Things That Make Me Go Hmm

A Return to Blogging

2010-01-20T19:53:00.002-05:00

Yikes! The blog has fallen by the wayside. Transitioning into a new job, the swine flu and just plain busyness (and of course a little bit of laziness) are to blame.

My new year's resolution is to get back into blogging, at least once a week, so look for a new post coming up later this week/weekend. There is still plenty going on the marketing/social media/advertising/pr world that Makes Me Go Hmm.

Not to leave you without something that brought the 'hmm' out of me. I recently caught a commercial that piqued my interest. However slightly old, how about the Taco Bell Drive-Thru Diet commercials where the woman claims she lost weight eating at Taco Bell? What?! Do we have the next Jared on our hands? I'm not all that familiar with the Taco Bell menu due to my straight up refusal to go there, exception being the times my TBell loving sorority sisters dragged me along in college, but if I'm remembering correctly the menu didn't exactly consist of healthy, weight loss friendly food. A ploy, truth, this one woman's odd metabolism? Read more here on AdAge.

To Virginia Tech and Hokie Football

2009-09-03T21:12:00.005-04:00

Warning: This post has nothing to do with marketing, or anything remotely related to the topic. There are times for an aside and this is one of them. For a girl has to cheer on her beloved Hokies.

VT bush at the South Gate Entrance onto VT's campus

You may not believe it, but there is a place where people show up in their RVs on Wednesdays for football games that will be played on Saturday.

There is a place where students (and alumni) impatiently anticipate the publishing of the next edition of TailgateFever before the weekend’s game. They will proceed to quote and recite the best parts of the post with their fellow Hokies like it’s an inside joke between a small few, except the majority of Hokie Nation reads the blog and can quote it right back.

There is a place where students have to pull themselves away from the tailgate in order to head to class to take that unfortunately timed Thursday afternoon quiz before the much anticipated Thursday night game.

There is a place where people proudly shout “Let’s Go” with the answering response “Hokies” and jump to the rhythm of Metallica’s Enter Sandman waiting for the team to charge out of the tunnel and onto the field.

There is a place where people proudly (and shamelessly) do the Hokie Pokie between the 3rd and 4th quarters.

There is a place where every tried and true fan knows to come equipped to a game with a set of keys and that these keys should be vigorously shaken on an opposing team’s third down for a “Key Play”.

There is a place where the deafening roar of the crowd intimidates opponents and drowns out audibles.

There is a place where people are fully familiar with Beamerball and where Bud Foster is considered a god.

There is a place where alumni join the college kids downtown at TOTS to drink the highly coveted Rail and relive the glory days of college, celebrate the big win, or drown the sorrows of a loss.

There is a place where people love the colors burnt orange and Chicago maroon and never think twice about wearing them together.

There is a place where 30,000+ know how to answer the common question, “What is a Hokie?”.

This place is in Blacksburg, Virginia, affectionately name B-burg, or The ‘burg. This place is home to Virginia Tech. Saturday my beloved team and their traveling rafter of Hokie Faithful will venture down to Atlanta to play the Alabama Crimson Tide in one hell of a season opening game.

Now you VT readers, grab your tailgating beverage of choice, give yourself some goose bumps and watch every Hokies’ favorite YouTube video, or sing along to Tech Triumph.

Cheers and GO HOKIES!

Win against Clemson. Field rush circa 2006.

That's 'Tissue' to You

2009-09-02T19:26:00.005-04:00

Last week while on Twitter I stumbled upon this screenshot of a Kleenex(R) Brand Tissue ad on Ad Age. The ad reads, "Kleenex should always be followed by (R) and the word 'Tissue'. Help us keep our identity, ours." (Click the image below to see the actual ad.)

While this problem can't be new, it looks like Kleenex(R) is confronting the genericized brand name issue.

It seems the Kleenex brand is trying to remind consumers that Kleenex brand tissues are a brand in a product category, and not the product category itself. Kleenex is not synonymous with tissue.

Similar brands that have faced such problems, Xerox, whose name became synonymous with making a copy. Even though the Xerox Corporation's effort to set their name apart and reinforce the word 'photocopy', xerox still ended up in the dictionary. The term xerox, as in to photocopy, seems to be used less today, which can probably be attributed to the rise in electronic documents.

Band-Aid brand also encountered similar genericized name issues as band-aid became synonymous with adhesive bandages of all sorts sizes, types, and brands.

I find it interesting that the Kleenex brand has recently employed such tactics for setting apart their brand. I wonder what suddenly spurred them to act on the issue. (This is the only ad I've from the company with such direction, but it's always possible that I haven't been looking in the right places.)

Still Kicking

2009-08-31T20:42:00.004-04:00

Yikes! It's been over a month since the last post, but the blog is still kicking.

The dog days of summer have taken their toll on me. Finding the urge to spend every waking moment outside of my gray walled cubical in the out-of-doors soaking up the last few drops of 'the summer that never was' has left little time for blogging. Well no, there's been plenty of time for blogging, but it's not easily done without sitting behind a computer, and I've yet to venture to try a blog post on my iPhone. While the weather is nice, I'm trying to spend as little time as possible behind the computer when I'm outside of the office.

Image: The waves from Hurricane Bill in Newport, RI.

The snow could come in October, you just never know with New England, but my fingers will be crossed that it holds off a long while. However, this week as fall has suddenly shown itself. With the nighttime temps dipping into the 50s, I see a plethora of blogging in my future.

Some future, hopefully this week, topics to be covered include the Bud Light Fan Cans campaign, Kleenex(R) tissue ad campaign (think brand preservation like Xerox), and an update to 'what's reading'. It's a lofty agenda, so we'll see how much I can get to.

Social Networking: What’s Your Flavor?

2009-07-29T21:12:00.002-04:00

As social networking has become all the rage, the list of networks to join has almost become endless. While I’ve been planning this blog post for over a week now, it became a little timelier with yesterday’s Mashable post informing readers that the number of social networking users has doubled since 2007. That’s pretty incredible if you think about it. According to a recent Forrester Research report as quoted by Mashable, 55.6 million adults visit social networks at least monthly, that equates to just under 1/3 of the population. In comparison, that was 17 percent of adults in 2007 and 18 percent in 2008. However, social networking use still pales in comparison to online shopping and email use among other things. We’ll see if the redirection of Twitter, from a focus on you the user to a focus on the entire world, encourages more adults to join and further increases this ever growing adult social networking usage trend.

With so many networks to choose from, I find myself having to limit which I belong to, mainly because there are only so many hours in the day. After 8+ hours of work, a trip to the gym, and any free time I might be able to scrounge up, I don’t find myself wanting to spend endless hours on the computer checking out the happenings on all of the networks I’m a part of. Don’t get me wrong, I like every other former college student used to lose hours of my life on Facebook, but I was only going to class, studying, pursing extracurriculars, and bar hopping. All of which allotted more free time to waste in such a manner. I would like to spend more time perusing the happenings and posts, but the real world just keeps me busier.

