Ripplewood Holdings had sent an American classic into bankruptcy. Read BrandlandUSA’s stories about how to save this American icon: The potential of Reader’s Digest in a Web 2.0 World. What to do about the magazine (and company) now that it is in bankruptcy. Hint: They need to channel the Wallaces.MORE HERE
PLEASANTVILLE, NY. – That private capital has been unsuccessful in a leveraged buyout of Reader’s Digest Association Inc. should be no surprise. Private capital like Ripplewood Holdings has failed in all manner of media plays. The reality is that during a downturn, a company can’t be expected to be payingMORE HERE
KILMARNOCK, SCOTLAND – Great brands are associated with a place. This is true even more with alcohol other products that have elastic demands. The place of manufacture adds to the allure of the brand, and that helps build a market for it. You differentiate your liquor product not only byMORE HERE
NEW YORK – Jake Holmes perhaps has had as much influence on American music as any other singer songwriter, but unless you are a devotee of early 1970s rock or advertising, you probably don’t know his name. But you certainly know his music, which includes Gillette’s “Best a Man CanMORE HERE
PORT ROYAL, VIRGINIA – When you think roadside, you think Stuckey’s and Horne’s. Both were the roadside rest stops; before the government got in the bathroom business with so many Interstates, places like Stuckey’s and Horne’s served up bathrooms, souvenirs, gas, food and whopee cushions to the American masses. Stuckey’sMORE HERE
Advertisers and agencies get so obsessed with technology in advertising that we forget that there is still effective analog advertising. One such concept is Sarasota’s I Pedal Ads, a bicycle-powered billboard. In most areas, zoning and sign restrictions have become so severe that there are fewer and fewer ways toMORE HERE
It’s a fundamental of trademark law. To keep a trademark, you have to use it. My old Virginia bank Virginia National Bank learned that lesson. It dropped the name VNB, and merged a number of times into what is now Bank of America. A few years ago, a new start-upMORE HERE
Amazon.com WidgetsIt’s summer. You go to the beach. There is that SMELL. What smell is it? Coppertone smell? Hawaiian Tropic smell? Bain de Soliel? Got to have a smell. That got us thinking, just a day after we wrote about Sea & Ski. What are the TOP sunscreen brands ofMORE HERE
We do like Holiday Inn at BrandlandUSA.com. BrandlandUSA.com is the website of business and travel writer and editor Garland Pollard. Visit his personal website at GarlandPollard.comMORE HERE
Sea & Ski has apparently lost its tan, and no one knows where to find it. In the 1960s commercials for the suntan lotion; it was always the more youthful lotion compared to Coppertone, which had an “all-ages” family appeal. I recall Sea & Ski from my summers in theMORE HERE