the eye been kept on the target group who were Rover’s loyal customers surely Rover today could be up there with the great premium German car brands - one of the great missed opportunities of British industry. And all because they utterly failed to value the Rover brand, understand what it stood for and cherish it as much as their customers did.

The truly great brands withstand almost anything in the world around them and survive and even strengthen their appeal in tough times. But they can never stand still or be complacent – as the British Woolworths did. And they can never be expected to carry more on their shoulders than they are equipped to handle – the Rover story shows the perils of trying to make a premium brand into a generic. So in today’s complex and challenging business times what are the three golden rules for brand managers to follow?

1. Value your brand financially – but don’t be greedy

The oil company Shell had one of the strongest of all consumer brands around the world until comparatively recently. But underinvestment both in the brand and in the assets, especially petrol stations, caused the brand to slip and especially to concede ground to the highly professional marketing of the supermarket brands like Carrefour, Tesco and Sainsbury’s. This led to a vicious downward spiral in some markets where there was an unwillingness to invest which led to loss of share which led to lower financial returns and increased unit costs. One example of where this happened is Greece and Shell eventually decided to pull out of the retail business in that country entirely. Except that they didn’t – at least from the consumers’ perspective! The residual goodwill in the Shell brand, combined with the significant cost that would have been incurred by the assets’ purchaser Avin to re-image the 700 sites, persuaded Shell to license Avin to continue to use the Shell brand at a fee rumoured to be 7.5 million Euros per year (mirroring an earlier similar agreement struck between BP and Hellenic Petroleum).This is a deal which would have gladdened the hearts of the voracious accountants – you get the assets off the balance sheet, cut your costs completely and still have a nice little earner from your intangible asset the brand. The problem is, however, that Shell’s brand management in Greece has been contracted out to a third party which means that the petrol stations whilst they look like Shell are really Avin’s concern completely. Are they Shell or are they Avin – they can’t be both! It’s like pregnancy – you can’t be half pregnant and you can’t be half Shell.

2. Invest in the brand counter-cyclically

This hurts! When times are tough brand investment and expenditure are high up on the list of things that are vulnerable to budget cuts. It ought to be the other way round – when times are tough the confident brand will redouble its efforts to be preferred and to deliver more. The problem is that the accountants will often see brand expenditure as “discretionary” – that is if you cut the cost in the short term the business probably won’t suffer much and the bottom line will of course be improved. Over time your brand position will weaken, but with business cycles ever shorter and shorter it is tempting to just cut the costs. A Company that did not do this saw the benefits – DSG International, owner of the Dixons, Curry’s and PC World brands, reported an 8% rise in sales pre Christmas 2009 compared with the previous year – and this in the highly competitive consumer electronics market. These results are in part attributable to DSG's program of redesigning and modernising its Curry’s and PC World chains – in other words in investing in its brands at the key consumer interface.

3. Always allow your brand to be consumer driven

A design consultant I worked with closely back in the 1990s when I was responsible for the project management of the redesign of Shell’s global petrol station network used to say that we must always remember that great brands, including Shell, are owned not by the company but by the consumer. This is close to Saatchi’s idea of the “Lovemark” mentioned above. This is difficult for some executives to understand – clearly those responsible for passing the Shell brand to a third party to manage in Greece didn’t understand it – any more than the management of Rover and Woolworths in the UK did. But the idea is undisputedly true. Brands exist in the minds of consumers or not at all and the best brands are built from the inside out, based on real properties that consumers value and which can be sustained over time. But consumers change and competitors change and the world around us changes – all too rapidly sometimes. This means that our brands must respond and evolve and the only way that they can do this is if we regularly tap consumer needs, opinions and beliefs through research – and then act on what we find. Market Research is not “discretionary expenditure” either – although it is vulnerable to cuts in the short term just as brand expenditure is. The smart companies do more research when times are tough – not less. My guess is that DSG researched extensively before they came up with new design and layouts for their stores – and the results are clear to see.

Call to arms

It takes courage to be a brand advocate in your company and sometimes you will be seen as a nuisance if you are. Be a nuisance and always think what the competitors would least like you to do. The last thing that they want is a bold brand-driven strategy from a competitor when they are trying to meet cost-cutting targets. That alone is why you should do it! Good luck.


