Fashion Notebook

Lessons in Branding: Levi's 2.0

If you haven't already, check out this story about Levi's "Jumpin' In" online viral campaign.

Now, I'm sure a lot of your out there at the apparel companies are salivating over the whole online thing, but you're probably pretty uncertain how to go about doing it. After all, you're already beset with fickle consumers whose whims seem to change with the season and who are constantly pounding on the  castle door with cries of "More! More! More!" so why move into the web where EVERYONE is fickle and decisions are made in less than a nanosecond?

Well, consider this example.

That "Jumpin' In" campaign—which features online videos of teens, well, jumping into their jeans through a mélange of backflips, roof dives, etc., and launched May 5 to build buzz for the "Live Unbuttoned" global campaign for the brand's flagship 501 collection—snatched some 3.5 million hits in 10 days. And if that doesn't factor into your media membranes, here's some more traditional fodder: The spots got play on "Good Morning America" and coverage from the Grey Lady's new style challenger Wall Street Journal.

Here's our comic-strip style flip book of a scene from one of the viral videos, which by the way, we think are totally stunning in an "I can't believe he freakin' did that" kind of way.

"[Jumpin' In] was supposed to be a small seeding activity," Robert Cameron, vp-marketing at Levi Strauss, San Francisco, told journo Gregory Solman at our sister-pub Adweek. "We didn't know it was going to blow up. So we're meeting with BBH on how to chase this. What do we do to adjust the strategy and ride the wave?"

Listen, you've heard this from us and our friends a million times already. The online space, and viral videos in particular, don't necessarily guarantee the kind of success that you can see here with Levi's version. But they do allow you to experiment, without the expense of a real test market, with some creative that just might pique consumer interest in a similar way. And you know who can explain this better than we can? Kevin Kells, the CPG sales head over at Google. Kells might be more in the niche of beauty and, well, packaged goods marketing, but what he has to say about the online thought process for ad creatives is, in our humble estimation, universally applicable.

Here's an exerpt from our convo with him a while back:

          Brandweek: What do you tell CPG marketers who still rely on traditional print and TV buys?                  Kevin Kells: I tell them that online advertising is more efficient, but that they have to look at               sponsored links as doorways that take your consumer where they want to go, where you can add
          value to their life. The problem is that traditional media is ingrained for many of those CMOs and
          marketers. They have 30 years of data on TV and magazines. So even though it's easier to get ROI
          figures from online ads, you’re up against 30 years of market data.

 
BW: Would you revolutionize those departments to have them doing it all online?
KK: No. It’s not to say that they should stop doing that stuff, but there’s a way to go a little deeper online around consumer insights. Instead of focusing on a small amount of creative, they should be making more. They should be making 1,000 digital assets a year as opposed to three television assets.
 
BW: Does what you’re suggesting require multiple times the amount of creative?
KK: Yes. That’s an obstacle and that’s paralyzing to them. Conceptually now we’re beginning to get them to know that they need to be online with different stories and they have the infrastructure. But in order to put all of those assets in the right place, someone does have to make them. That can be solved by more efficiency. There’s a clunky system right now between the client and their multiple agencies. That’s why you see the emergence of agency networks like WPP.

OK, class dismissed for now. Next time, we'll take a look at those other web items that are probably giving you both a surge of excitement and perhaps some sweaty palms: widgets, the online applications that you've no doubt seen on your kids (or hey, maybe even your own) Facebook and MySpace profiles, or, if you're chic tech nerds like us, those wonderful things that pop up when you hit F12 on your Apple computer.

Lessons in Branding: How Steve & Barry's Does a Lot With a Little

OK, so if you haven't read our news story (you know, that OTHER
job we have), about Steve & Barry's launching a new collection of
branded "Sex and the City" t-shirts and tank tops ahead of the year's least-anticipated and most-loathed premier (to us), check it out here. If you're link-a-phobic, here's the brief:

"Further cashing in on the stars of HBO's hit show Sex and the City, Steve and Barry's has launched a collection of branded T-shirts and tank tops designed by leading actress Sarah Jessica Parker.

The collection, with all items priced under $9, hit cheap n' chic retail stores last week, ahead of the May 30 premiere of Sex and the City: The Movie at theaters nationwide. The T-shirts and tank tops come with printed phrases including "I'm with Mr. Big" and "I (Heart) Sex and the City," as well as images of the characters from the TV series."

"Millions of women have flocked to our stores since the launch of Sarah Jessica Parker's Bitten brand last year, and Sex and the City: The Movie merchandise is a perfect complement to that collection," said Howard Schacter, chief partnership officer at Steve & Barry's, New York.

