Please, my product is already ‘BLING’

What happens when the aspirational qualities of a product are used to enhance the status of another brand? This can be beneficial for both parties or develop into a point of contention.

For example, a desired ‘status brand’ such as Cristal Champagne that has quietly developed recognition through quality and demand, based on exclusivity may not appreciate obvious, repetitive placement (Homer, 2009). In an interview conducted by the Economist Cristal Managing Director, Frederic Rouzaud, when asked about Hip Hop’s promotion and association to their product simply replied:

“What can we do? We can’t forbid people from buying it.”

The desire aspect of a brand, such as Cristal Champagne defines its aspiriational brand quality as outlined by Doyle in Doole and Lowe’s book International Marketing Strategy (2008):

Such brands do not simply…deliver…high specification and quality, but also recognize the customer’s status, recognition and esteem that can be associated with the brand.

Demand for Cristal already outstrips supply, as the house only produces its product in years when grape quality is exceptional. In a good year the yield is 400,000 bottles, about 65,000 cases. Also unlike Krug, which aggressively marketed to the fashion industry in the 90’s and other champagne brands target Formula 1, Cristal has opted out of this race. Deciding to supply select exclusive parties during such events, adopting a peripheral marketing approach instead (Bhargava, 2008).

Being branded as the drop of choice by Hip Hop ‘players’ was not their idea of quality brand building and for this reason the comments by Cristal executives angered Hip Hop superstar Jay-Z who called for an outright ban of the product in June 2006. He felt his efforts in promoting the product in his music and videos were not appreciated and the comments offensive. So he has moved on to paid product placement by Armand de Brignac (with new product below), now his drink of choice, as investigated in the Atlantic.

In Jay-Z’s and other Hip Hop performers careers Cristal was used as the status drink to ‘swig’ and during live performances used to ‘hose down’ female talent on stage. Offensive Rouzaud’s comments may have been to the Rap community but from a brand perspective so was the degrading use of the product.

I miss my drop

Not all love is lost for Cristal in the Hip Hop community as witnessed by Puff Daddy’s Super Bowl celebrations in 2008 with his exclusive Cristal fueled event. Two years is obviously long enough for a boycott of a quality product. Jay-Z and Puff originally stood together on the boycott. Though in recent years both men have had polar marketing trajectories.
Puff has rebranded himself as an elegant ‘player’ channeling a more refined man with a hint of the truly sophisticated Sidney Poitier (Now that’s talent!). To his empire Puff has added a line of quality bespoke clothing made in Italy and England (his urban wear labels are long established). Jay-Z on the other hand has still cultivated the urban ‘player’ made good. He can afford the dapper lifestyle and has been blessed with a successful, bootylicious wife (Beyoncé) but remains hood to the heart.

The interesting question is was racism part of the disagreement? I believe the disregard for the essence of the product, in this particular case, adds great weight to the discussion. Please don’t ‘product place’ for ME, my product is already ‘BLING’.

References:

Bhargava, R. (2008, February 11). Trendspot: Peripheral marketing. Influential Marketing Blog. Retrieved October 29, 2010 from http://rohitbhargava.typepad.com/weblog/2008/02/trendspot-perip.html

Doole, I. & Lowe, R. (2008). ‪International marketing strategy: analysis, development and implementation (5th E). London: Cengage Learning EMEA.

Homer, P. M. (2009). Product placements: The impact of placement type and repetition on attitude. Journal of Advertising. V38: N3, p21-32. M.E. Sharpe Inc.

Sizzle and Smoke

Corporations and creatives are still encouraging woman through product placement to smoke by using visually oppressive tools. Tapping into insecurities of body image and the aspirational qualities of independence and glamour. From the perennially edgy publications of French and Italian Vogue come editorial upon editorial of uber-chic females musing in a ‘post-coital’ gaze whilst puffing away. This–in the same way as the alcohol industry–is influenced by a complex web of corporate ownership leading to cross-pollination of industry promotion. This form of product placement is especially heinous as tobacco consumption by females is still very high as outlined by Samet and Yoon in Women and the Tobacco Epidemic—Challenges for the 21st Century.

Stylists and photographers add textual layers of artistic merit and on-trend seduction that is difficult to combat once the, especially young, viewer is entranced. A fascinating study conducted in Switzerland examined techniques and approaches on motivating young woman to veto smoking. The study Aging Images as a Motivational Trigger for Smoking Cessation in Young Women aged the images of the young woman participating in the study, as they smoked (love it!). The abstract outlines:

We concluded that aging images are a promising intervention for reaching young women and increasing their motivation to stop smoking.

