Fashion Notebook

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.

Breaking News: Commes Des Garcons' Rei Kawakubo To Design Next Guest Collection for H&M

Now this is one that actually has us a little hot under the collar.   

Lagerfeld, sure. Viktor & Rolf, cute. Cavalli, sexy. Stella McCartney, feh. Rei Kawakubo, what?!

That's right, empress of whimsical Japanese luxe label Comme des Garcons, Rei Kawakubo, has announced that she will be the featured artiste on H&M's next designer collaboration. The collection launches first in early November, to coincide with the opening of H&M's second Tokyo store. In the following days, it will roll out to doors in the rest of H&M's global markets.

The collection will include apparel for men, women and children, as well as accessories and a unisex fragrance. This certainly is a much more expanded program than the fast fashion retailer has done in the past, and it would seem that the growth of product offering owes everything to the freshness that Kawakubo can bring to the brand.

Much like the Japanese designers Issey Miyake and Yohji Yamamoto, with whom she formed the Japanese triumvirate that defined much of the new wave fashion of 1980s American culture, Kawakubo's designs are structurally intense, and often include popular cultural references in a rather Pop Art motif (such as a series of men's suits she rolled out a in spring 2006 back that featured the iconic Rolling Stone's lips n' tongue logo splayed across the fabric). She was also the mentor for another fashion avant-gartist whose star appears to be ascending these days, Junya Wantanabe. For a look at some of her work, check the photo above.

That said, we're so interested to see what she turns out when she's not using high-tech fabrics or restrained by price points that might tie in some of her more flights of fantasy designs. As we see it, this could be a love it or hate it collection, and we just hope that the quality matches up to the buzz that will no doubt follow this collection's launch. We remember hearing that there were some issues with the clothes that Cavalli put out on the racks, not to mention those of the McCartney collection (said one of our friends, at the time: "I walked out with a cute dress that turned into a pile of buttons and thread after two weeks.").

Anyways, as always, here's the mutual lovefest that always follows these kinds of announcements.

"I have always been interested in the balance between creation and business," said Kawakubo, in a statement. "It is a dilemma, although creation for me has always been the first priority. It is a fascinating challenge to work with H&M since it is a chance to take the dilemma to its extreme and try to solve it."

See what we mean? Seems like old Kawakubo might be prepping us for the design vs. quality vs. price issue we outlined above. Less avant garde, but better quality, or more envelope pushing and delicate? Again, will be so interesting to see her "solution" as she calls it.

And now from H&M's creative advisor Margareta van den Bosch (great name, non?!):

"Rei Kawakubo has been at the top of our wish list for a long time and we are thrilled that she has chosen to collaborate with us," said van den Bosch, in a statement. "We have tremendous respect for Kawakubo's fashion philosophy of questioning fashion's ingrained patterns, and admire her artistic approach to design. We are particularly excited that the collection will be launched in Japan, Kawakubo's native country, at the same time as the launch of our new store there."

Ok, so we'll have to stay tuned, but we think this could be good news. It will drive some buzz—as these collections have done in past incarnations—for both the designer and the retailer, exposing the younger, less monied set to Kawakubo's work and perhaps building brand affinity there, while probably giving H&M a much fresher and more high-concept street reputation for the risk they're taking in bringing her in.

We'll be checking back in November to see what the product looks like!

Lessons in Branding: Members Only Reexamines the Lookbook

Normally, lookbooks are the run-of-the-mill press materials that you  throw into a trusty bin (or, in our case, an unused aluminum beer cooler) and forget about until you need to do a trend report or look up the name of a garment that appeared in an ad.

Spiral bound, velo-bound, perfect bound, matte, natural or glossy, they're all pretty much the same. Which is why this one from Members Only—that brand you wore in the early the 80s, when we were still drooling and incoherent (it wasn't the cocaine honey, we were babies!!)—caught our eye.

It's done up as a scandalous spread from US Weekly or Life & Style or Star (whichever you like best), with the product previewed throughout the shoot and called out in caption boxes.