I currently belong to three networks, Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn, and I used to be on MySpace back in college. I find my uses for each one very different. Twitter is my current favorite, mainly because it fulfills my news junkie quality. You can learn endless amounts of information on Twitter and you can share all kinds of information that you’ve learned or found interesting yourself. It’s fascinating. My use of Twitter is a mix between professional and personal. I follow all sorts of public relations, marketing, and advertising thought leaders. If these folks in my field are sharing their valuable opinions, knowledge, and experiences for free, how could I ever pass up not signing up to listen and interact? Not only am I hoping to, and already am, learning a lot from these folks, but I figure it can’t hurt future career aspirations to interact with industry professionals. Now, I feel like this means that I can’t go around tweeting worthless nonsense about my everyday happenings. This is fine with me though, I’d rather mainly share information than the ingredients of my breakfast. I also oversee and manage my employer’s Twitter account. I create tweet worthy content and interact with followers. It’s great to be able to apply all of the info I’ve learned from my favorite PR/marketing/social media thought leaders.

Next we come to Facebook. My use of Facebook has dropped dramatically from what it was back in college. While I used to seriously waste hours of time in one session, I now hop on for 10 minutes tops in most cases. Why has my usage changed? Well, partially for a lack of time like I mentioned before, but mainly because Facebook has changed so much over the past two years. Facebook is not Twitter, it never will be and it never should be. Original Facebook users like it because it’s Facebook. It’s a place where you can interact with friends, keep up with people you don’t talk to on a daily basis, and flip through a photo album to find out what’s going on in people’s lives. It’s a place where you can record your interests and your favorite things. But it’s changed so much I feel like I barely recognize it. Call me old, but I have trouble finding things on it, the status updates in the newsfeed irritate me, and I’d impossible to actually find the profile part my friends have recently updated. Other than creating content and assisting with my employer’s fan page, I don’t use my FB for professional interaction.

My LinkedIn usage is at the opposite end of the realm from that of FB. I use linked in solely for professional reasons. There I connect with other professionals, join professional groups, cover and elaborate on the tasks of my current job, list previous jobs, my skills, strengths, etc. LinkedIn for me is like one giant resume. It’s the least exciting of the networks I belong to, probably because I’ve just never really gotten into using it on a daily basis and navigating it easily. Its purpose however is fantastic and I need to learn to use it more, which I have been trying to do recently.

What social networks do you use? Myspace, Friendfeed, Friendster, if it still exists, others? And better yet, if you use multiple networks, do you use them in the same manner for the same purposes or different networks for different purposes?

Back to the days of the coffeehouse?

2009-07-21T18:30:00.005-04:00

15th Avenue Coffee and Tea, Inspired by Starbucks. That’s the name of the new local community coffeehouse concept brought to us by global giant Starbucks. This brand extension has me thoroughly intrigued.

The first store, 15th Ave… supposedly opened this week in Seattle. It will be followed by two more test stores, which will all have different names and be unbranded. This is to get at that local, one-of-a-kind coffee house feel that independent coffee shops seem to convey, and adopt a “community personality” as a company exec calls it. Not only will the new stores serve coffee, but they’ll also be adding beer, wine and live entertainment to their menu. Call me a coffeehouse novice, and maybe my polo shirt and boat shoe wearing personality deems me not crunchy enough to venture into authentic local coffeehouses, but I had no idea that they served beer and wine. The thoughts running through my head about this concept are endless, so I’ll try to only hit the highlights. (Read Huffington Post's take here.)

Starbucks Goes Back to its Roots with Café Concept -- That’s the title of the Ad Age article where I first read about these goings on. But can a business that owns 16,000 stores across the globe really turn back the clock to create the “local coffeehouse” or is the brand already too far beyond this? And in relation, does the unbranding and varying names of the coffeehouses fracture the brand leverage that comes with being affiliated with the Starbucks name? It is known all over the world after all. In applying a the concepts from the article Brand Leverage Power: The Critical Role of Brand Balance, by Vicki R. Lane, a brand extension article I read in my brand management course in grad school, I would consider Starbucks a “diamond” under the balanced brand category. In general, it has high consumer regard and familiarity, and thus has high leverage power. But I would assume in an extension situation they would leverage the brand name, not create a new unbranded product.

Enough people out there drink Starbucks because it’s Starbucks. If stores extend beyond Seattle are the 'Starbucks because it’s Starbucks' drinkers likely to hit up unaffiliated, unbranded stores, even if they are technically owned by Starbucks? These folks most likely aren’t the demographic being targeted by this extension, but they are avid Starbucks drinkers and fans, and probably the brand’s core consumer.

Just because you don’t call it Starbucks and offer more beverage options doesn’t mean it’s not Starbucks. This thought conjures up the “rose by any other name would smell as sweet” from Romeo and Juliet. Meaning it matters what something is, not what something is called. No they are not calling it Starbucks, but it’s still owned by Starbucks. Can they really create an environment so unique and intriguing to grab customers whether it has an unaffiliated coffeehouse name or not? With the news of this new venture all over the web it’s not like Starbucks can completely hide their brand affiliation with these new coffeehouses. Will someone seeking an authentic local coffeehouse venture into Starbucks’ take on such for Starbucks to effectively steal the consumers that frequent already established and authentic local coffeehouses? Notice this point could contradict the people drink Starbucks because it’s Starbucks point above, but will they still drink it if it doesn’t say Starbucks on the cup?

Or, will these stores become the next hit thing in coffee? If people drink Starbucks for the name, are they also likely to drink and sport 15th Avenue Coffee and Tea cups and merchandise because it’s Starbucks’ next hit thing? Thus, will these stores have enough of the Starbucks trendiness factor behind them for carry over and spur the next celeb hand accessory or runway prop?

As foreign the coffee and alcohol concept is to me, it apparently isn’t foreign to regions outside of Seattle and this company may have been beaten Starbucks to the punch. Café Caturra, whose motto is “Artisan coffee by day. Boutique wine by night. Simple, fresh food all day.” currently has three locations in and around Richmond, Virginia. Friends tell me it’s good; I will test it our for myself over the weekend and will report back with my take on a coffee/wine crossover establishment.

In my personal opinion, I’m not going to head to a Starbucks spin-off to grab a glass of wine or a beer, but I’m also the type of person to take my coffee on the run. Now, I wouldn’t mind taking a glass of wine on the run occasionally, but I’m pretty sure that’s not legal, or at least not legal in any place I’ve ever resided. I don’t sit and hangout at a Starbucks or any other coffee establishment for limited amounts of time. I might have used it as the occasional grad school/undergrad project meeting place, but I generally find the atmosphere too distracting to get anything of importance accomplished. Too much people watching to indulge in.