Taking this data into consideration it becomes quite obvious how the antithesis happens in fashion editorial. Note: Fashion label advertisements don’t show smoking, it is the magazine editorial that perpetuates the behaviour. If aging images repulse young females from their habit and/or addiction then nubile, thin beauties are the equivalent of a ‘moth to the flame’.

This targeted form of product placement highlighting physical appearance issues permeates the movie industry. There are multitude examples of–obvious–smoking endorsement in movies but I wanted to focus on one in particular, Avatar. Interesting how the disconnected intellectual ends up being magnetically cool. I think the Dr’s character warrants a ‘light,’ yet it seems cinema, photographer and visual arts invariably slide done the artery of tempting tobacco.

As Mr. Cameron stated in the NY Times:

Ms. Weaver’s character, Grace Augustine… doesn’t care about her human body, only her avatar body, which again is a negative comment about people in our real world living too much in their avatars, meaning online and in video games.

True, true but its still charismatic Ms Weaver–from Aliens to Avatar–Cameron obviously adores sultry Sigourney with a cigi in hand.

PS. Notice how hard it is to find a still of the smoking scenes online? Count on 20th FOX!

Disclaimer: I adore fashion and I enjoyed Avatar

Reference:
Samet JM, Yoon SY. Women and the Tobacco Epidemic—Challenges for the 21st Century. The World Health Organization; Washington, DC, USA: 2001.

I said “Slizzard my tween” Cabello!

Slizzard: drunk, tipsy, smashed (holla!)

Product placement is such an inspired or pervasive marketing tool. Regardless of ones view it has permeated society to the point of inebriation. As outlined by Hudson and Hudson (2006) product placement has evolved into a complex and sophisticated tactic of integrated marketing:
Branded products are no longer just ‘placed’; they are woven into entertainment content making a stronger emotional connection with the consumer.

With increased restrictions placed on corporations (eg: tobacco and alcohol) they need to find dynamic, inventive and clandestine ways to market their products. This has evolved into a pernicious form of product placement. Corporations influence recreational behaviour through popular music videos that laud drinking to the youth market.

From binge drinking teenagers and young adults. To tweens watching music videos initiating them, early on, into the collective cool of “gettin’ slizzard”.

Over the course of my blog I want to discuss various manifestations of product placement, and while I swig on a beer I thought this was the perfect place to start!

Poppin bottles in the ice, like a blizzard
When we drink, we do it right, gettin’ slizzard
Sippin’ sizzurp in my ride (in my ride) like Three 6
Now I’m feelin’ so fly like a G6

Check out the video almost 63 million views!
Now Far East Movement is signed to Interscope records who is owned by Universal Music, who is owned by Vivendi SA, who also happens to own Seagram Company Ltd (the largest distiller of alcohol beverages in the world) that has now become Pernod-Richard. The name change has allowed for a distancing of the Seagram/Universal brand from the music industry that it influences. If you ‘like’ you can follow the trail through the following sites:

Seagram website
Business Publications
Independent UK
As outlined in Vivendi’s 2009

Annual Report:
Music publishing rights and catalogs include music catalogs, artists’ contracts and publishing rights acquired in December 2000, as part of the acquisition of The Seagram Company Ltd.

Match this collective power to the signed stable of artists that include Lady Gaga the blanket influence is astounding. I do now wonder how much of her first single “Just dance” was artistic vision or corporate placement. Why show a label when you can influence and market a culture (Parker-Pope, Feb 2008).

I’ve had a little bit too much, much
All of the people start to rush, start to rush by
How does he twist the dance? Can’t find a drink, oh man….

Control your poison babe, roses have thorns they say
And we’re all getting hosed tonight, oh oh oh-oh

References:
Hudson, S. & Hudson D. (2006, June). Branded Entertainment: A New Advertising Technique or Product Placement in Disguise? Journal of Marketing Management, Volume 22, Numbers 5-6, pp. 489-504(16). Routledge.
Parker-Pope, T. (2008, Feb). Under the Influence of…Music? The New York Times online.
Retrieved from NY Times

Colour my drugs

In 2003, the U.S. Government will spend over $19.2 billion, about $609 per second, on the War on Drugs. State and local governments will spend at least another $20 billion. People arrested for drug law violations in 2003 are expected to exceed the 1.5 million arrests of the year 2000, with someone arrested every 20 seconds. – www.drugsense.org

When does output actually match outcome?

The presentation outlining the war on drugs is fascinating in the aspect of political agenda being disguised under the blanket of social, moral and public health responsibility (Whitford & Yates, 2009). The financial outlay appears to reflect a desire to sustain industry instead of implementing effective change. It is a tool to promote political agenda with the media aspect having the necessary concomitant effect of distributing wealth into the advertising industry and maintaining a system of bias against the poorest end user in the ‘heinous’ drug model.