This approach works for two reasons:

1. It gets the attention of editors and industry types who normally have to sift through a bunch of crap from countless companies. We're not used to seeing this kind of stuff, so at the very least, it gets us to spend an extra few seconds (crucial!) looking through the materials before chucking it into the aforementioned trusty bin.

2. It lays out the looks in a lifestyle manner, practically doing the work (though none will admit so) of the stylist his/herself. Essentially, it gives us an idea of how the clothes would look in real life and suggests some styling options that seem viable.

But that's not to say that there aren't a few drawbacks to this more inventive format, chiefly that it's not necessarily very user friendly. For instance, it's not easy to flip through this for reference. The format requires the editor's eye to  jump to all manner of text boxes, which is detrimental for those editors trying to pull together a trend report or merely browse product to see what would be appropriate for an upcoming shoot. With the lookbook, utility cannot be underestimated.

Also, this male model is hideous. I mean, they're not all to our taste, and that's cool, but we're just not feeling this guy (and we LOVE skinny hipster guys). Also, "Poppi" was the best name they could come up with for the girl? Finally, the models appear to have like zero chemistry, which actually makes looking through the spreads all the more interesting, even if it's because we're laughing at the "Make Me a Supermodel" antics.

Still, it's a refreshing take on an industry standard that actually got us to take a look, and, well, write about it. Check out one of the spreads from the book, below. (Click to enlarge) 

UPDATED: The Freestyle World Tour and Reebok's Search for Female Consumers

UPDATE!: Reebok flacks reassure us that "Framed" is full speed ahead. And, what's more, it's now available on Yahoo!Sports and behind-the-scenes footage has been, er, Flickr'd. Congrats! Now, what about that whole "Your Move" campaign?

For those new readers who walked into this convo like a child wandering into the middle of a movie ("You're out of your element Donny!"), check the rhymes below. Note: There won't be any more Big Lebowski references from here on out, for better or for worse...

Been around the world and I, I, I... I can't find my
Reeboks?

Forgive the indulgence of a song we've had stuck in our heads this morning (sometimes shower song sessions can drag into the work world, even for business-minded journos like us!), but it kinda, sorta ties into Reebok's new Freestyle World Tour launch that kicks off Feb. 21. Once again, it's a puzzler. But first, the deets.

Again going after the women's market, Reebok is taking a Nylon-style tour de monde with a new collection of apparel and footwear that will incorporate the particular modes of fashion capitals including Tokyo, Paris, New Delhi (huh?), Madrid, London and New York. Starting tomorrow, the first style, a send up of Tokyo street style with inspiration taken from the city's subway map hits stores. Future releases for each city will roll out as follows:

March 2008—Freestyle Paris, which references the "Can Can" in red, pink and black
May 2008— Freestyle New Delhi, featuring embossed satin and Bollywood-style vibrant color patterns
July 2008—Freestyle Madrid, which references flamenco dancers
Setpember 2008—Freestyle London, featuring an embroidered raven on the heel
November 2008—Freestyle New York, which references our city's unmistakable taxi cabs

All shoes will retail for $85, and the apparel collections that accompany them, which include hoodies, tees, and track jackets, will retail for $28-$75.

The global ad campaign, for which spend was not revealed, will include print, in-store and digital efforts. Somehow "global" just doesn't ring right without the  "TV  spots" tag, but hey, we're traditionalists. Reebok spent $27.5 million on measured media advertising in 2006, and for the first 11 months of 2007, has spent $16.6 million. Below is a list of the pitch women the brand has signed  for the campaign. Full disclosure: We had to look them all up too, so feel free to click the names if you're unfamiliar!

