Fun for Foodies

I love brands that create great concepts and deliver on them in their stores to the smallest detail. One of these brands is Fresh Market. They started in 1982 with a new idea about grocery shopping.  I am sure they have fine-tuned their concept over the years but the two stores that opened in my market are fantastic.  It is the only time I have ever really been happy shopping for food.  A friend in the design industry said the stores are too dramatic for her.  But, nothing can be too dramatic for me.  They provide a really pleasant (without trying too hard) experience. Adding to my admiration is the fact they carry the original Patsy’s sauce from Patsy’s in New York rumored to be Frank Sinatra’s favorite Italian restaurant.  Of course it is $8 a jar but well worth it.  My only disappointment is the web-site. It looks nothing like the store.  If anybody from Fresh Market reads this – please call me.

Resilient

So I attended a new year’s celebration service at New Thought Unity which like its name promotes new thought.  At these services they have you think of a word and then you select a word.  The two together become your mantra for the coming year.  The word I thought of was resilient.  The word I picked was power.  I have the power to be resilient.  After thinking of that word suddenly I found resilience everywhere.  And coming out of 2009 resilience was required.  Marketers had to be fleet of foot and flexible.  Campaigns had to have a certain spirit and toughness.   Hyundai claimed “We are all in this together” and Allstate asked “Was it the great recession or the recession that made us great?” Lo and behold – optimism back in style.

Diversity in Advertising and Entertainment

The advertising industry is sometimes criticized for its lack of diversity in the creative staff.  And although I do not have access to any data that supports that premise, based on my life experience in ad agencies, I believe it to be true.  But if you relied on the traditional news media outlets for your view of the world most minorities (outside of a few reporters) would be criminals or wrong-doers.  Advertisers and their creative agencies have always been very mindful of reflecting the majority of the minority populations - people who are working in jobs and raising their families just like everyone else.  In fact, I read an article that claimed the American people were more ready to embrace President Obama because television shows had already featured African Americans as the President and in other high positions. So kudos to marketers and brands and creative companies who support programs and commercials that reflect the real America.

A brand is a brand is a brand

Sometimes brand, branding and all things “brandish” can make me ill.  In all of marketing, branding, in all of its permutations, can drive a person insane.  And all the companies who claim to do brand work is crazier still.  Many of them have no business claiming to have an idea that will position a brand that will actually grow a company’s business.  I most recently worked for an architecture company that created retail stores.  Their clients didn’t really think of store design as brand work but for retailers, what is their brand if it isn’t their store – the place where people actually buy things?  I knew I had gone over the edge about branding though when I started telling my husband that I was a brand – but now that I look at this website, maybe I am.

Cinco de Mayo

So it’s Cinco de Mayo – a perfect day to celebrate and start a new blog.  This one will be about marketing, advertising, theater and because the City is the epicenter of all these businesses – New York.   Having lived in New York for over 12 years, but not consecutively, I have watched the city change for good & ill. I saw the decline of the Upper West Side from an esoteric, artistic neighborhood to the suburban shopping mall that it is today.  And whose big idea was is to destroy McHale’s, the venerable actor’s bar and film location, and replace it with that grotesque modern structure?  Brand New York makes a few missteps.   (More on brands in another posting.) On the positive side, New York is still the most lovely, energetic, optimistic center of the universe and I was always proud to say I was a New Yorker.