In September 2003, the Senate voted to slash $50 million from the anti-drug advertising campaign, cutting the total amount by a third to $100 million, citing previous reports questioning the campaign’s effectiveness. The committee also included language in the bill that would require 80 percent of the media campaign spending be dedicated to media advertising (Belch).

As a strategy used to empower set agendas it is excellent and utilizes many mediums to promote its point. These include political rhetoric, media and blanket advertising. The campaign engages persuasion through the strong mediums of advertising to engender politics with a moral high ground amongst the voting public without having to commit to effective and controversial education and health care initiatives (Peavie, 2001). As a campaign to effectively combat drugs it fails but this is not necessarily the real goal or desired outcome. The system it supports involves myriad corporates from the advertising industry mentioned above to the law enforcement and private correctional systems that thrive in America and have expanded globally. Many American towns and cities survive off the livelihood of the prison system and so do the thousands of businesses that attend and promote their services at the annual trade-show of the American Corrections Association (www.aca.org).
A snapshot of the system is outlined by the Drug Policy Alliance (2001):

The U.S. “war on drugs” is big business — a multi-billion dollar public/private venture that radically inflates the value of illegal drugs and is used to criminalize the poorest people of color, trapping them in a vicious cycle of addiction, unemployment and incarceration:
• $27 billion for interdiction and law enforcement, $1.3 billion for Plan Colombia in 2000.
• $9.4 billion in 2000 to imprison close to 500,000 people convicted of non-violent drug offenses, 75% of whom are Black.
• $80 to $100 billion in lost earnings.
• Untold billions in homeless shelters, healthcare, chemical dependency and psychiatric treatment, etc.

Advertising and the media industry are key players in assisting this political agenda. Communicators use their talents and skills to sustain their own interests and promote bias systems that tap into the core of unresolved social unrest and prejudice. Between 2.3m and 2.4m Americans are behind bars, roughly one in every 100 adults (The Economist, July 2010) this amount includes a large proportion on non-violent drug related offences and extremes in law, such as the 3,700 people who committed neither violent nor serious crimes that are serving life sentences under California’s “three strikes and you’re out” law. As a knock-on effect to the war on drugs marketing and communication strategy, is the distribution of voting misinformation. The majority of Americans with a criminal record believe they are not eligible to vote, these disfranchisement policies and confusion and are not lucidly communicated. In many cases once a sentence is complete an individual may apply for reinstatement (ACLU, 2008). There are 47 million Americans with criminal records and an average yearly arrest rate of 11% for non-violent drug possession (DrugWarFacts.org, 2010) the war on drugs has contributed greatly to promoting political agenda over social justice policy. As communicators we must be honest about our contribution and not merely review case studies as marketing strategy success or failure scenarios.

References

Belch, M.A., & G.E. (2004). Using Advertising to Fight the War on Drugs: The Power of Social Marketing or a Waste of Money?
McVay, D.A. (Editor) & Borden, M.J. (2010). Drug War Facts (6th Ed). www.drugwarfacts.org.
Retrieved October 21, 2010 from http://www.drugwarfacts.org/cms/Crime
Peavie, B.K. (2001). United States war on drugs: Addicted to a political strategy of no end.
Defense Technical Information Centre. Retrieved from

http://www.dtic.mil/cgi-bin/GetTRDoc?Location=U2&doc=GetTRDoc.pdf&AD=ADA391171

Rough justice in America (2010, July 22). The Economist. Retrieved October 17, 2010 from

http://www.economist.com/node/16636027

The U.S. War on Drugs: Political economics of a new slavery (2001, August). Drug Policy Alliance.
Retrieved October 24, 2010 from http://www.drugpolicy.org/about/position/race_paper_econ.cfm
Voting with a criminal record – executive summary (2008, October 1). American Civil Liberties Union.
Retrieved October 23, 2010 from

http://www.aclu.org/racial-justice-voting-rights/voting-criminal-record-executive-summary

Whitford, A.B. & Yates, J. (2009, April). Presidential Rhetoric and the Public Agenda: Constructing the War on Drugs
Political Communication (Vol 27, Iss 2), 225 – 227, Routledge.

A Fading Response

Well the thought hasn’t faded but permeated. I first thought Fading as the technique applied in behavior therapy, where an initial trigger to prompt an action is slowly withdrawn while another is introduced to become the new stimulus.

Then I considered fading of colour and how colours fade over time and are bleached by the elements, white is even transformed by this, it achieves colour. It parallels the way memories fade, the vigour of youth or our identity if we don’t stimulate and feed our passions. Touch up our colour so to speak (a little more red anyone)! Or if we start as a blank canvas can the process add pigment like our friend white.

The fading process brought to mind a brilliant play ‘Long days journey into night’ by Eugene O’Neill with its nuanced fading, shifting of emotional colours and migration from morning to the solace of night and the truth that darkness can disclose.