Those are my thoughts, questions, and opinions as they relate to Starbucks local coffeehouse venture. Maybe Starbucks will successfully blow a coffeehouse novice like me away with this concept. I am more of a daily Dunkin’ Donuts coffee girl after all.

What's Reading?

2009-07-15T19:36:00.004-04:00

In addition to all of my fabulous hobbies, like running, going to the gym, surfing the interwebs, being a news junkie, drooling over JCrew merchandise, collecting shoes, self-educating with marketing and public relations blogs, tweeting, at least once daily visits to Dunkin' Donuts, and eating more fruit than the average person should consume (this happens only during the summer months), complaining about Boston and the not so fantastic weather, daydreaming about D.C. and Virginia, AND missing my Hokies, just to name a few, I also find time to read.

So now that you know all of my hobbies, big and small, I thought it might be fun to keep a list of all of the books I'm reading and have read recently. If I can remember to, I'll even report on how they are going, my thoughts about them while reading, and my thoughts after finishing the book.

Now, here's my take on reading: it's good for you. That pretty much means I read almost anything and everything. Yes, that means I read mindless chic lit sometimes too. But if you put it in front on me chances are I'll read it, or at least give it a try. I have to disclose one thing when it comes to reading though. During a visit to the New Bedford, MA whaling museum a few summers ago my dad purchased me a copy of Moby Dick. I never had to read it in school, but apparently the rest of the world did. I gave old Moby one hell of a try, but after about 50 or so pages I gave up. I couldn't get into it and I just couldn't go on any further. Maybe one of these days I'll dig it out and try again.

Anyway... these are the following titles that I'm currently reading, and yes, I'm typically reading more than one book at a time as I try to balance pleasure reading with self-education reading.

1. Dreams from My Father, by the man himself, Barack Obama. First thing I have to say about this book is, it's not at all what I expected and I wish I'd started reading it at Christmas when I got it. Not only is Mr. Obama a fantastic writer, but I keep forgetting that this is actually a real story of someone's life and not just another fiction read. I'm only about a quarter of the way into it, but it pulls you in and I'd recommend it to anyone.

2. World Wide Rave, by David Meerman Scott. This is a book I'm reading for self-education/career field reasons. I'm trying to keep up on all of the emerging PR and marketing tactics. Like Dreams from My Father, I've been meaning to read this book for months as well. I only started the book Monday, but so far the book is fantastic with all kinds of advice, tips, and full of stories from PR/marketing folks who've successfully created WWRaves. Scott also wrote The News Rules of Marketing and PR, which in my opinion is a must read for every marketing/PR professional.

3. I just finished Quentins, by Maeve Binchy which I borrowed of our communal bookshelf down in my apartment's entry way. It was a decent book and I used to read a lot of her stuff back in high school. Always set in Ireland, I find her books give you a view of life outside of your current surroundings. The naivity of the main character annoyed me a little bit, but the book ended well and it was an enjoyable read.

4. In the spring I also finished Eats, Shoots & Leaves, by Lynne Truss. It's a funny little book about punctuation. Good to read if you want to brush up on such.

I think that covers everything I'm reading at the current moment and the titles I can remember having finished recently. Up on the docket I have Angels & Demons by Dan Brown. Seeing the movie inspired me to reread the book. It was great the first time around and I'm excited to read it again. I've also have One Fifth Avenue, by Candace Bushnell, the author of Sex & The City, so obviously this one's going to be good! My next self-educating book is going to be Puting the Public Back in Public Relations by Brian Solis and Deirdre Breakenridge. It's about social media reinventing and changing PR. And last but I'm sure not least, I want to reread the 6th and 7th Harry Potter books. If my 59 year old dad read them, I figure it's ok for me to do so too!

Phew, so that's what I've got for now. If you can't find me at work or pursuing one of my hobbies, then you'll find me with my nose in a book.

Sunshine + Giant Daisies = Free Wifi from Prius

2009-07-14T18:31:00.005-04:00

This post is a little behind the times since I first saw this Third-Generation Prius outdoor promotion last Monday, but nonetheless it's fun and noteworthy.

Outside of the Prudential Tower on Boylston Street in Boston, and a few other areas around the city, you can find a number of oversized solar flower structures that resemble giant daisies. Obviously not your typical field of daisies, especially since they're made of plastic, metal, solar panels, and whatever else, these daisies provide solar powered free Wi-Fi and charging and are part of Toyota's national marketing effort for the Third-Generation Prius. The flowers are aimed at advertising Toyota's a/c powering solar roof panels, optional on the Prius.

This is a great experiential marketing installment to support their "Harmony Between Man, Nature and Machine" campaign. It's smart to tie a hybrid product to something useful, like hard to find outlets in the middle of a city powered by clean solar energy. The stunt also seems to clearly integrate the whole Earth loving, Earth friendly, happy, colorful vibe that the new line of Prius TV spots exude.

You can read more and see photos of the solar powered flowers on Boston.com.

Life without marketing

2009-07-07T13:41:00.004-04:00

Life without marketing, well it would be different. So, score one more for the marketing profession.

Without marketing everyday life wouldn’t be the way we, especially Americans, know it today. For example, toilet paper might never have gotten off the ground and become the ‘can’t live without’ product that it is today. I suggest reading this entertaining Mental Floss article, ‘Why toilet paper belongs to America’ via CNN to understand the role marketing played in creating our appreciation for and usage of toilet paper today.

And thanks, marketing; I’ll take TP over a corncob any day.

Calling All Coffee Runners

2009-06-22T11:52:00.003-04:00

One of my favorite brands does it again… Dunkin’ Donuts continues its marketing brilliance. Today they launched a new tool, a “social online group ordering experience tool” to be exact, to make the life of everyone’s favorite coffee runner easier. Gone are the days of stopping by each coworkers desk to scribble down their order on a napkin, where once you get to the coffee establishment you can’t figure our if it says 2 Splenda or 3, or if that raspberry iced is supposed to come back in the form of coffee or tea.

Thanks to Dunkin’ Run™, the famous coffee runner can invite coworkers through email to announce the coffee run, let them put in their orders, and if you’re a registered user it even saves your favorites. The runner then has the option of printing the list of orders or taking the list on their mobile phone to a Dunkin’ where workers assemble the beverages using the list to fulfill orders accurately. Brilliant!

So why hasn’t anyone thought of this before?! Almost every time I visit Starbucks (I do go every now and again if I’m feeling like I have a few bucks extra to spare) I always get stuck in line behind coffee runners with long and involved orders and it makes me want to turn right around and go back out the door. This new tool saves every Dunkin' goer and Dunkin' coffee runner some time and frustration. If I’m ever selected to be the coffee runner in my office, I’ll make sure to use Dunkin’ Run to simplify my efforts, but for now I’ll stick to my morning Dunkin' coffee stop down in the T.

