Cadbury Is The First Brand To Get Banned From Advertising To Kids
Cadbury is the first symbolic advertiser to have ads banned, but the real target may be sugary processed foods that pretend to be healthy snacks.
Product Marketing
How Hot Dog Water Became The Hottest New Health Drink In America
Hot Dog Water officially launched this week and you can have some for just $38 a bottle. Before you roll your eyes in disgust, would it change your mind to learn that it helps restore the body’s homeostasis after an electrolyte imbalance? It is only if you read till the end of the small print … Read more
Customers Are Not Always Right (And Sometimes Don’t Deserve Nice Things)
Yes, Elon Musk finally released his flame throwers to the consumer market … and people promptly began using them in totally inappropriate ways. It is a predictable side effect of our culture of Everyday Stardom that consumers behave badly … just because they can. This week, there were plenty of examples that maybe we don’t … Read more
How To Reinvent A Brand: Lessons From Kodak, Blackberry and Crayola
This week Crayola branched out in a new direction by launching its own line of colorful beauty products. In the same week, Blackberry continued their own quest to maintain relevance and resurrect their fading brand by announcing the KEY2 (a new phone featuring a full keyboard) and Kodak showed off the first photos taken on … Read more
StockX Takes On Ebay (And Wins), Predictive Banking And A Surprising Gamble From Moviepass
This was a busy week with continuing stories from the Olympics, teens showing leadership, and the launch of a questionably moral new reality show from Netflix. Other stories this week take a deeper look at the potential of predictive banking, the rapid rise of StockX as a competitor to eBay and Emirates wonderful new ad that … Read more
7 Exciting Trends To Watch From CES 2018
In the first years of publishing my annual trend report, I used to wait until early in the year just so I could go to CES and incorporate some of the ideas and products from the show into my research. With the accelerated schedule of getting the report out by December, I end up forecasting … Read more
Flavor Changing Skittles And Other Fun Halloween Stories
Given next week is Halloween – I thought it fitting to share a few related stories this week. The first is about Skittles “Trick Plays” bag which features candies that do not taste like their colors, which is sure to frustrate some die-hard Skittles consumers. Last week I featured Snickers hunger bars and this week I came … Read more
Stop Selling Products & Services and Sell Projects Instead
This post from GlaxoSmithKline exec Antonio Nieto-Rodriguez really got me thinking about a new way of selling. Rather than focusing on products or experiences, this article argues that the future might belong to brands who excel at selling “projects.” He uses the case study of how Philips moved from selling medical devices to instead partnering with Westchester … Read more
Adventure Tape Tries To Create The Next Duct Tape
What would you do if you had to market a product that is competing with duct tape? Here’s a great 5 step strategy from the team at Adventure Tape … (1) Attack what people dislike about the market leader (duct tape leaves a sticky residue). (2) Get endorsed by media outlet targeting innovators (this story … Read more
Why The NFL’s Newest Stadium Will Have $2 Hot Dogs and $5 Beer
In a league often defined by greed, with unscrupulous owners who are sometimes hated by their entire fan populations (like Daniel Snyder of the Redskins), it may come as a surprise that there are some who do care about more than the bottom line. Instead of requiring vendors to buy expensive sponsorships and then subsidize them with … Read more
