曹畑_思考的力量大于物质的力量→扭曲的商业环境中美酒

Over the last 32 years, the brand has shown it can grow successfully from a two-man operation to a large organization employing hundreds around the world. But this doesn’t mean the company can layback and ride the wave, it just means the challenges are different. Namely Rip Curl must:

1) Avoid being blown out by the competition,
2) Remain relevant to core consumers while attracting new,
3) Remain true to the original spirit and promise of the brand for both consumers and employees, and
4) Continue to have fun along the way.

Rip Curl, Billabong and Quiksilver ride the crest as the big three among surf companies worldwide. The similarities between the three make for a crowded field from which to differentiate and claim a unique identity.

Rip Curl is the oldest but the others are close behind by only a couple of years. Their stories are strikingly similar and evidently comprise a winning formula for building a brand from a small but dedicated base. Namely, a couple of guys, mad for surfing, develop clothing and products that respond to the needs of the surfer. A business is borne from necessity, and a grateful public willingly enlists. All three are originally from Australia. All three have recently embraced the female market with labels such as Rip Curl Girl, Roxy and Billabong Girl. All three have branched into other sports such as skateboarding, sailing and snowboarding. And all three are heavily involved in sponsorship for individual athletes and surfing championships.

And this is only the fierce competition. Add to these the number of local brands who command a small but strongly loyal base and the “tourist” brands like No Fear. How does Rip Curl remain in the slot?

Gary Dunne, Team and Promotions Manager at Rip Curl, says they engage in a number of strategies to grow the market base and distinguish the brand from competitors. There’s obviously the product line, which they hope is differentiated and consistently focused on quality. There are the unique aspects of the brand, which range from Australian-made to the tradition of durability and reliability, and there’s a commitment to focus on the core sports and not get distracted by growing the product line.

Robin D. Rusch was the founding editor of brandchannel. She is the CEO of BrandWizard.

It’s an enviable position for a brand to be so loved by youth. But with fame comes fakes—and The North Face has been plagued by cheap knock-offs. There is even a website, TheNorthFaceGuru.com, whose primary mission is to report on North Face counterfeits.

Counterfeiters target The North Face for a number of reasons. First, the jackets in particular are outrageously popular, pricey, and rarely discounted. The logo is not difficult to reproduce. Many of the garments are made in various locations outside of the United States, so a seller of counterfeits can simply claim the clothing is manufactured somewhat differently in different countries. Online shoppers look for bargain prices on The North Face jackets and find them. The problem is the product is not authentic. While some may see forgery as flattery, VF Corporation, owner of The North Face brand, sees it as a threat to the brand. In March 2006, the company won a judgment of over US$ 1 million in a New York court case against a family that was selling fake North Face jackets. VF, by the way, is the largest apparel maker in the world. In addition to The North Face, VF owns such brands as Wrangler, Lee, Gitano, Chic, Reef, Eagle Creek, JanSport, and Nautica.

How did The North Face climb to the top? It’s a Cinderella story: Two hiking enthusiasts opened a small mountaineering retail store in San Francisco’s North Beach. They called it “The North Face” because in the Northern Hemisphere, the north face of a mountain is generally the coldest, iciest, and most formidable to climb.

In 1968, The North Face began designing and manufacturing its own brand of high-performance mountaineering apparel and equipment. In 1975, the company introduced the geodesic dome tent, which became a standard for lightweight, high-performance tents. A sleeping bag introduced that year also became an industry standard. In the early 1980s, extreme skiwear was added to the product offering. By the end of the decade, The North Face became the only supplier in the United States to offer a comprehensive collection of high-performance outerwear, skiwear, sleeping bags, packs, and tents.

In 1996, The North Face entered the sportswear market with the launch of Tekware, a collection of high-performance sportswear. Later that year, the Company acquired A-5 Adventures and added big wall gear to its collection of outdoor equipment. The North Face launched its own line of trekking and trail running shoes in 1999.