More like a "What?!"

2009-05-19T12:18:00.002-04:00

Now way back when, I blogged about an article I’d read on Ryanair. In this post I mentioned how the CEO was probably a PR persons nightmare because he seemed like a loose cannon and making statements like they were planning on charging for customers to use the restroom in flight. Well another interesting piece on Ryanair has popped up, and low and behold it also has to do with fees.

According to this story, which can be found on BlackBook magazine, Ryanair is going to be charging a potential grand total of $67.50… just to check in! Forget that $15 fee to check a bag on US Airways that caught me off guard! Apparently, Ryanair will be establishing a $7.50 online check-in fee, and online check-in will be the only way to check in for your flight. It gets better, for those who don’t print out the boarding pass at home, because obviously everyone always has access to not only a computer, but also a printer, there will be a $60 fee for reissuing a boarding pass. I read the article and wondered if it was real, but apparently it’s true and you can read about it on WIRED too.

Let’s hope the US air carries don’t get any online check-in/boarding pass fee charging ideas, however it looks like United and US Airways are increasing check bag fees just in time for the summer travel season (via Chicago Tribune).

Thanks, I think I’ll stick to JetBlue when I have a choice.

Burrito Engagement

2009-05-18T12:40:00.002-04:00

What better way to get back into the blogging groove than to blog about burritos? And there’s nothing like a good little bit of audience engagement to go along with it. While it might not always reach and encourage everyone, it’s those most loyal consumers who are so important anyways and this is whom Chipotle is reaching out to in their latest campaign. Read the article here on AdWeek. If you’re a loyal burrito eater, then why not stop by mychipotle.com and upload audio and video recordings of your favorite burrito.

Fun campaign if you ask me. Who doesn’t love a good Chipotle burrito or burrito bowl?. The campaign is aimed at spreading the word, via the loyal eaters of course, and combating the confusion and intimidation that might occur among any first time Chipotle goers. In addition the campaign if aimed at getting people out of a ‘I only eat one kind of a burrito’ rut, and showcasing the many different, and mighty delicious, ingredients and variety of burrito creations that can be created.

I’d do it myself if there were more Chipotle’s in Massachusetts, and one that wasn’t a 20 minute walk away! Instead I’ll do my part with a little WOM to all of my co-workers and friends reminding them that the plethora of Chipotle restaurants in the mid-Atlantic is just another one of the many reasons why the mid-Atlantic beats New England.

Still Alive!

2009-05-06T09:47:00.002-04:00

I'm finding myself slightly uninspired and busy. When the weather finally starts to get nice after months of winter, less time is spent behind the computer! But have to fear, the blog is still alive, as am I! Look for a new post soon.

Today we're all Hokies...

2009-04-14T23:40:00.003-04:00

... But I'm a Hokie every single day. Remembering 4/16/07.

As we approach the second anniversary of the Virginia Tech shootings I find myself sitting here thinking, “I can’t believe it’s been two years.” I suspect for the infinite future the middle of April will bring about sadness for me. It’s not typically a topic I talk about unless asked, but my mind is reeling with the topic and I think it’s time to express my thoughts through writing as it's the best way I tend to express my feelings.

It’s funny how certain times from two years ago can seem like yesterday, like the VT anniversary, and so many of my other senior year of college experiences seem like they happened a decade ago. I can vividly remember sitting at my desk in the bedroom of my on campus sorority house checking the weather and later my email that strange April morning. Not only was the forecast calling for snow, but in my email I had a message from the school saying there had been a shooting in one of the dorms on campus, police were investigating and we should stay clear. I was a little uneasy as we’d also had a prisoner escape from treatment at the local hospital with a gun a few months earlier, but violence just doesn’t happen on the Virginia Tech campus. As I sat biding time until I had to get ready for a group meeting for my capstone communications class that I was supposed to head to that morning, I informed my roommate of the occurrence in the dorm on campus. Word spread like wildfire as it always does amongst a bunch of college kids, especially a bunch of girls living in a sorority house. As the next email rolled telling us of the shooting in another part of campus and to stay inside away from windows no one really understood what was going on.

From here my experience of the rest of my senior year of college gets very surreal and clear, trustworthy memories get spotty. We sat out the day holed up in the house watching the news. For the majority of the morning we were glued to it trying to figure out the details of what had happened. At first the reaction seemed to be that this was a crazy occurrence, it wasn’t until the grave details started rolling in that the mood became somber and serious. I have vivid memories of watching and listening to the student’s cell phone video taken outside of Norris Hall. The sound of hearing the pop, pop, pop of gun shots on that tape as every news station replayed it over and over again will forever echo through my mind.

As the day wore on and details and video emerged we as a sorority took it upon ourselves to account for our members. Everyone could be accounted for but one. When we discovered one of our sisters had been in a class in Norris that morning two of my closest friends took it upon themselves to call and visit all of the hospitals in the area trying to account for her. I can’t imagine the trauma they endured, being shot down place after place and phone call after phone call being told she wasn’t in their hospital. The initiative taken by these two is something I will forever admire.

The remaining details of the afternoon remain sketchy in my mind. I remember fighting the busy signals trying to use my cell phone. I was able to hold it mostly together, except when talking to my family. I called my parents and my sisters and each time ended up in tears listening to their frantic voices wondering how okay I really claimed to be. I remember sitting around for hours, eventually turning off the TV after hearing the majority of the grave details emerging, unable to bear hearing about the “Virginia Tech Tragedy” as it was termed or those fateful shots from the cell phone video anylonger.

The afternoon/evening hours passed and we might have fought the mob of barricades, police, and streaming in news vehicles to grab some food once campus was deemed secure, but I can’t remember for sure if this food adventure happened on the actual day, or one of the following days that seemingly run together. We eventually got the grave news that our sister had been lost in the shooting. While this grave news was something the majority had started to anticipate the official confirmation brought a wave of screams and hysterics through the house. A grief counselor was brought in for us, while I don’t remember anything that was said to us, I remember feeling like sticking together was the only way we were going to get through it.

The following days and weeks leading up to graduation are a complete and total blur. The first weekend I decided to venture to Richmond after the shooting everything seemed so surreal. Thoughts that people all over the world were watching the news coverage being broadcast straight out of Blacksburg and the VT campus seemed to overwhelm me. While I understood what was going on at VT as I was there being a part of it, I couldn’t comprehend that people all over the world were infiltrating themselves into this personal and tragic aspect of our closely knit university community via the news. I fully and vividly remember each and every weekend that I spent in Richmond visiting the new boyfriend I had at the time, but I don’t remember any detail from the days between spent at VT. The end of my college career should probably be some of the most enjoyable time I spent among my best friends and at VT, but my brain has blocked out most of it. I can’t remember who spoke at our university graduation ceremony, but I remember giving a standing ovation to the Comm. student, a survivor, who walked across the stage on crutches during our individual college graduations.

