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Today Wal-Mart announced that its U.S. division is continuing to slump. For the seventh consecutive quarter, same store sales declined. This of course is not good news. There are many factors behind the move, but I suspect one of the primary issues driving the decline is Wal-Mart’s growing focus on private label products. Wal-Mart grew with […]
I posted my thoughts on the 2011 Super Bowl ads on the Kellogg Super Bowl Advertising Review blog. You can see the post here: https://kelloggsuperbowlreview.wordpress.com/
We are just days away from the biggest advertising event of the year, the Super Bowl. The advertising circus is already well underway, as brands try to get their message out ahead of the game. Still, the big event is the game itself. Going into the game there are several advertisers to focus on. Chevrolet: […]
Every once in a while you see a piece of advertising that just works. The commercial grabs your attention and delivers a message. It all looks easy. Ford’s new truck campaign is a great example of this. The spots do everything a piece of advertising needs to do. First, the campaign has enormous breakthrough; the […]
Over the past few weeks, my wife and I have been bidding on a rather nifty house in Chicago. We finally reached an agreement with the sellers but at the last instant another buyer showed up with a significantly higher offer and got the house. This was a huge disappointment for me. When I look back on how […]
Toyota announced today that it was launching a family of cars under the Prius brand name. The company will add a new larger hybrid, the Prius v (a mini-SUV) and the very small Prius-C. Toyota will also add the Prius PHV, a plug-in variety. You can read about the full line here: https://www.toyota.com/upcoming-vehicles/prius-family/ Is this a good idea? […]
Clorox released second quarter earnings guidance today and the results were not good. Clorox also announced that it was taking a goodwill impairment charge of about $250 million due to the Burt’s Bees acquisition. The Clorox press release quoted CFO Dan Heinrich stating, “The Burt’s Bees business remains a very solid contributor to Clorox’s results, with […]
The Wall Street Journal reported this week that financial giant UBS is out with a new dress code for its Swiss employees. You can read the article here: https://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748704694004576019783931381042.html The UBS code is rather impressive; it is 44 pages long and includes lots of advice on dress and person hygiene. It document reviews how to […]
This week Seattle’s Best coffee has been in the news; the brand is rolling out a new simplified packaging system. Seattle’s Best is adopting a new level system, featuring different coffee blends at different amounts of intensity. The move is all part of an effort to reinvigorate the Seattle’s Best brand and, perhaps more importantly, […]
We’ve all learned a lot about brands and crisis management in recent months. First, even the best brands can run into major issues. Toyota, one of the world’s most admired companies, took a huge hit as stories surfaced about potential safety and quality issues earlier this year. BP and J&J have taken hits, too. Second, […]
More and more stores are opening on Thanksgiving Day. For many years almost every retailer closed on the holiday. Then a few started opening on Thanksgiving. This year the trend is clearly accelerating: Sears, Kmart, Gap, Walmart and Old Navy all will be opening at least some of their stores. Is this a good idea? Personally, I […]
This week Sears Holdings released quarterly results. The latest numbers suggest that the company hasn’t managed to slow the declines at Sears. Overall results for Sears Holdings were poor, with revenue for the quarter ending October 30 down 5% from $10.2 billion in 2009 to $9.7 billion this year. The company lost -$215 million this […]