Despite the continuous growth of the brand, The North Face had a few stumbles along the way. In the 1980s, for example, the company tried manufacturing all of its own products. In the same decade, it opened outlet stores which some feel cheapened the brand. In 1988, The North Face was acquired by a holding company that, five years later, filed for bankruptcy. By the end of the 1980s, that the company would some day become a major target for counterfeiters seemed inconceivable. What caused this reversal of fortune?

A new decade brought with it a new way of thinking at The North Face. What ultimately saved the company was its strategy to enter the leisure apparel market in the mid-1990s. While it was still positioned strongly in its high-performance niche, The North Face was embraced by consumers. Furthermore, the company’s status as a tent supplier to the US Marine Corps also helped boost sales.

Today, The North Face has certainly not abandoned its core market either. On the contrary, The North Face invests heavily in high-performance athletic events. For example, The North Face sponsors “The North Face Endurance Challenge” presented by Gore-Tex (a North Face partner/supplier).

The North Face Endurance Challenge Series includes four regional events and one Championship event. From April through December 2008, five endurance events will span the US, starting in New York, passing through Washington, Washington, DC, and Wisconsin, and culminating with the Championship in San Francisco, California. Each offers options for runners of all levels at an array of distances, including: 50 Mile, 50K, Half Marathon, and 10K. Each men’s and women’s regional 50-mile champion will take home $1,000 and a trip to the Endurance Challenge Championship in San Francisco in December, where a cash prize will go to the top male and female 50-mile finisher. The Endurance Challenge is expected to attract some of the country’s top ultra-endurance runners.

Other brand-building initiatives have included innovative in-store kiosks, on which customers can watch videos of expeditions, and advertising that has highlighted “visual journals” of athletes’ expeditions. The company also launched an online magazine called Epic that features photography and articles appealing to “people who are passionate about backcountry sports, from rock climbing, backpacking, and bouldering, to trail running, mountaineering, skiing, snowboarding, ice climbing and more.”

With a firm grasp of its many markets, a continuing cachet among youth, aggressive growth plans, and an owner focused on protecting the integrity of the brand, The North Face has nowhere to go but up. Not even the most ingenious of counterfeiters can replicate that type of success. They'll certainly try.

Barry Silverstein is a 25-year advertising and marketing veteran and co-author of The Breakaway Brand (McGraw Hill, 2005).

Taj Mahal Palace & Tower in Mumbai, built in 1903, was the chain’s first hotel, and represented the refined taste of its founder. Born in an Indian culture where the guest is treated like God, J.N. Tata traveled the world to ensure that his hotel was equipped with world class facilities. From English butlers to Turkish baths, The Taj offered its guests the best in luxury.

At the time when the Taj Hotels brand was born, the travel and tourism industry in India was at a nascent stage. As Ashwini Kakkar, Managing Director, Thomas Cook India, explains, “In the early 1980s the tourism industry in India was equated with the foreign visitor. The hotel rates were generally priced higher than the economic standards prevalent in the country and for Indians, travel was restricted to either places of pilgrimage or visiting one’s home town.”

However, the growth of the Indian corporate sector in the mid 1980s saw an increase in domestic business travel. Also, the liberalization of the Indian economy in 1991, coupled with permission of Foreign Direct Investments (FDIs) in various sectors of Indian industry, created a spurt in both inbound and outbound travel. Domestic players like Taj Hotels and Oberoi Hotels seized the opportunity and expanded rapidly to meet the demands of the growing market.

In the last decade, the recognition of India’s IT talent has seen the influx of corporate multi-nationals like Microsoft and IBM, matched by international hotels chains like Hyatt, InterContinental, and Hilton. With a multitude of brands vying for space in the burgeoning hospitality industry in India, there is now intensified competition for homegrown brands like Taj Hotels, Oberoi Hotels, and Leela Hotels and Resorts.