We all managed to get through the end of our senior year in different ways. While some of my friends turned to partying and drinking, and others had recurring nightmares, I chose to remove myself from the situation as much as I could and focus on the more promising aspects of my life at the time, namely the new boyfriend.

My best friends, the sorority sisters from above, and I have recently been discussing the details and feelings we’ve had around 4/16/07. Some prefer not to talk about it at all; others prefer only to talk about it with other Hokies that were there at the time. I myself have grown to not mind bumbling my way through trying to talk about it. If you choose to ask me, you’ll pretty much only hear me trying to articulate how surreal the entire situation was, but unless you were there, you’re never going to understand the thoughts that go along with my words. We’ve discussed the most awkward responses we’ve gotten to saying we graduated from Virginia Tech. Even if those you’re talking to say nothing, you can see the thoughts going through their mind wondering if you were there. Well we were there. And if your next question is whether we knew anyone who died, the answer is yes. And now the conversation has gotten 10 times more awkward than it already was to start with, but personally I’d rather have you flat out ask than have an awkward silence follow my announcement that I went to VT.

As a proud Hokie, and friend of many other proud Hokies, we don’t want Virginia Tech to only be associated with the events of 4/16/07. Virginia Tech is one of the most wonderful places one will ever experience. It is a word-class institution with incredible spirit and a fantastic football team! Any Hokie can say their VT experience was undoubtedly the best four years of their life. If I could live it all over again, especially with a different out come to the end of my senior year, you can bet I would snap up that opportunity in a heartbeat.

The events of April 16th have forever changed me as a person. For one, I will always find myself with the memories that remain from that day and the best friends that will forever be best friends with common bond we share. I know that these people will always be able to relate to my thoughts, memories, sorrows that will appear mid-April of every year. Secondly, I find myself worrying about the wellbeing of others more than I ever normally would have. If I haven’t heard from a close friend or someone I care about in a reasonable amount of time panic starts to set in. I now have the capability of tying myself in knots with stories of what could have happened to someone have I not heard from them when I think I should have, or when I’m trying to reach them. While this later change is fairly mild in perspective, it’s still trying for a typically pretty carefree person to get used to. It’s been hard to deal with and a breaking factor in relationships with those who weren’t there that day. As much as you can explain your experience, there are no words to describe the feelings Hokies went through that day at Virginia Tech.

It has taken me two years to write down my thoughts, feelings, and what’s left of the memories I haven’t blocked out from April 16, 2007. It took me a year and a half to actually discuss the event with a fellow Hokie and best friend. I can honestly say it’s the only topic in which I will ever feel comfortable crying about late-night in the middle of a hotel bar not caring what anyone around me thinks.

"We will prevail, we will prevail, we will prevail.
We are Virginia Tech."
-Nikki Giovanni

Live for 32.

Validation

2009-04-08T09:05:00.002-04:00

My instincts on the brilliance of JetBlue's latest marketing efforts were correct! Grad school has paid off!

You see, I wasn't the only one who found my favorite brand JetBlue's marketing to be fantastic. A recent AdAge article listed them as one of the five brands doing it right for marketing in a recession. "The CEO's Guide to Jetting" gets me every time.

Trim What?!

2009-04-07T20:14:00.004-04:00

I saw a commercial last week for the new Schick trimmer for women. I can't say I realized that it was for a trimmer until the end of the commercial when the product was shown. For the majority of the commercial I found myself perplexed and unable to figure out what product was being advertised. What do the trimming of topiaries and women have in common?

If you've see the spot you've figured it out by now, however, I can't say that I was expecting this interesting commercial to end up advertising Schick's new razor and trimmer the Schick Quattro TrimStyle for Women. That's right, a bikini trimmer... not something I was expecting the spot to be advertising. After seeing the commerical it all makes sense with the creative tying to the product, so maybe it is more so that I didn't expect to see a commercial for a bikini trimmer on TV.

I wouldn't go so far as to say I was taken completly aback by the commerical or found it offensive. Afterall, tampons, birth control pills, and various little pills for men get advertised all over TV. Not to mention I closely examined the advertising and branding of Trojan for a grad school class. None the less, I did find the spot surprising.

I found the creative for the spot to be tasteful, but a little cheeky. I think it has the potential to be offensive to some, but I found myself giving a good chuckle once the creative was connected to the actual product. I suppose it is probably a fine line that is walked when you're trimming bushes and advertising a personal grooming product.

Brands and April Fool's

2009-04-01T14:35:00.003-04:00

In a time like it is, speaking economically, I appreciate a brand’s effort to a smile on the face of its consumers, or those people like me who might not be a direct consumer, but appreciate all things branding, marketing, and PR related. I’m talking about April Fool’s jokes.

I pulled up Gmail to log on this morning, as I do first thing every morning, to see the Gmail Autopilot blurb. I quickly skimmed it, as I do with most things that I see around the 8:30 a.m. hour when I’m trying to read my morning news before opening up my work email in an effort to put off the barrage of emails that will be waiting for me to respond to. Point being, my first thought with the Gmail Autopilot was, “well that’s kind of cool I guess, but I don’t think I’d ever use that.” My second thought being, “Man, how lazy are we really getting if we have an auto-response for every email that graces our inbox?”

Now don’t get me wrong. I could definitely use an auto-response for those emails I try to ignore until I can’t ignore responding to them any longer. Not that I make a habit of this! I’m typically a speedy responder. But how about all of the spam that I’ve been getting recently. I don’t know what list my name got on, but I’m not really in the need for any of the products these spam emails are trying to sell me. Back to my thoughts about this “new” Gmail product. Call me gullible; which I probably can be, but I didn’t actually get that it was an April Fool’s joke at first. I guess this can also be blamed on the fact that I’ve never pulled my own April Fool’s prank, and by the fact that I completely forgot today was April Fool’s Day!

It all changed when I hopped on good old Twitter and saw folks tweeting about Google’s April Fool’s joke. With all of the interesting Google Labs items that are always being developed I cut myself a little slack on not picking up on this joke. Hey, this could be a cool, if incredibly antisocial, but sometimes helpful (reference spam), tool to have at times.

Adfreak highlighted some of the other brands with April Fool’s jokes out there today on their blog: read the post here. Thanks to these brands and others who’ve put smiles upon our faces with a little April Fool’s Day fun. We needed it!

Stay Tuned...

2009-04-01T09:05:00.004-04:00

To my loyal readers, yes, all 3 of you:

Have no fear, the blog hasn't died, I've just been busy. Various things have continued to spark 'Hmms' for me, however I haven't gotten a few empty minutes to blog about them. Look for an updated post before the week's end!