Tokyo—Ai Yasuda                                Madrid—Bimba Bose
Paris—Yelle                                         London—Nikki Beatnik
New Delhi—Sagarika Ghatge                New York—Sheetal Sheth (above, in a spot for the NYC collection)
 
 Since none of the girls here are names that we've heard of—and we'd like to think we're pretty up on things—the campaign is a bit of a puzzler unless they're going for super underground authenticity appeal. But isn't that the kind of marketing that a big brand like Reebok should avoid? Shouldn't Reebok be looking for bigger sales, to grab a larger share of the market and turn around their banking books?

What happened to Scarlett Johannson? And what about that IFC film series, "Framed," that they launched not too long ago.  

And what about the "Your Move" campaign we heard about back in September, when CMO Uli Becker (a straight-talking Adidas alum), told us the following:

"We need our marketing to appreciate where the consumer comes from and make them king of the whole thing as well," Uli Becker, head of global marketing, explained of the brand's "Your Move"  campaign. "It brings the message into one campaign context. Whether we're talking about running or women, we're playing into one equity image of the brand with that single slogan."

For a brand that said it was going to focus on a single, streamlined marketing approach, it doesn't seem to be delivering. "Framed", the "Kool-Aid" collection and, now, the Freestyle World Tour seem diametrically opposed to Becker's statement about a unified message. In fact, it seems like the same kind of mixed messaging that he said, at the time, had been detrimental to Reebok in the past.

Speaking of "Your Move" campaign, why haven't we seen it anywhere yet? Has "Your Move" moved on? Trust that we're on the hunt to find some answers here.

 

The Big Bang: J.C. Penney's Biggest Launch Ever for "American Living," (And Why It's Smarter Than You Skeptics Might Think!)

J.C. Penney is really going whole hog with the
marketing push behind its new "American Living" collection!

While we hear a lot of "biggest push ever" b.s. from marketers, this one's the real deal:

-First TV spot hits Univision, in Spanish, for the "Premio Lo Nuestro a la Musica Latina" Awards, on Feb. 21
-Mass-market TV spot to make full debut during the Oscars, on Feb. 24
-Month-long run on prime-time TV slots
-A 60-second in-cinema spot at an estimated 14,000 theaters for all PG and PG-13 features
-Print campaign in the usual barrage of consumer pubs (see example, right).
-Direct mail with 12 different specialty catalogs
-In-store promotions, including fixtures and themed uniforms for employees
-AmericanLiving.com dedicated Web site.
-Creative shot by Bruce Weber (sufficeth to say, ain't cheap people!)

The brand and the campaign, both by Polo Ralph Lauren's Global Brand Concepts group, will be the biggest in the company's history, according to CMO Mike Boylson. The imaging is meant as an emotional play that connects consumers with images of Americana and family.

While some may doubt the strategy of going big during a time when consumers feel like they're going bust—and Boylson said he's heard more than a few naysayers—the strategy actually works in their favor, according to Patricia Pao, of The Pao Principle, New York, who told me that J.C. Penney could potentially triple their media spend value given that they will be one of the few people making a real push.

And even though she felt the price points for the collection—a broad swath covering $24-$500 goods—might be a bit too aspirational for the times, WSL Strategic Retail's Candace Cortlett told me that the big campaign is still a good investment in the brand.

"[This effort] will live beyond the hard times," she said. "The worst thing to do is to put all of the energy into developing a brand like this and then just letting it sit on the shelf. That was Sears’ mistake when they got the Land’s End franchise."

Check out the full story here.

John Varvatos Goes Back to His Record Collection For Spring 2008 Campaign

It's always been clear where designer John Varvatos
gets his inspiration: his record collection.

Growing up in Detroit, Varvatos became infatuated with the slew of 1970s-era rockers that defined the music scene of the time (and, obvs, continued to influence for many years to come), and that infatuation has become the flashpoint of influence across not only his collections, but also his advertising creative. Recent spots have included Alice Cooper, Iggy Pop and Aerosmith's Joe Perry, alongside more modernist rock figures such as Chris Cornell, and the Scott Weiland-fronted and Slash-anchored Velvet Revolver.