OK, so why does this matter, and why, as we contend in the headline to this post, do we see it as a brilliant example of doing "a lot with a little." Well, pretty much, it's because Steve & Barry's is likely to get a groundswell from this, selling not only these t-shirts, but also more items from the "Bitten" collection that the retailer trotted out from Sarah Jessica Parker (she of the Skeletor visage, pictured left, in that show that proffers female empowerment but really ends up, sing it with us Obama, "more of the same," in our humble opinion, and that of others) last year. And better yet, they'll do it—again—with barely a cent spent on advertising.

This isn't a groundbreaking marketing idea—big film coming up, you've already got a product tie-in to one of the characters, so plug her again and ride the film's publicity and boon in related Internet searches to see the sales needle get a lift—so why aren't more people doing it?

Well, the answer to that might be that they're just too damn rich. And that's not a slight.

Think about it. When we're flush, it's all dinners at BLT Prime and brunch at Essex, but when we're broke, it's poulet roti chez nous with rosemary and other fresh herbs, that serves two and, we dare say, tastes just as good as the same dish at either of those tony joints. Leftovers are broken down into chicken salad, the bones boiled into a chicken soup. And presto! We've got lunch for days. And for about half the cost of a porterhouse at BLT. Sure, we definitely got way more out of cooking the chicken at home and getting creative with stretching the meals, but that's because we had to. And once our coffers are full again, you'd better believe we'll redefine dinner—like retailers and apparel companies define a "launch"—as a strictly Tourondel affair. N'est ce-pas?

So what if the big agencies and brands just starved their budgets on a few projects and saw where it went? Listen, we're not saying that Nike should book Sharapova for a tennis commercial and then forego a TV spot, but maybe test out an anemic cash flow on a smaller project and see what the creatives come up with. You never know where the results might lead. Maybe even straight to sales.

Stay tuned to see how well the "Sex and the City" tops do. You know we are.

Puma Pumps Up Its Hollywood Jam

Looks like Puma's going Hollywood. 

The fashion athletic company said that it's opening a new office dedicated to entertainment marketing in Los Angeles next month. The West Coast operation will be geared to increasing corporate partnerships and product interaction with music and film celebrities. Can we get a "Sexy Back Speedcat"??!!

Anyways, you know what new offices mean! More staff! Puma USA is adding new roles to fill up the cubes the L.A. office (hey, it might be fashion, but it's all work-a-day office aesthetics, or so we have to believe as we stretch beyond the limits of our three walled container). Ryan Babenzien joins as head of U.S. marketing operations. He was formerly the business development and strategy consultant for Oddcast, New York, a company that does web authoring tools or some other such beep-boop-beep. Ryan Ayanian, who previously worked as a consultant for marketing agency Antenna, Ontario, Canada, has been hired as music marketing manager. And last, but not least (though we admit we have no knowledge of how Puma's hierarchy works) Ed Choi, who joined Puma in 2006 following at stint at ID Agency, Manhattan Beach, Calif., has been named entertainment marketing manager.

For Barney Waters, Puma North America's vp-marketing, the new office is a move to go "fish where the fish are," though he did note that the brand has had a smaller marketing presence on the West Coast for some time.

"These moves represent a recommitment to entertainment marketing as a real driver for the Puma brand," Waters told us over email. "We're also evolving our approach, as there are so many more opportunities beyond product placement. Hollywood is a great place to develop relationships and brand driven content, which can help reach the people that may not be spending as much time looking at traditional media outlets."

Puma has been making inroads with celebrities over the past several years, working on design and advertising projects with rapper Ludacris and socialite-heiress Lydia Hearst-Shaw (we're not saying she's 100%, but she's definitely not like the other socialite-heiresses we can think of. Barf Tinsley Mortimer and Paris Hilton!), among others. This month, Puma unveiled its new TV campaign, featuring cute-but-disposable Scottish singer/songwriter Paolo Nutini (pictured, right, smoking something). Nutini's single, "New Shoes," is being used in Puma’s lifestyle campaign. We were wondering how long it would take for that to get snatched up by the commercial world.

In May, the company will begin promotional tie-ins with the film Speed Racer, which will include a signature shoe, product placement in the movie and worldwide in-store promotional campaigns. BTW... Does anyone remember what exactly Speed Racer, the show, was about, you know besides a boy racing, like, fast? We're trying to recall, but just can't seem to do it. Somehow, this didn't seem like a movie idea to us. But 'tevs, we're not filmmakers. But why not a He-Man movie? Hey, we're just sayin'.

No notes on what they'll be spending this year to pull off these tie-ins and tie-ons. In 2006, Puma spent $13 million on advertising in the U.S., excluding online, down 23% from $17 million in 2006, per Nielsen Monitor-Plus.