Jared Stern's Blog

I have been looking through other students blogs looking for a topic of interest to link my final blog post to. I have been picky, as I have become interested in writing this post every week and finally found one that I could happily write about. I was reading Wyatt Hamilton‘s blog and the effectiveness of moving billboards. He spoke about European hockey players uniform’s littered with adverts. Our professional athletes in North America rarely have any sort of advertisement on their uniforms, and I agree with Wyatt that our “style” is much better.

But this trend goes much further than hockey. Race cars tend to be the perfect place for companies to paint their logos and attract customers. Automatically, we north American’s think of Nascar. Not only do these cars have advertisements, but cars are actually painted in title sponsor livery. Like for these for examples.

You think a die hard Kurt Busch (M&M car) is going to be eating Smarties? I doubt it. Obviously, there are more sponsors but these title companies gain the memory recognition. Kurt Busch=M&M’s.

I think the major sport where athletes are used as billboards is soccer. The most watched and played sport in the world. Companies would love to get their logo on any Premiership or any team quite frankly. Brand names will be shown over and over again. Fan’s who buy apparel will have that logo on their chest, hung on the wall, in the closet etc etc. It will always be in their line of vision. Especially when it is bigger than the actual team’s logo on the jersey. Look at Man U and Chelsea, two of the biggest teams in the world. The Title sponsor is front and center on the jersey about 10 times the size of the small team’s chest on left shoulder.

I don’t remember which team is which, but I remember that Samsung and Aon are companies I should look at.

I’m supposed to write about what I’ve learned about myself this semester after being enrolled in 299. The harsh reality is that the one thing that sticks out in my mind is that what I have done so far in my life “isn’t good enough” to get the job I want. I’m not sure if this course is meant to frighten students into getting “experience.” I have lots of different and unique experiences in my life, and I have felt almost unworthy because I haven’t had enough work place experience. This course was good for giving me tools that I need to get a job, such as a good resume, cover letter, some interview experiences and tricks of the trade. And that is all good. So the greatest thing I have learned about myself is that I’m a motivated person and will do it my way. I will stand out by not what I have to say but by the way I carry myself. I’ve always gone it things with a different point of view than others I have been around and will continue to do so.

Like most people, the most influential people in my life have been my parents. They have had a great hand in shaping the person I am today. However, I’m not going to talk about them. There has been another influential individual in my life in a different way. This person has been influential in pushing me and motivating me. He’s my big cousin Jordan. I never had a brother, so he was the closest thing I had growing up. Being three years older than me, we were far enough apart in age that I could really look up to him but close enough that we could still relate. And as we have grown up we have become closer and still have a lot in common.

The way in which he has been influential to me is by pushing me to be better and motivating me to stack up to him. He is currently a professional rugby player in Edinburgh. He has also played in Australia, as well as representing Canada and the US on the international field. More amazingly is the fact that he only started playing at 16, before that he was an elite level alpine skier.

His work ethic and commitment is quite simply amazing. When he wants to accomplish something, he won’t stop until he earns it. Being around this has really been helpful for me as it has shown what it takes to make it when following your dream.

I was reading Scott Wasden‘s blog about Red Bull and how they were able to successfully add numerous brand extensions. It got me really excited, as I have wanted to talk about Red Bull for a while. In my opinion Red Bull is one of the coolest companies in the world and I hope to work for them one day. They work with so many great athletes and are marketing geniuses. Red Bull always seems to one up itself, their innovators and to me that’s very interesting. The funniest part is, I hate the Red Bull energy drink. I tried it once and couldn’t stand the taste, but that’s okay because there is so much more to the company then just the drink. My previous statement kind of sounds like an oxymoron when you think that Red Bull actually offers only a handful of consumer products. I hate the products, but love the company. Weird.