Donut Design

2009-03-23T15:50:00.002-04:00

In addition to the brand favoritism I have for JetBlue and their ingenious marketing/branding efforts, I’m also quite a fan of Dunkin Donuts. Now blame it on memories from my youth when my dad and I would take early Saturday morning trips to Dunkins to get donuts for the family for breakfast, or blame it on the delicious quality of the first iced coffee I ever consumed, but it’s safe to say I’m hooked on Dunkins.

My loyalty used to lie solely with the iced variety of coffee, namely blueberry (don’t knock it ‘til you try it), but spending recent years in MA and now living here, the weather doesn’t always cooperate for the drinking of an iced beverage. Hence, my taste buds, my need for caffeine no matter the temperature, and my frozen fingers have grown to appreciate the deliciousness and all-important warming factor of a hot Dunkins coffee as well.

I go to the same Dunkins every morning in the T, and I go to the same line with the same woman working. You know you do this too often when the only question she asks is whether you want a medium or a large today. And no, I don’t order just a black coffee; I take mine with hazelnut flavoring, skim milk, and two Splenda. Props to this very nice woman for remembering my order day after day, and it seems to be one of many orders she remembers from us regulars.

Now don’t get me wrong, it’s not like I haven’t consumed Starbucks, and it’s not like I don’t occasionally crave something like a green tea latte or skinny caramel latte. But as insane as it sounds purchase a cup of Dunkins on my way to work every morning and if I did this at Starbucks I think it’s safe to say I’d be close to broke. If you’re wondering whether I’ve calculated how much money I spend per week or month purchasing coffee, the answer is no. I’m pretty much avoiding doing that, but I’m sure there would be at least a little extra in my bank account if I made coffee at home in the morning.

Now down to the actual point of this post. In addition to Dunkin Donuts’ great “You Kin’ Do It” ad campaign, they have a creative consumer involvement contest running. Through April 7th you can visit dunkindonuts.com/donut and design an original donut. The grand prize is $12,000. Not a bad prize, the contest sounds fun, and who wouldn’t want to design their own donut and maybe see it in a store near them! Maybe I’ll have to give donut design a whirl. Check out the story here on BrandWeek to learn more.

Score one more for JetBlue's Marketing Team

2009-03-19T19:48:00.003-04:00

Back in February I wrote a blog post touting my brand loyalty to JetBlue and their brilliance in marketing. With their Welcome Bigwigs campaign they really took into account the current economic climate and all of those frowned upon CEOs and their private jets.

Well, they've done it again. JetBlue, with some help from JWT, has extended the campaign further online with the creation of The CEOs Guide to Jetting. This guide to jetting consists of three videos explaining the simplistic details of air travel that us "regular folk" encounter every time we fly.

The videos are brilliant and one of the most amusing things I've seen lately. Give them a watch and decide for yourself.

Side note: I'm flying US Airways down to D.C. in April and I'm dreading it already. How will I distract myself from thoughts of the plane falling out of the sky without Direct TV and Terra Blues potato chips?

Engaging Out of Home

2009-03-11T12:01:00.002-04:00

Now this is something I just find great and not to mention totally fun. Carnival Cruise Lines and their ad agency Arnold, read here via BrandFreak, have come up with an engaging out of home display that takes advantage of empty storefronts. Not only does this concept add the interactive aspect to OOH advertising, it also makes those previously boarded up storefronts look a little more attractive. And who can complain about that?!

Now some might say it adds to the advertising clutter we already see on the street, and in all other forms and places as we go about our daily lives, and while yes, I guess this is true, I also say this is one of the best forms of ‘clutter’ I’ve seen lately. However, working in the marketing/advertising field I do tend to appreciate the ad clutter, not actually thinking of it as clutter, so maybe my opinion is a little biased here.

Also, being familiar with virtual aquariums, as I happen to have tried my luck creating and watching my own virtual fish swim around on the screen, only to see it be munched on by a larger fish, I can attest to the fun aspect these allow.

If you find yourself in Baltimore, Houston, L.A., N.Y., or D.C., keep an eye out for Carnival’s virtual aquarium. See if it catches your eye. While it may not prompt you to head straight back to the office and book yourself a cruise, it might encourage you to pull out your cell and create your own fish. Sounds like a good way to procrastinate on the way back to the office from lunch.

Staycations

2009-03-09T12:37:00.002-04:00

In times of economic uncertainty the majority can't really afford to take vacations. This in turn is leading to a number of marketers/advertisers/PR pros, etc., pushing the fantastic idea of the 'Staycation'. A term I was first introduced to in the the late summer, you know, back in the days before things started really getting bad, staycation was kind of being used as a way to see, do, and explore all of the things in your city, or nearby city, without having to go a great distance, spend the money on airfare, etc. And from my experience it's still being used this way, but it's been expanded upon.

Maybe the staycation concept was around before this past summer when I first learned about it, but if not, why wasn't it. In reality it's a brilliant idea. I feel like the majority of people that live in or close to a city probably don't regularly explore all of the sights, venues, entertainment that they city has to offer. Now I have to ask myself, if I were in the shoes of a city tourism bureau, why wouldn't I be using this concept and messaging to target my local inhabitants all of the time? And perhaps they have been using this and I'm just unaware, and I also know that city tourism bureaus are probably more focused on just that, tourists, but it would seem like a great idea to target all of the locals just hanging out in the palm of their hand so to speak.

As an example, take my favorite place in the whole wide world, not counting Blacksburg, Va/Virginia Tech, it is Washington, D.C. Now having grown up not too far outside of D.C. we made the trips into the city to visit the museums, see shows at the Kennedy Center and the National Theatre quite often, but my parents believed in culturing us. I can't say I had too many friends at the time who's parents regularly took them into the nation's capital to let them experience all it has to offer. D.C. has so much to offer, and what's even better is so much of it is free.

Having many friends that have grown up and/or live in Northern Virginia, I can say that a lot of them don't Metro in to check out the newest exhibits/renovations at the various Smithsonian museums on a regular basis. And we're talking FREE museums here. Of course the thought running through my mind is man, why wouldn't you take advantage of the close proximity, I'd be there like every weekend, but maybe that's just because I miss D.C. that much. Maybe the real problem for these locals is that it's just not top of mind having grown up with it all right there.

So, then my question is: Are these institutions/tourism bureaus putting into effect the staycation message, is it new, or have they been using it in good times too, and should they? Especially with the current economic climate, the doom and gloom recession, and the growing unemployment rate news that seems to be showing up on a daily basis, I'd think a little staycation, 'all of this stuff can be done in your city and you're on it's front porch' messaging would be pretty timely.