January 2010 © Minale Tattersfield

Due perhaps to its 'magical' effects coupled with the unusual green colour of the product, Absinth gained the nickname, 'la fête verte' (green fairy). The nickname has been picked up in the packaging where the illustration of a hermaphroditic character recalls the green fairy. The product is endorsed with a quote from Oscar Wilde: "Absinth has a wonderful colour green. A glass of Absinth is a poetical as anything in the world . What difference is there between a glass of Absinth and a sunset".

I absolutely love this quote and truly enjoyed working on this label with Aristlend Ltd, the importers of Prague Absinth, so on completion of this project we all filled our glasses with the fête verte' and drunk to all our Absinth friends!

Brands – they impact upon our lives almost every moment of the day and they have become so ubiquitous that as consumers we take them for granted. When all is well they give us value and reassurance and they make us feel better. When they are really cherished by us they become almost like a member of the family – we like using them and being seen with them – and we even defend them to the hilt when they falter, just like a family member who slips from the straight and narrow. These are the towering brands that illuminate our society – the brands that “Saatchi and Saatchi” called “Lovemarks” – brands to which we are “loyal without reason” and which “deliver beyond your expectations” and “reach your heart as well as your mind, creating an intimate, emotional connection that you just can’t live without”

Saatchi’s language is flowery and passionate and corporate man – especially the ones who hold the budget allocations in their tight grasp – might think that it is all a bit too fluffy. “What’s your brand really worth – in hard dollars and cents?” the accountants often ask - as if the brand asset is like any other and can be measured in the open market or traded on Ebay. But they shouldn’t really need to ask because the hard evidence pops up from time to time. Would Kraft really have paid nearly $20billion for Cadbury Schweppes if it had just been factories they had been acquiring? Of course not – Kraft wanted Dairy Milk and Roses and Twirl and the dozens of other brands that add incremental value over and above their pure utility value - and therefore allow premium prices to be charged.

But for every brand success story, stories about products which became cherished brands because consumers were given and accepted reasons to prefer and even “love” them, there are dozens of stories of brands which fall from grace , lose their advantages and disappear. And it is not just about brand names – it’s about how a brand performs. “Delivery” in the modern jargon. Take Woolworths. Now there’s a brand that has created a distinctive market edge, offers quality products at competitive prices in well laid-out stores with friendly staff and with a distinctively excellent customer focus. Isn’t it? Well in South Africa it is and it is the polar opposite of the failed chain of stores with the same name in Britain. Of course brand names are important – but even the most valued names will lose their edge and even fail if insufficient thought goes into their management and insufficient investment into maintaining their edge. Woolworths in Britain became synonymous with shoddiness and confusion and it failed. Woolworths in South Africa offered more and delivered – and prospered.

Of all the many destructions of brand value that we have seen over the years few have been more shocking than that of Rover Cars. Those of us of a “certain age” remember when a Rover was the ultimate aspirational car for the successful professional man. In the mid 1960s there was no doubt at all that in Britain Rover was perceived of at least the equal of BMW, Mercedes or Audi - and probably ahead of them. This was for two main reasons. First the brand had a comfortable resonance and history as British and as standing for quality. Secondly the company actually began to deliver a range of cars which performed reassuringly well. And brand extension was also handled well – the Rover 2000, a superb family saloon, was utterly different from the countryman’s Land Rover – but each was at the top of its class and the parent brand was enhanced by having both in the family. Then disaster struck. Rover was subsumed into a huge unwieldy car-making conglomerate called British Leyland in 1967 and gradually decisions about Rover cars and the Rover brand were being taken in a totally different corporate context. And when the British Leyland colossus lost its way years later an attempt was made to try and wrench some residual brand value from the premium “Rover” name and the whole company, with its myriad of failing products, became the “Rover Group” – and that, of course, was the end for Rover as a distinctive up-market brand. Had Rover remained independent, had proper and focused investment in its products occurred and had the eye been kept on the target group who were Rover’s loyal customers surely Rover today could be up there with the great premium German car brands - one of the great missed opportunities of British industry. And all because they utterly failed to value the Rover brand, understand what it stood for and cherish it as much as their customers did.

The truly great brands withstand almost anything in the world around them and survive and even strengthen their appeal in tough times. But they can never stand still or be complacent – as the British Woolworths did. And they can never be expected to carry more on their shoulders than they are equipped to handle – the Rover story shows the perils of trying to make a premium brand into a generic. So in today’s complex and challenging business times what are the three golden rules for brand managers to follow?