I’m kinda getting off topic, what I really want to talk about is Red Bull’s brand equity and interesting ad campaigns. Unlike Virgin, there isn’t much brand dilution within Red Bull. Most people know that they originated as an energy drink. The popularity they gained from their simple, easy to understand and catchy cartoon advertisements about “giving you wings” has allowed Red Bull to venture off and gain enormous success in other areas. They were the first energy drink to start sponsoring athletes and extreme events and now have some of the most popular athletes in the world on their team: from Travis Pastrana to Jon Olsson and even Dion Phanuef. More impressive, is the number of sports and teams that they have their brand affiliated with. Just to name a few, Red Bull Crashed Ice, 2 (yes 2) Formula 1 teams, an MLS soccer team (New York RedBulls), Nascar, DTM, World Rally, Surfing, Extreme Sailing, the list literally just goes on and on and on…

It’s just a crazy good, cool company…

Here’s their treasure chest of planes and race cars.

Obviously, I like cars. I already mentioned Ferrari in an earlier blog post, but it’s one of my favorites so I’ll talk about it again. I was reading Peter Vallas‘ blog on trendhunters.com today about Ferrari’s big announcement and unveiling at the Melbourne Grand Prix next week. For all you that don’t know, that’s an F1 race in Australia and it’s the season opening Grand Prix. On a side note, Ferrari has changed the name of their car 3 times before the season has even begun. They were sued by Ford for using the F150 name. Anyway, I was really excited to see what Ferrari had in store. I’m always anxiously waiting for the release of a new car, especially a new Ferrari. Fast, sexy, exclusive and expensive. However, as I read on I learned that Ferrari isn’t releasing a new car. Instead, they are releasing a book called the “Opus.” It weighs 37 kg and costs a ridiculous $250,000. (HA!)

This got me thinking. Ferrari obviously has a strong brand and most people around the world can identify the prancing horse, as well as what it stands for. The Ferrari name has allowed for numerous brand extensions. Now you can find the Ferrari logo on shoes, watches, video-cameras, t shirts, model cars, perfumes, briefcases and the most surprising an Acer laptop. And to me that’s just crazy, who knows what they will do next.

This may be a stretch, but at Sauder we are continuously told and taught to build our brand. As individuals we are the greatest marketer of our own brand. Every single student attempts to build a competitive advantage, a way to stand out in a crowd, and proceed to market their brand. People have been utilizing youtube in order to promote themselves and their individuality. A small Canadian celebrity from Ontario took advantage of the youtube phenomena, and I’m sure that you all have heard of Justin Beiber. Now, I don’t have “Beiber Fever,” but I do respect his route to stardom.

Another group of Canadians are also utilizing the technology at hand to market themselves and slowly are becoming youtube royalty. This group is called “EpicMealTime.” I’m not sure how many of you have heard of them or seen their videos, but they have viewers in the millions. They have grown from a joke to a full on cooking show with a large following. All of this was achieved through weekly youtube videos. Their videos are unique and entertaining, although they tend to be a little disgusting and vulgar. Even though they are still only a youtube sensation they continue to build and differentiate themselves from imitators, while continuing to market themselves across many different social networks. And that’s what marketing is about right?

Spring is just around the corner. The snow is melting (not in Vancouver, but other parts of Canada) and is going to be replaced with sunshine and warmth. However, for sports fans the most excited part of the year is here. There is plenty to keep everyone interested, March Madness for College fans, NBA playoffs, NHL playoffs and the beginning of the MLB season just to name a few. With these differentiated “products” that each of these events provides the fans how do they create a competitive advantage? Well, since I’m Canadian and a hockey player, I’m obviously going to look into NHL promotion.

Even though hockey rules in Canada, it struggles in a lot of American markets. For example, the Phoenix Coyotes are broke and have been for years. They continue to dig their grave with less than 10,000 fans coming out to see them play. Could the Coyotes make a return to the City that they were originally stolen from, Winnipeg? Let’s hope. But in order to counter act the unpopularity in American markets and compete with the other 3 big leagues (MLB, NFL & NBA), the NHL marketers must be creative to draw new viewers as well as retain loyal fans. The playoffs are the perfect time to do so. Hockey gets more intense and excited to watch. NBC and the Versus network introduced the “History Will be Made” campaign during the 2010 post season. The ads were extremely successful and they have continued through this season and new commercials will be continuously released from now all the way through the Stanley Cup playoffs. These ads draw on rememberable moments of playoffs, such as Bobby Orr’s famous superman goal to win the Stanley Cup. On a personal level, these ads bring me chills and shivers every time I see one because they bring back so many emotions and feelings. I can only hope that they do the same for the American viewers they are targeting so we can grow the great game that I love.