My post on staycations here was spurred by by an article I read last week on the BrandWeek website. It seems Sabra Hummus is breaking a new campaign inviting consumers to "enjoy the taste of the Mediterranean without leaving home". I would say that Sabra is tapping into the staycation concept, which is something that I'm seeing for the first time with a product, but that doesn't mean others haven't done it before. Will their first national campaign sell more hummus, and can this be attributed to the use of the staycation concept, well your guess is as good as mine, but I'm all for timely messaging.

Sabra hummus is pretty good too, I recommend giving it a try if you're a hummus eater!

Branding the Stimulus Package

2009-03-04T12:12:00.002-05:00

The powers of branding have reached new heights. Yesterday, President Obama unveiled a new logo that will be featured on all projects that are funded by the stimulus package. In my opinion this was a brilliant move. American people want to know and see where the stimulus money is going. What better way to do this than through a unique, easily identifiable emblem that will adorn these endeavors.

The logo, which is actually quite visibly appealing, has been designed as a circle featuring three different quadrants that showcase areas where the money will be spent. According to this article via Denver Business Journal, the gears represent infrastructure and the plant in the green sector represents green technology. There are American flag looking stars over a blue background and the emblem features recovery.gov, which is the url for the website that has been set up to track the progress of the various stimulus projects. I think the inclusion of the url is a great way to remind everyone that they can learn more via the website.

The administration has so far been praised for their web saavy initiatives that allow the American people to be more involved, the White House website, etc, while this is a little different, I think it falls under a similar category of saaviness. I'd say it's pretty ground breaking to be, in a way, branding part of the presidency. That is a marketing job I wouldn't pass up.

Brand Extensions

2009-03-03T12:03:00.002-05:00

This past weekend before the latest snowstorm hit on Sunday, I braved the cold weather and ventured somewhere new for dinner, LTK, also known as Legal Test Kitchen, in the up and coming Seaport District. LTK is an extension of the Legal Sea Foods restaurant chain, one of the better chains in my opinion since they actually serve decent food. You can get delectably fresh fish and probably one of the best crab cakes I’ve ever consumed. I know my crab cakes; I grew up in Maryland, home of the MD crab cake, so trust me on this one.

Now LTK is a bit of a different story. With a name like Legal Test Kitchen I expected exactly what a name like that would convey, a Legal restaurant with the same atmosphere, but some sort of rotating menu where they might pilot new dishes that would perhaps rotate in on the specials menu if they fared well in the test kitchen. Obviously I didn’t do my research, or any research before going to LTK, because my assumptions of what the restaurant would be like were completely incorrect.

LTK is a flat out brand extension of Legal Sea Foods if you ask me. If you didn’t have the Legal part in the LTK, the Legal logo appearing every so often, and a few of the same/similar menu items and concepts, then you’d never guess that the two restaurants were related. At least I wouldn’t have.

It seems that LTK aims to target a different, younger and more hip, demographic. First, off the décor was completely different. While the Legal restaurants tend to be bathed in blues and rich wood colors, LTK had bright reds, oranges, sliver, and black. Hipper colors if you ask me. Next, we have the menu. While it does rotate every few weeks, I don’t think any of the items are actually “tested” for market in Legal Sea Foods restaurants.

The menu also seemed to consist of foods that a younger audience, 20s and early 30s might consume, and there were a few slightly lower priced items. These foods ranged from a tuna burger, to fried pickles, to a steamed edamame app, to a lack of swordfish, and the only vegetable side being sautéed spinach. This last factor here, and the lack of swordfish on the menu, deterred me from ordering the wood grilled fish with two sides, a typical favorite of mine. Two fried sides weren’t what I was going for, and how many people really eat sautéed spinach?

So, the atmosphere is ‘hip’ and the food is ‘hip’, however the service and the dish I ended up ordering left something to be desired. I ended up ordering hoisin glazed Atlantic salmon with vegetable lo mein. Sounds delicious, but that wasn’t the case. The fish was okay, but the glaze was a little salty, and the noodles were a gloppy disaster. I don’t recall there being so many vegetables amongst the lo mein noodles that were cut up into bite sized pieces.

Now the restaurant was a zoo, and the servers and food runners had to walk through the bar/entry area to wait on the tables, not smart from a restaurant design standpoint. This might account for the lack of terrific service, but our fried banana spilt dessert took 20 minutes to get to our table. It had obviously been sitting in the back waiting to be brought to us, as a straw would have worked better than the spoons we were provided with. Dessert, even with all of it’s ice cream soup factor, and the blueberry Stoli and soda I started the meal out with were the highlights of the experience.

While my experience at LTK wasn’t the best, I can’t say that this is a bad brand extension. Its actual relation to Legal Sea Foods seems minimal. I can’t see a bad experience harming the brand name, but there is enough of a brand relationship to draw the usual Legal goers for a one time go around. The concept of a rotating menu with some staples seems a like an ingenious way to bring customers back time and time again. Overall, I think Legal Sea Foods/ LTK is successfully targeting a different demo. They’ve been around since 2005, so something they are doing must be working. As for me, the food and service would have to improve before I’d venture back to LTK, but I’ll eat a crab cake at the real Legal any day.

CEO vs Spokesperson

2009-02-27T15:46:00.002-05:00

Sometimes when it’s a slow news day you end up actually reading the articles hidden all the way down at the bottom of MSNBC. There you will find the travel section. Don’t get me wrong, I like travel, in fact a tropical vacation is something I wouldn’t mind going on right about now. These articles don’t lack the quality of any of the other higher page articles; I just rarely get all the way down to reading the travel section. This article about Ryanair just amuses me.

I think it is also case and point why PR/ spokespeople, and talking points are important. Nothing like having the CEO say you’re airline might start charging passengers to use the bathroom, and then having to go back and have the spokesperson say the CEO often makes things up at will. That’s probably not great company practice, and I wouldn’t relish having the job of that PR/spokesperson and having to say, “Oh no, that’s not really happening, our CEO just makes things up at the spur of the moment and reports it to the media.” However, the spokesperson did continue to provide the info that the airline has actually discussed such new revenue making maneuvers, but there were no immediate plans to introduce them.

First, luggage charges, having to pay for a pillow, a blanket, a snack, if they even exist anymore, and now you might even have to pay to use the bathroom. Let’s hope it doesn’t come to this, but we might all want to start giving some attention to that overly chatty seat neighbor that we’ve all experienced. You never know when you might need to borrow some change in order to do your business, or it could be a long flight with your legs crossed.

Mass Transit

2009-02-26T12:10:00.004-05:00

Check out the link for this Ad Freak post to see a couple of great ads in support of mass transit via Belgian agency Duval Guillaume. The penguins version is my favorite of the two. I'm all for mass transit, especially here in Bean Town where the general population lacks any sort of driving skill. While I don't encounter many killer whales on my trip to and from work, there are those occasional riding-the-T-during-rush-hour-novices who always need a little push to tap into the crowd mentality of squeezing just one more rider on to complete the tin can full of sardines effect... The T makes me miss the Metro a little more every day.