So another season, another rocker and this time from the vinyl bin, Varvatos, and the team over at Yard, New York, have unearthed another vintage treat: Cheap Trick. Check out one of the spots above (click to enlarge), which feature members Bun E. Carlos, Rick Nielsen, Tom Petersson and Robin Zander (can you believe they're all still alive!) racing along on, what else, 1970s-era vintage two-seaters.

The creative, steered by Stephen Niedzwiecki, the creative director over at Yard, was inspired by boardwalk and carnival imagery (why do we always think Diane Arbus when we hear these words?) from the 1940s and 1950s.

"The Cheap Trick guys have an almost uncontainable energy," said Varvatos, in a statement. "This season is one that embodies a freewheeling style that is so quintessentially America. The campaign continues to be about iconic rock n ' rollers caught in real moments."

Real moments? I'd definitely classify this as stylized fantasy. I mean, honestly, when's the last time you saw a bunch of guys pushing into the stretches of old age racing around on bikes in full evening wear? (And if you have seen such a phenomenon, frequently, let me know where you live because it sounds like an interesting vacation spot!)

We also have to wonder if this campaign doesn't make Varvatos' brand feel too old. While we loved the campaign with Iggy Pop (who, let's face it, is no spring chicken himself, with wrinkles that recall Varvatos' own pricey, aged leather carry-alls), that campaign had a youthful exuberance that we just don't feel from the shock-white heads of the Cheap Trick-ers. This could also be a function of the fact that our eyes automatically gravitate to Rick Nielsen in the spot above; his bandmates do look more youthful on second consideration.

Regardless, the aging rocker-as-posterboy works for Varvatos, solidifying his brand's musical heritage, and, here's the big bonus: he'll never get accused of just tapping somebody because they of-the-moment (looking at you Versace with your robotic Jonathan Rhys Meyers ads). And double bonus: these guys probably come pretty cheap.

  You know what would make our day, though? If Varvatos' next campaign featured T. Rex's Marc Bolan (pictured, left). C'mon John, you know you love him too! This guy is the original unicorn... Just imagine that sex bomb in a Varvatos suit!

Lessons in Branding: A Night Out with Ben Sherman

Having attended many fashion parties that were no more
than an excuse to down a bunch of free drinks before going
out for your real night on the town, we must admit that most of them are throw-aways, except in the rare instance that they shed some light on some real branding work.

While such is by far the rarest of breed in the Fashion Week party line up, Ben Sherman's party Friday night at the brand's Soho flagship proved to be a rumination on the execution of a rebranding, if not a somewhat nostalgic trip down memory lane for us (pictures left, via LastNightsParty.com).

If you haven't checked in with Ben Sherman in a while you should, because it's likely very different than you remember. The U.S. vp-marketing, Dana Dynamite has been working to give the brand some serious hipster cred, starting out  first with a MySpace site several years ago (one of the first to jump on that now über-popular chuck wagon) and extending relationships with a series of downtown New York nightlife's more  prominent partiers (and all too often, party promoters by default... hey, even hipsters gotta eat!).

Most recently, the brand inked a partnership with Merlin Bronques, a downtown scene photographer á la, but predating MisShapes (R.I.P.) and The Cobra Snake (we're fairly sure about this, facts about these guys are usually anecdotal at best) as well as newcomers like Nicky Digital (if you don't know these names, you're either over 35 years old or need to seriously re-read your Hipster Handbook). Bronques produced a series of stills—in k eeping with his hipster verité styles—of downtown's denizens that were used for a Christmas OOH campaign here in New York.  Alongside Bronques came a slew of other night-lifers, such as the DJ/comic (huh?) Mike Nouveau (who's really a web marketing and ad sales guy for Paper, and prior to that held similar duties over at Rolling Stone, pictured, left, with friends) and DJ Jess (the skinny, seemingly sexually ambidextrous DJ who used to, and perhaps still does, spin at Rififfi, where you can expect to hear "Kids in America" and "Common People" about 1.75 times each hour).