To compete with these global chains, Taj Hotels introduced new systems like corporate standardization, renovation of previous properties, and new age services like loyalty programs and spa services. Along with its heritage, the continued focus on customer service and innovation helped Taj Hotels maintain its position in the Indian industry. And to compete with the global brands in their own turf, Taj Hotels also set up and acquired properties outside India. The brand now boasts of a luxury hotel chain with 57 hotels in 40 locations in India and 18 locations worldwide such as Maldives, Malaysia, Sri Lanka, Seychelles, the United States, Bhutan, and the Middle East.

With properties gracing metropolitan cities, hill stations, wildlife destinations, beach resorts, and historical sites across India, each Taj hotel serves as a window to a destination, where guests can absorb the region’s history, savor traditional fare, and interact with the locals. For example, Taj Lake Palace, Udaipur, and The Rambagh Palace, Jaipur, are luxurious palace hotels which allow guests to experience the grandeur and lifestyle of the Indian “Maharajas” (kings). On the other hand, Taj Exotica, Goa, and Taj Garden Retreat, Kumarakom, are leisure properties that showcase some of India’s wonderful scenic treasures.

The presence of these “four and five star hotels” in exotic locales around the country has not only helped showcase Indian destinations to the world but also played a significant role in promoting tourism among the country’s growing middle and upper middle class.

One of the key attributes about the Taj brand is the way in which it juxtaposes the traditional and the contemporary. As Mr. Ajoy Mishra, Senior Vice President, Sales and Marketing, Indian Hotels (the company that owns the Taj properties), explains, “While we ensure that the décor and ambience of our hotels echo the region’s culture, our hotels provide guests with the comfort of modern facilities and services.”

While most luxury chains in India are on a level playing field when it comes to service and amenities, the focus on “food & beverage” often serves as a differentiator. As a spokesperson of Taj exclaims, “In India, the dining experience can make or break a hotel, especially when it comes to creating a perception about the hotel.” The Taj brand’s penchant for creating outstanding culinary experiences has increased footfall of non-resident guests, which has been a significant revenue source. For example, Taj was the first to introduce international cuisines like Sichuan, Thai, Italian, and Mexican in India. In another innovative initiative, a year ago, Taj introduced PURE at Taj Lands End, Mumbai—India’s first restaurant focused on organic ingredients.

In order to attract business clientele, Taj Hotels is providing corporate clients a mix of practical utilities with luxury. It is focused on developing cutting edge technology, and introduced an innovative service called “cyber butlers” in some of its properties, which allow guests to help get connected to the Internet in any part of the hotel. Wi-fi technology has also helped the company promote “green workstations,” particularly at a time when India is emerging as an important MICE (Meetings, Incentives, Conferences and Exhibitions) destination.

While the Taj brand in India has a high, unaided brand recall, the company regularly undertakes advertising campaigns to reinforce its brand values of warmth, luxury, and efficiency. In the 1990s, the brand launched the “She is the Taj” campaign, which emphasized that the Taj was modern and efficient, yet traditional in its respect and care for people. It was personified as the Indian woman who is traditional and graceful. Recently, the Taj has launched a campaign to promote its palace properties. The advertising is reminiscent of India’s bygone era and entices travelers to savor the lifestyle of the Maharaja.

According to a company news report, “the overall strategy is to ensure that a third of the brand’s revenues come from global acquisitions.” No wonder, that in recent years the company has witnessed a spate of acquisitions, like the Ritz-Carlton in Boston and Campton Palace in San Francisco, and plans to enter gateway cities like Paris, Frankfurt, Chicago, and London in the near future.

Internationally, Taj Hotels is generating brand awareness through niche promotions like participation in global travel exhibitions and marketing alliances (a recent one was the alliance with Okura Hotels and Resorts, a leading international hotel chain in Japan).

In India, the Taj brand has beautifully captured the essence of Indian hospitality. If the brand can evoke a similar feeling of warmth and efficiency in its properties abroad, the brand is definitely set to go places.

Preeti Khicha currently lives in Mumbai, India. She graduated from the University of Bath, UK, with a Master's in Management, specializing in Marketing. She holds an undergraduate degree in Economics and Psychology from the University of Virginia, USA.