Bit by the Repackaging Bug

2009-02-25T12:16:00.003-05:00

PepsiCo has caught it. Caught what? The repackaging/branding bug. First the Pepsi logo got it's own overhaul. Have you seen any of the leaked documentation with the rationalizations for the new logo design? Check it out here with Ad Freak. It's a little out there.

Then there was the redesign of the Tropicana packaging. This turned out to be not so successful with the loyal consumers. (See last post.)

And now Frito-Lay, a division of PepsiCo, is redesigning the packaging of their baked snacks. Read more here, NY Times. Everything needs to be spruced up now and again, and it's a great idea to target women with these baked snacks, since they are the main consumers.

In illustration of this, my favorite sorority sisters in college were 100% obsessed with Baked Cheetos. We're talking hit every grocery store in town to find them when the local Kroger was out kind of obsessed. They craved them non-stop and always seemed to be talking about Baked Cheetos. Something tells me the male population doesn't discuss their obsession with Baked Cheetos while at a bar sucking down a few rails.

While I think the packaging, looks pretty attractive, I'm a little curious on the cartoon women that will be adorning the print and TV ads. Personally, female cartoon figures aren't going to entice me to buy a product and I don't know if they are going to cut through all of the clutter around me to grab my attention. Not to mention they remind me of the little Red Bull gives you wings guy.

Back to the packaging itself, it's pretty visually pleasing, at least in the little photo in the NY Times article. I like that they are using neutral colors that can be related to nature, which I think ties in 'the better for you than regular potato chips and related snacks' idea. Not to mention, the bright yellow of the old packaging was a little harsh on the eyes, but it did standout on the shelf.

I'm finding the neuromarketing concept, used by Juniper Park very fascinating. I think it's a pretty interesting idea to look into the differences between women's and men's brains to adjust marketing tactics if you're going to specifically be targeting one segment over the other. This is definitely a topic I want to learn more about.

May this redesign fair better than that of Tropicana among those ever so important loyal consumers.

The Power of OJ

2009-02-23T21:45:00.000-05:00

Now don't get me wrong, I appreciate marketing, branding, and packaging, etc, just as much as any marketer, but I just don't get all of the fuss over the Tropicana packaging redesign. Now if you live in the dark, never go grocery shopping, or just pay no attention to all of these marketing related things that infiltrate us practically every minute of every day, take a read with this Brand Week article to get the redesign scoop.

Not that I'm saying that the new packaging, via Arnell Group, is anything mind-blowingly incredible (what is these days?), but when I take a look back at the old packaging, I can't help to think that it's busy and pretty ugly. And the whole jabbing the straw in the orange, isn't that a little tired these days? Those commercials stand out in my mind as ones that seemingly frustrated me to no end as a kid. I knew that if I were to go get an orange out of the fridge, and jab a straw into it, this is all assuming there is a straw sharp enough to pierce through the skin and pith of an orange, the juice would never flow up the straw no matter how hard I tried.

A lot of articles and consumers have bashed the redesign, I however kind of like it. While a lot of consumers called the the cartons generic looking and resembling "store brands" like that's something negative, I can't honestly think of a generic orange juice, or what the carton of one looks like. I found the look of the new Tropicana packaging quite powerful all lined up on the shelf at my local Shaws. The simplicity of design set it apart from the cluttered packages of the other brands. While I can't attest to the design making it difficult to tell what type of orange juice, pulp, no pulp, heavy pulp, etc, was in the carton, this apparently garnered some of the complaining. My suggestion to all of those consumers, is to take a little more time on the oj aisle, we're all moving too fast from one place to the next anyway!

I know it's important to please the consumer, especially your most loyal consumers, since apparently they complain enough to encourage a revert to the old packaging (check out this NY Times article), but isn't it what's inside the packaging that these so called loyal consumers should be most concerned about. The actual product didn't change, it was simply a package redesign, yes it looks different, but sometimes that's a good thing! While PepsiCo decided the feedback was bad enough to revert back to the old style, hey, it got a whole lot of people talking about Tropicana, and a little buzz, even if it's not necessarily the best, is still pretty good, right? (And don't worry, that cut little orange shaped cap is all that will remain to remind loyal Tropicana drinkers of this little flub up.

Now what I'm taking away from this PepsiCo Tropicana redesign flop, is that one, personally I think PepsiCo is throwing in the towel too early, it's been maybe two months, give people some time to adjust. Two, if consumers are really going to switch oj brands just because they find the packaging not as visually pleasing, then were they really loyal to begin with? Three, where was the market research questioning oj drinkers on their attachment, likes/dislikes of the packaging? PepsiCo could have save some major money here. Now the whole deciphering the 'type' of oj in the Tropicana carton, that's a different story, I see how that could be irritating, a no pulper hates having to chew their morning cup of oj, but one that could probably be easily solved with different colored/larger fonts, etc.

The power of the consumer is pretty amazing. Who knew so many people cared so passionately about the looks of their oj carton? Just think of the uprising that would have happened had they tried to improve the actual product and failed.

Brilliant

2009-02-20T12:22:00.000-05:00

This is definitely one of those 'Why didn't I think of that?' marketing efforts. Hats off to JetBlue and their Welcome Bigwigs campaign. (My favorite airline and the only one that I will fly even if I have to pay more and provided it's going my direction of course. How's that for brand loyalty?) Back to the important stuff here, their latest marketing effort takes advantage of the current economic climate, a brave marketing move, and takes aim at all of those struggling companies and their executives flying on corporate jets.

Now it's a little cheeky, even a little risky, and I'm sure not everyone gets a huge kick out of it, but they make light of the reality of the situation by adding a little humor, and well, truthfully it's pretty brilliant. Why not market your airline as the travel solution for the corporate jet issue, point out all of your product differentiators, and have a little fun while doing it. Maybe it's the JetBlue brand loyalty that I already have, but if I were a business exec needing to travel, I'd say the smart thing to do would be to check out JetBlue and leave that corporate jet parked in the hangar.

I first read about JetBlue's new effort here on Ad Week: JetBlue Welcomes High Flyers

Here goes nothing

2009-02-20T12:08:00.000-05:00

I've decided to start a blog. Actually it's my second blog, but the other was for a grad school class, so this is my foray into blogging about things that interest me and aren't assigned topics. With a blog title like Things That Make Me Go Hmm, I'm hoping to hit on all of the advertising, public relations, and marketing things that really spark my interest, make me go hmm (either in the 'is that really a good idea sense?', or the 'why didn't I think of that?' sense), and probably a few random things in between.

Here's to blogging and here goes nothing!