Monday 15 August 2011

An Expensive Shave

NASA spent $25 billion to get to the moon.

So are a few minutes shaved from my train journey to our Manchester office worth £32bn?

That seems to be the rather high price to pay for the proposed High Speed 2 project that is now in its official consultation phase.

Rory Sutherland wrote about HS2 in his Spectator column recently. Firmly in the ‘no’ camp, he argued that time on a train is actually rather pleasant and a better use of public finances would be to focus the bit between his house and Euston.

The ‘for’ camp argue that we should see the £32bn as an investment that will deliver a fantastic return in terms of jobs, economic growth and progress.

Rory is of course correct that time on a train can be pleasant (especially in first and not on the last off-peak train before rush hour on a Friday). That time is also valuable and productive for business people who by the miracles of modern technology can make and receive calls, catch-up on emails and even think about stuff. Which causes somewhat of a hole in the economic growth argument you would think?

The story about economic connections and growth also falls down by the fact that it about a few minutes less on journeys between London and Birmingham, Manchester and Leeds.

The latest GDP figures show the Birmingham area ranked 14th in a European league table. London is in the top 2 and looking a little further south the Randstad area in the Netherlands along with the Cologne, Dusseldorf and Hamburg area in northern Germany are both in the top 5.

So wouldn’t it be better to pool our resources with our European cousins and figure out how to bring London closer to these areas?

That and get a decent taxi lane between Euston and Rory Sutherland’s house.

Sunday 26 June 2011

Everything you say or do ...

Sofa.com present themselves as the Innocent of sofa brands.

I've never met them but after 12 minutes on their website I have an insatiable desire to hang out at their HQ and consume 'lashings of ginger ale'.

So attracted by the promise of a stylish sofa bargain and a free barbecue, we headed off yesterday morning to the sofa.com warehouse sale.

Ouch!

We arrived at a rather functional warehouse near Heathrow which contained 30-40 sofas and around three times that number of confused AB1s.
The root of that confusion was the fact that 90% of those sofas on display had large 'sold' stickers on them.

The obvious next step was to question one of the sofa.com staff to check what the 'process' was.
Unfortunately they were all busy. Customer confusion can be a time consuming business you see.

The obvious next step was to eves-drop.
And from this tactic we discovered there was a bit more stock and a 'master list' of sale items in the office.

So off we went to the office. Excited again.
But unfortunately the queue to investigate the list was put at 2 hours and news quickly filtered through that all the popular styles had gone.

The barbecue (what else to do) was perfectly pleasant if a little off brand (sainsbury's basics range and coke not ginger ale).
But the toilets were taped off presumably so those pesky customers couldn't monopolise them.

So all in all a pretty average brand experience.
A painful reminder that EVERYTHING you say or do effects your brand.
And an example of when it's not a good idea to let your customers see behind the brand (image) veneer.

Advice?
Use your very good website next time.

Thursday 27 January 2011

W+K To The Power 3

It’s a long time since TBWA first presented that idea to 3. Eight years in fact.

In that time the business has been on a hell of a rollercoaster. From initial excitement about the possibilities … to realization that the technology and handset manufacturers hadn’t yet got out of bed … to the wonderful world of Korean cowboys, singing cherry charts, Agent Provocateur parties and record contract sales … to the recent malaise of an opportunity seemingly lost.

As an ex-3er I still retain a certain emotional attachment to the brand so I was pleased to see W+K pick up the business. It feels like the brand needs to be in new, hopefully strong hands.

I don’t know why the business went from Glue. I can only assume the work didn’t work. Getting a brief to tell people you are working hard to improve your network is understandable but fundamentally flawed. People don’t need to hear it, they simply need to experience it.

So I hope W+K get to take the brand back to its true opportunity, away from an existence as a channel for handsets + cheap tariffs. It can play in a youthful, positive, uber-innovative space. Doing things differently, living on the edges of the mass-marketing mobile norms, understanding what the people who care, care about and building its image around that.

That of course is much more than just a communications task.

And that is something I hope everyone involved both realises and is up for.

Otherwise another agency will simply end up being judged as having failed to deliver the dream.

Saturday 22 January 2011

Friendly Little Coppers

Now there’s an ignition point….

It didn’t quite soften the blow of my first £1.35 a litre diesel experience but I thought my local Esso’s ‘Penny Pot’ was a nice touch when I filled up last week.

A simple idea – admittedly only relevant when not paying by card – where I can leave a few coppers to brighten my fellow man’s day or equally benefit from his or her thoughtfulness before me.

We rightly search for the big ideas and platforms we believe can transform and propel brands forward but it is sometimes worth remembering – especially in a category like fuels - that the little things can also have a positive effect.