The collection is the result of an otherwise unlikely collaboration between high fashion and the Swoosh icon. It’s the product of a multi-year conversation(s) between Junya Watanabe, the fashion designer and apprentice behind Comme des Garcons, and Richard Clarke, Nike’s Creative Director of Sport Culture, who joined forces to develop a collection of “the best of” (pre-Air Jordan) shoes.

The shoes represent the best of technology at their given times, designed for optimum sports performance. These breakthrough technologies have long been discarded, but the series’ collection of three different model types from over the years comment on how Nike impacted sports and mainstream culture in the retro-favorite 70’s and 80’s.

The concept was to create a “new” line that looked as if the designs emerged straight from the original creators’ tech specs, with a bit of wear along the way. Bill Bowerman, the head track coach at the University of Oregon, was the man responsible for the original Nike craze of waffle soles not too many years after Nike’s founder Phil Knight, a University of Oregon student, began selling running shoes out of the trunk of his car. The first waffle soles were the result of Bowerman’s quest for durable, lighter shoes for his runners including the famed Steve Prefontaine. Millions of sales later, it’s hard to believe it all began with rubber poured into Bowerman’s wife’s waffle iron as an experiment.

 Call it art in fashion as a cultural statement: The new versions of the vintage products are made to original specifications and aged to look like thirty years actually have progressed, complete with rather evident imperfections, such as faded suede and even yellowed midsoles. In addition to the Oregon Waffle, the Nike Daybreak and Cortez are also available.

The collections were first sold at Comme des Garcons stores in New York late this spring and have made their way to premium retailers such as fashion concept store Collette in Paris and other selective fashion boutiques in Manhattan, Europe, and Asia, selling for about 100 Euros per pair.

Nike isn’t the only one to get sentimental for the elite footwear wearing market. Reebok made its own trip down memory lane when it re-released the 1980’s white leather aerobics shoes that became synonymous with the brand, including a special edition done by New York artist Jean-Michel Basquiat. Levi’s also has its own 20^th century heritage reflected in its own vintage clothing line, as does Fila.

In addition to inspiring the vintage collection, Watanabe has put his mark on three new products from Nike including the Nike Woven Air Footscape, featuring a very un-Nike like design in the colors of the eight national teams that Nike sponsored in the 2006 FIFA World Cup. The shoes are available only through Comme des Garcons in London and Tokyo.

Other reproductions of Nike running shoes, such as Nike Elite, are also available from select retailers, but come sans vintage wear.

Alycia de Mesa is a brand consultant, speaker and writer with over 10 years experience from Fortune 100 to start-up companies. She is author of Before the Brand, the definitive brand identity handbook, published by McGraw-Hill (under the name Alycia Perry). Her new book Brand Avatar (Palgrave-Macmillan) is selling in Spring 2008.

If I hadn't been in a postpartum brain fog for the past three years, perhaps I would have noticed some of the designer organizational solutions offered up by simplehuman. From ergonomic frosted dishracks and press-and-tear paper towel holders to the brand's signature stainless-steel butterfly trash can—complete with a hydraulically operated quiet-close lid that opens from the center to maximize under-the-counter space—many of the brand’s products could have helped me tackle the most mundane of household chores more efficiently as I took care of my growing brood.

Simplehuman's philosophy is stated quite succinctly on its website: "We all have daily tasks we want to do faster, things that take up too much space, and projects we want to organize. Simplehuman is committed to designing products that help efficiently achieve these goals." The company's products incorporate innovative engineering elements into a slick, aesthetically pleasing package. (Even the design of simplehuman's site errs on the side of eye-catching minimalism, right down to the ee cummings-style lower-case typography. Apparently, capital letters would take up too much space—and that just wouldn't be very efficient.)

To think that these good-looking household products could actually minimize the drudgery of everyday chores—at least that’s the unspoken promise of the simplehuman brand, tantalizing prospective users with utilitarian products that can double as home-design accessories. A stunning modular dishrack, for example, allows users to add and remove accessories as needed to make space for dishware, while many of the brand's garbage cans come with motion dampers to make sure the lid closes with a whisper instead of a slam.