Just this morning in class we were talking about brand and brand equity, and I couldn’t think a brand that screams brand equity more than Tiffany and Co. It doesn’t matter what the piece of jewelry actually is, as long as it comes from a little turquoise box it’s special. As I’m writing this right now, my girlfriend has that famous turquoise bag with little black lettering sitting on her desk. Talk about a brand that fully exemplifies everything that was taught this morning. It creates a strong, if not one of the strongest, emotions and reactions.

Tiffany and Co. makes promises and follows through (to the lady’s). As I said early it DOESN’T matter what the product is, as long as it’s Tiffany’s it is all right. Finally, consumers are definitely willing to pay a premium for the brand as long as it’s Tiffany. The brand is so powerful it has a effected products that it doesn’t even have any part in. For example, the limited edition Nike SB Tiffany Dunk, which is the sneaker shown below. This is a collaboration between Nike and a company by the name of Diamond Supply Co., and has absolutely nothing to do with Tiffany. However, it features the same turquoise coloring and the same exclusivity. And for this, consumers are willing to pay upwards of $800(!!!) to get their hands on a pair of these. Talk about brand equity.

With the internet, social media, and smart phones gaining huge popularity amongst marketers, TV ads have fallen to the wayside, with the exception of the super bowl. The super bowl is still the almighty marketing giant. With record numbers of viewers surpassed basically every year. This year was no exception, with two of America’s most popular football teams the Steelers and the Packers. Over 100 million American’s tuned into watch the game as well as millions of Canadians (although we don’t get the excitement of most of the great commercials seen). Companies pay outrageous amounts of money just for the air time, not to mention production costs. How outrageous? Well, how about $100,000 per second of air time!!! And if you’re planning to pay millions of dollars for air time, you’re not going to waste it on a pathetic commercial, which is why we see such great and creative commercial’s on super bowl Sunday. It’s the big show – football players strive their whole lives for the spot and so do marketers. Even if sales don’t automatically increase, a funny, creative, and catchy commercial will definitely stick in the memory of the consumer, and as we know all companies want to be in the “evoked set” of their consumers. At the end of the day that is the most important thing.

Here are a couple of my favorite’s from last night.

According to some research I have done over the past week, it seems that companies are unwilling to bring over diesel powered cars because of the economic threats and political restraints. On the economic side, gas is much cheaper and in a higher supply on our continent. People in the UK basically pay 150% of what we pay for gas, and because of this they are forced to buy cars with better fuel economy (diesels 30-40% more efficient). Adding to this point, diesel equipped cars are generally more expensive coming from the show room, generally $1500-$2000 more, and some people are unwilling to pay this premium. On the political side of things, there are two things that restrain the development of American diesel cars and the importation of them. The first, which also ties into economic, is that diesel is taxed more in comparison to gas. Tax is high enough as it is, people don’t want to be taxed more for fuel. (that’s expensive enough too for that matter) The other government policy constraining diesel engines has to with emissions and more specifically, nitrogen oxides. Without getting into to much detail, basically diesel engines require an expensive ‘high-pressure fuel injection system,’ which adds to the already expensive MRSP.

We want to be greener, the government claims they want to be greener, so why have they rejected the idea of more efficient diesel engines? Only 3.6 of cars offered in America have a diesel engine. My honest opinion on the matter is that American car manufactureres don’t produce diesel powered cars and the government needs to step in and allow them to compete. Therefore, there is a more expensive tax on diesel making the cars more expensive. From a marketing perspective, it is pretty impossible to present a product, that is going to be more expensive with the governement taxation, to a group of close minded people. Marketers of this product have to break the reputation of soot-shooting, oil burners of the past. Even though this reputation has been broken down in other parts of the world. Just look at the Jetta TDI for reference…