So, at the party, it all became clear how these kids—we have to laugh here a little bit, since we've seen them evolve over the past four years from awkward kids our friends used to hook up with to something of legitimate (?) nightlife figures, and speaking of Merlin, why did you lose the wig!!??—have been perfectly deployed to revamp this aged British apparel brand both on and offline (they all promote each other via MySpace pages).

The party was thronged with young kids (check out all the images, here.), which isn't such a surprising thing at fashion events, particularly during Fashion Week. But it was thronged with the kinds of people that we recognize, obviously a direct appeal to young twentysomethings who make the rounds at various clubs decked out in DIY and bargain fashions. The walls were splattered with images from the current campaign, and the room packed with a bunch of young, mod-ish looking pretties that posed for Bronques' pictures. (Though due diligence requires us to report that there were some aging club queens out as well, but that's par for the course around downtown NYC. It wouldn't feel like home without them.)

And while our friend did note that the new outdoor campaign looked like "American Apparel Lite" (which, to be fair, is, itself pretty much "1970s-Era Gym Porn Lite"), Ben Sherman was effectively communicating its new message. After being off of our radar for years, Ben Sherman suddenly felt hip. And the product wasn't—particularly the party dresses—bad either.

And it's not just our musings either. Agyness Deyn, that pixie-faced model you've been seeing in nearly everyone's campaigns this year, popped into the party, wearing some super high shouldered blue jacket and with a mini-entourage of bottle blonds in tow.  That  surely says something, whether she was comp'ed  for the night or not. Though I'm starting to worry about Agyness as a brand spokesperson—seems she's been a bit of the village bicycle lately and while we love her look, we have to wonder how much Agyness we'll have to see before we get fatigue and move on.

And speaking of moving on, while we love the 1980s, I think it's time we stopped LITERALLY reinterpreting the decadent decade. Seriously, there's a way to pull off hip without being a literal reproduction of a Salt N' Peppa album cover. Cheap, clunky gold chain and patent purses were always passé people!

Marketing to Men: How Two Beauty Brands are Reaching the Elusive "Mook" Psychographic

When I saw Knocked Up for the first time on DVD, I kind of fell in love with Seth Rogen. The same thing happened when I watched Jonah Hill’s character saunter through frenetic, sexually frustrated dialog in Superbad (see Rogen pictured, far left, with film's stars, Michael Cera and Hill) earlier this year. These guys reminded me of an old college buddy of mine: a pot-smoking, hard-drinking good times guy whose “Madden 2004” soundtrack used to put me to sleep each night, and with whom I'd spend the weekends swollen with beer, hollering myself hoarse watching NCAA games at a local Irish bar. We'd rag on each other, compare girls we were dating (these were my pre-out days, and now we split down the middle, he'll go for Juno's Ellen Paige while I'll geek out over Cera), and our apartment was the kind of squalor that we've both promised we'll never live in again.

Because, you know, those days are over. But they're not really, and guys well beyond the college years are whooping it up, well, like guys in college.

If you haven't already, check out my most recent feature story, "The Mook Industrial Complex," here.

The term comes from a 2001 Frontline documentary (female counterparts were dubbed "midriffs") and they're the zeitgeist of the 18-34 year old male demo that represents about $1.02 billion in annual household income according to MRI reports.

The problem is, they're highly elusive and, what's more, even though you might think their humor beyond sophomoric, they are wizards at blocking out your marketing messages. Maxim's Rob Gregory told me that these guys receive roughly 3,000 impressions a day (if they live in an urban area, natch) and they block out about 90% of them. So going after the dude-bro is not as easy as slapping a scantily-clad woman on a 30-second commercial for beef jerky, say. But some brands have found a way to get through the clutter, and there's some good advice and strategy talk from the marketing honchos at Mitchum (unit of Revlon) and Axe (unit of Unilever).

Oh, and for extra gross-out factor, check out some of the sites I had to go through for my research: Ebaum's World and College Humor. I can't guarantee that it's work safe, kids, so browse at your own risk.