Simplehuman likely doesn't care about those who would balk at spending close to US$200 for an upscale repository for their refuse, since that's not who the brand's radar is honed in on. Its target female audience embraces a sleek, spartan approach to home décor and has always been secretly uncomfortable about unsightly garbage-bag "overhang.” This consumer has no problem dropping top dollar for home supplies, as evidenced by some of the arguably overpriced retail outlets where the brand’s products are sold, including Restoration Hardware, Crate & Barrel, and Williams-Sonoma. The brand’s editorial media blitz includes featured appearances in trendy high-end home magazines like Dwell and Domino, as well as gourmet cooking publications like Food & Wine and Bon Appetit; strategic product placement has infiltrated such hot TV shows as Lost, Nip/Tuck, and Desperate Housewives.

 Simplehuman doesn't quit reminding potential customers that the brand not only promotes functionality and feats of design engineering—it's also a brand that’s fully versed in 21st-century technology and social interfaces. A blog on its site features conversations with such company bigwigs as founder/CEO/design director Frank Yang, as well as a bountiful archive of handy life-simplification techniques and tips, from baking a Super Bowl Sunday cake to cleaning sneakers, applying skin bronzer, and buying a puppy. And, just to assure its place on the hip list, simplehuman even created its own iTunes playlist in 2006.

The progression of simplehuman is literally an example of one man's trash evolving into every homeowner's treasure. Yang was brainstorming one day about the next big housewares product when his hideous kitchen garbage can inspired a home solutions revolution. Since the company's beginnings in 2001, Yang has become a walking billboard of sorts for the brand, constantly on the lookout for ways to improve upon his products. He even confesses on his blog that you can often find him skulking in the aisles of retail outlets where simplehuman is carried. "During my store visits, I often find myself talking to people either about our products or other items in their shopping carts," he explains on the site. "Whether I'm acting as a salesman, listening to feedback, [or] answering concerns, I find these store visits are invaluable. There is no better way to understand what consumers care about and [to] learn what features and price points are important. Sometimes I even come up with new product ideas in the store."

Simplehuman is also an advocate for inspiring others to create, a la the American Inventor TV program. Just this year, the company launched an annual simple solutions design competition for product-design students (this year's winners dreamed up a countertop pot-and-pan holder, a dog food holder/dispenser, and a tote bag that catches mail slipped through door slots).

The company has definitely made an impression on the home solutions landscape, more or less leaving most of its direct competition in the dustbunnies. Another well-known household solutions brand, OXO, offers many similar organizational items, but its mission statement is decidedly different. OXO touts its "universal design" (the design of products usable by "as many people as possible... young and old, male and female, left- and right-handed and many with special needs"). Simplehuman's products, on the other hand, are meant to transcend pure functionality and don’t seem to be targeted to every homeowner on the planet—their main purpose is trying to conquer household clutter one well-manicured, high-per-capita-income home at a time.

Meanwhile, Umbra manufactures what it touts as “casual, contemporary, affordable design for the home,” which seems to be pushing form over function. Its droplet soap pump would look real pretty on the cover of Martha Stewart Living, but can it beat the practicality of simplehuman’s space-age-style, sensor-activated soap dispenser when the kids come traipsing into the bathroom after an afternoon of mud fights?

Simplehuman's high price point could still be perceived as somewhat of an obstacle to the average homeowner, but there are some more reasonable items in the lineup (a $10 grocery-bag holder, for example, won't break the bank and will keep the polyethylene-plastic pandemonium that usually plagues the underbelly of most kitchen sinks to a minimum). And with infiltration into Bed Bath & Beyond and Target, as well as features in Woman's Day, Good Housekeeping, and Parenting magazines, simplehuman is making inroads with middle America in addition to its core audience: the organizational elite.

Who knows? Before you know it, homeowners may be polishing their garbage cans as often as they do their silver.

Jennifer Gidman loves her new simplehuman garbage can, but she still makes her husband take out the trash.