Is Laughter Really the Best Medicine?
There are two new comedies coming out that plan to lift the stress of these hard economics times with laughter. But are we ready to laugh about it yet?
An untitled series starring Kelsey Grammer takes a Wall Street millionaire and turns him into “Mr. Mom” for a family that he doesn’t spend any time with.
The series “Canned” is about several friends that lose their jobs with an investment bank and must take hold of their lives. It is an interesting approach because it forces them to sit back and analyze their lives at a young age. Sometimes bad situations are the best thing that can happen to a person.
Although these shows are not being shot until April, producers are already looking for the brands thatRead more
Branding on a Budget
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With the economy slowing, many consumer brands are feeling the pressure to keep customers spending, which means better deals for us! Listed below are just a few brands that are attempting to leverage the recent economic crisis.
TARGET:
Target’s new TV ad campaign focuses on a more cost friendly approach to everyday life. The do-it-yourself spirit of the ad empowers customers to think about their everyday life differently. For example, riding a bike to work rather than worrying about expensive gas, cutting your children’s hair rather than taking them to the barbershop every 3 weeks and exercising at home rather than paying a costly gym membership. The ads encourage me to think about the necessities in my life and how I can find ways to simplify and reduce my spending.
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Wherefore art thou Bailout?
John McCain recently had an interesting proposal: instead of calling the revised $700+ billion financial package that's heading from the senate to the house a ‘bailout’, we should refer to it as a ‘rescue’. This change in verbiage might provide the shift in outlook necessary for both government and public buy-in.
In other words: whereas a bailout is simply removing water from a boat, a rescue is saving that boat from the storm.
Will a little re-branding be enough to give this mammoth bill a boost? Or was Juliet right when she said, “that which we call a rose by any other name would smell as sweet.” (Or in this case, perhaps the expression is better updated to “that which we call a bailout by any other name would be rejected”)?
Contributed by: Maghan Cook
Don't blame it, name it!
It’s a scary time for those on both Wall street and Main street. But let's try and make some of that proverbial lemonade out of a sour economy.
I don’t know about you but when I hear 'sub-prime meltdown', I think of something off the menu at Quiznos. I think we should take this opportunity to give the sub-prime mortgage crisis a name with branding potential. If Lehman Brothers employees are successfully selling their company paraphernalia online, think of the merchandizing opportunities just waiting for an economic crisis brand! Mugs, hats, paper weights for those now useless stock certificates… the possibilities are endless.
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Economic Marketing
With the “R” word looming and gas prices soaring, it’s easy to get caught up in the economic frenzy. Watch your gas usage. Don’t spend your money. Put your savings in a coffee can under your bed like our grandparents did. While I think it’s good for us as a society to conserve our resources (from both a financial and environmental perspective), it’s hard to move the economy forward without injecting some cash into the system.
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NASCAR, Marketing, & Receding Economy
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Every media channel is buzzing with talk of a possible receding economy and I started wondering how this might affect future marketing initiatives. I then came across an article titled, Racing through Recession: Brand Lessons from the Daytona 500.
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You say tomato, I say Mortgage Lifter?
Spring is upon us and I’ve spent a lot of time flipping through gardening books, perusing the local nurseries, and trying to decide what to plant. Every time I thought I had made a selection, ok so I’ll plant the tomatoes here, another question would inevitably crop up. (Who knew there were that many different tomato varieties out there?)
Looking through seed catalogs I was actually struck by some really interesting tomato names. One of the tomatoes I came across, the Mortgage Lifter, turned out to have a great back story. Apparently, sometime in the early 20th century, a West Virginia auto repairman known as Radiator Charlie created an extremely popular tomato. In just four years, Charlie paid off his $6000 mortgage by selling his tomato seedlings for $1 each. How ‘bout them love apples?
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Vamos a Wal Mart!
It’s rough out there. The GDP is growing at an anemic rate, and while experts may not be using the R-word just yet, there is no doubt that we are in an economic downturn. And with a sluggish economy comes consumers who are more and more selective about where and why they spend their money.
So one can assume that this is probably not the best time for a value superstore to rebrand one of its flagship stores . . . right?
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