1. Value your brand financially – but don’t be greedy

The oil company Shell had one of the strongest of all consumer brands around the world until comparatively recently. But underinvestment both in the brand and in the assets, especially petrol stations, caused the brand to slip and especially to concede ground to the highly professional marketing of the supermarket brands like Carrefour, Tesco and Sainsbury’s. This led to a vicious downward spiral in some markets where there was an unwillingness to invest which led to loss of share which led to lower financial returns and increased unit costs. One example of where this happened is Greece and Shell eventually decided to pull out of the retail business in that country entirely. Except that they didn’t – at least from the consumers’ perspective! The residual goodwill in the Shell brand, combined with the significant cost that would have been incurred by the assets’ purchaser Avin to re-image the 700 sites, persuaded Shell to license Avin to continue to use the Shell brand at a fee rumoured to be 7.5 million Euros per year (mirroring an earlier similar agreement struck between BP and Hellenic Petroleum).This is a deal which would have gladdened the hearts of the voracious accountants – you get the assets off the balance sheet, cut your costs completely and still have a nice little earner from your intangible asset the brand. The problem is, however, that Shell’s brand management in Greece has been contracted out to a third party which means that the petrol stations whilst they look like Shell are really Avin’s concern completely. Are they Shell or are they Avin – they can’t be both! It’s like pregnancy – you can’t be half pregnant and you can’t be half Shell.

2. Invest in the brand counter-cyclically

This hurts! When times are tough brand investment and expenditure are high up on the list of things that are vulnerable to budget cuts. It ought to be the other way round – when times are tough the confident brand will redouble its efforts to be preferred and to deliver more. The problem is that the accountants will often see brand expenditure as “discretionary” – that is if you cut the cost in the short term the business probably won’t suffer much and the bottom line will of course be improved. Over time your brand position will weaken, but with business cycles ever shorter and shorter it is tempting to just cut the costs. A Company that did not do this saw the benefits – DSG International, owner of the Dixons, Curry’s and PC World brands, reported an 8% rise in sales pre Christmas 2009 compared with the previous year – and this in the highly competitive consumer electronics market. These results are in part attributable to DSG's program of redesigning and modernising its Curry’s and PC World chains – in other words in investing in its brands at the key consumer interface.

3. Always allow your brand to be consumer driven

A design consultant I worked with closely back in the 1990s when I was responsible for the project management of the redesign of Shell’s global petrol station network used to say that we must always remember that great brands, including Shell, are owned not by the company but by the consumer. This is close to Saatchi’s idea of the “Lovemark” mentioned above. This is difficult for some executives to understand – clearly those responsible for passing the Shell brand to a third party to manage in Greece didn’t understand it – any more than the management of Rover and Woolworths in the UK did. But the idea is undisputedly true. Brands exist in the minds of consumers or not at all and the best brands are built from the inside out, based on real properties that consumers value and which can be sustained over time. But consumers change and competitors change and the world around us changes – all too rapidly sometimes. This means that our brands must respond and evolve and the only way that they can do this is if we regularly tap consumer needs, opinions and beliefs through research – and then act on what we find. Market Research is not “discretionary expenditure” either – although it is vulnerable to cuts in the short term just as brand expenditure is. The smart companies do more research when times are tough – not less. My guess is that DSG researched extensively before they came up with new design and layouts for their stores – and the results are clear to see.

Call to arms

It takes courage to be a brand advocate in your company and sometimes you will be seen as a nuisance if you are. Be a nuisance and always think what the competitors would least like you to do. The last thing that they want is a bold brand-driven strategy from a competitor when they are trying to meet cost-cutting targets. That alone is why you should do it! Good luck.


Paddy Briggs
January 2010 © Minale Tattersfield

That’s “Not Bad,” in Italian, and the only line in this 2:00 minute “commercial” from Shell and Ferrari. Formula-1 racing is the most watched sport in the world, and easily the most expensive.

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Caltex, Australia's largest convenience retailer, faces tomorrow's challenges with a smile :)

Out of gas? Need a break? Find the nearest fuel station of Dor-Alon according to your location and easily navigate yourself to it. You can also plan your travel in advance locating the Dor-Alon’s fuel stations on the way Customers may fill up at Dor Alon stations across Israel with the Speedomat, automatic refueling system. Get the stations’ full contact details and exclusive offers, designed for your needs.

source from: CENT
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Brand manager is a continually updated section that voices views and observations of brand mangers across the industry past and present. Paddy Briggs, ex Shell brand manager kicks off the section with a series of pieces getting to the heart of the issues of the day. Feel free to challenge or validate Paddy’s or any other guest brand managers views using the blog facility.
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