Black I keep coming back….

Colour my artist

I thought I would share some history of an artist that I respect and I feel applies the power of colour and its transformative qualities to poignant effect and affect.

Text by Victor Cabello

Feeling the deep summer heat reflected off Miami’s art deco brilliance artist Miriam Cabello prepares to mingle with the lauded and hopeful at the American Institute of Architects annual conference. A breeze coloured by cool deco and grand streetscapes reminds her of UTS’s inspiring Gehry transformation. “I felt initially overwhelmed but seeing Miami’s architecture and being here to collect an award made me feel like both UTS and I were ready to embark on new, exciting adventures.”

In 1971, Miriam’s parents fled the impending omnipotence of Chile’s dictatorship. They arrived to Australia with fifty cents, high hair, aspirations of further education and a longing for avocados. Miriam was six. Early on she discovered her symbiotic relationship with art and forged a vision to embrace art, design and business. This lead her to undertake a post graduate degree of design at the Tower (UTS). The growth of the graphic design business, which she developed with her brother Victor Cabello, was acknowledged at the 2002 Australian Micro Business Awards (Winner: NSW Creative Arts Category). Over time she was able to spend more time with her true companion, oil painting. Since 2005 she has dedicated herself full time to her art and recognition has followed. Miriam has been a finalist in the Blake Prize and Mandorla Prize. She has been a winner of the Manhattan Arts International, exhibited in Barcelona, and was a winner at the Florence Biennale where art legend Christo presented her award.

“I feel comfort in the scents of Miami’s Latino culture.” At the awards ceremony Miriam’s nervousness drifts away. She receives international recognition for the painting installation ‘Station II: The Betrayal,’ birthed in Sydney at the Uniting Church, Waterloo. Her series the ‘Stations of the Cross’ is a contemporary melange of master techniques and innate expression that elevates figures traditionally seen in art as ‘other’ to that of Christ and his disciples. Her passion for the Civil Rights movement found a voice in the oral history of individuals such as Dave Sands an Indigenous boxing legend. Her black Jesus has the power to resonate, challenge and shift peoples ideals as confirmed by the Jury’s comments “Exhibiting these paintings in a church invites interpretations that reflect the changing times and the social context. The work is thought provoking and makes a powerful statement, recasting the Stations of the Cross as a contemporary and relevant experience.”

The boxer now informs ‘White Rope’, her new series exploring the robust male and how society has created and disarmed him. She paints her emotive portraits using glazed transparent layers and only three colours. The focus is on the individual and like Michelangelo’s David physicality does not make the task ahead less daunting. A challenge is something Miriam has always embraced and she anticipates exporting the two series to New York. White Rope (Series I) has sold out in Sydney and she is currently in negotiations to exhibit the Stations series in two culturally significant galleries in Manhattan. The exhibitions are scheduled for 2012 with shows for her White Rope series scheduled in Melbourne and Canberra followed by the exciting opportunity of participating in the Brooklyn Dumbo Arts Festival, 2011.

As a UTS Alumni she is elated at the response from gallerists in New York and is committed to sharing her adventures with her colleagues, “I shall have stories from our Broadway to Brooklyn.”

white rope II

Black a positive symbol, really!

Before I discuss black and its interpretations and connotations in contemporary popular culture and media I thought we should explore how it has been used throughout history.

Black has always figured predominantly in culture value segmentation. Black can be seen as the color of authority, seriousness and sumptuousness. It is used in academic dress, for formal occasions and by law practitioners; such as barristers and judges. In the Maasai tribes of Kenya and Tanzania, the color black is associated with rain clouds, a symbol of life and prosperity, sweeping across to North America black plays out all its valued roles in the Peace Pipe Ceremony .

Black is the color of the west

Where the sun goes down.

Black is darkness, release, spirit protection.

In the darkness, the spirit beings come to us.
The spirit beings warn us, 

Protect us, foretell for us, release for us.

They are the spirit helpers to Wakan Tanka.
Black is the cup of water;
The life-giving rains come from the west,
Where the thunder beings live.
Water is life.
Black stands for the spirit world…

The aesthetic perfection of black can be seen in the revered master craftsman of Japan and the beauty of their traditional lacquer techniques. Black is also associated with honour and achievement (black belts).

How does all this feed into our contemporary world? With new media and global marketing the collective history of all these cultures is vocal, we can also thread a connected human response. In ancient China black was the symbol of north and water, like many of the other cultures discussed in this post, the themes of water and life begin to surface. How can we as communicators engage these similarities efficaciously?

Next week I shall explore black as a representative of societies negative agenda. How colour has been used to define people and polarize us for the benefit of powerful agenda setting groups.