Corn Boobs and Cooking with Dirty Dishes

Most marketers have experienced the most frustrating conversation in the history of marketing:

(Someone): “The Board is wondering if we should do a rebrand.”

(Marketer): “Meaning…?”

(Someone): “Oh, you know, maybe some new colors on the logo.”

(Marketer): Hits head against brick wall.

Words and phrases related to branding get tossed around like a dog’s chew toy. Only a small handful of people know what they actually mean, so they frequently get used out of context and eventually become very expensive mistakes.

Let’s do a level-set FAQ style.

Q: Okay, maybe we should start by just agreeing on what a brand is (and isn’t)?

In the English language, there are only two words that are relatively interchangeable with the word “brand:” expectation and reputation. Your brand is what consumers expect of you – not because of your logo (who really cares?), but because you deliver the same experience time and time again, consistently, without fail, as close to 100% of the time as you can get.

The only way you can do that as a company is for everyone responsible for the experience to have a common understanding (and passion for) the best way to deliver that experience. Period. Full stop. And so it stands to reason that brands cannot be successful without a commitment to, and constant measuring of, internal brand compliance.

Screw the logos and the slogans. Brands set expectations by creating experiences. And those experiences have very little margin for error.

If you live in Wisconsin, you’re certainly familiar with the Culver’s brand. A very big part of the Culver’s promise is that your food will get to you fresh, made on order, not wilting under some Easy Bake Oven heat lamp. When the drive-thru throws that numbered sticker on your rear-view mirror, you are happy to park and wait, because you know that shit is coming out fresh. You are actually surprised, and perhaps a bit concerned, if you are not “parked.”

So that becomes your expectation: parking. And in the process, freshness becomes central to the Culver’s brand – because your food is fresh and hot, consistently, without fail.

Delivering on that promise so predictably only happens with strong and unwavering internal training systems, and that training runs the gamut – from the quality of vendor partners to kitchen food prep to fulfilling orders to running out to your car. One error delivers an off-brand experience.

As a marketer, it’s your job to make sure your managers, your Board, and your C-suite understand the difference between “rebrand” and “update the logo colors.” Which leads us to…

Q: So…the title of the blog includes three brand things that sound very similar to each other. What’s the difference, and how do I know if or when I should do any of them?

Let’s start with the most work-intensive of these: the rebrand. A rebrand is a starting-from-scratch approach to your entire business model, and it should be considered only if you have negative brand equity.

What does that mean? It means you’ve communicated an experiential promise that you cannot consistently deliver – so the consumer expectation and the actual experience do not align. If you drove through Culver’s 10 times, and 7 of those times, you were handed a big bag of food without parking, you’d grow suspicious of that “made to order” promise. As you should. And then let's multiply that experience by hundreds of transactions per store per day, and in no time at all, that central component of the Culver’s brand would collapse, creating negative equity.

You are, as we like to say, cooking with dirty dishes.

Over-promising is a key symptom of negative equity. Brands love trotting out superlatives that set lofty expectations – “best” this, “#1” at that, “100% satisfaction guaranteed.” Not being able to consistently back these claims up is a great way to set yourself up for failure in a way that will eventually require a rebrand.

And so, rebrands are, by necessity, inside-out endeavors. You start by assessing the business model, operations, experiential delivery, competitive differentiation, and your brand promises – and then you decide what name, logo, or slogan to throw on all that.

By contrast, a brand refinement should be considered when you are losing competitive ground. Your name and logo and core messaging still have positive equity, but perhaps you’re losing in key areas that consumers or clients value – product innovation, relationship development, voice of the customer strategies, speed, payment methods, customer service. All of these (and more) create an opportunity to build on existing brand value by making new promises – and backfilling the operations required to deliver on them.

Consider brand refinement a good-to-great endeavor that has much more to do with meeting expectations and crafting authentic messaging than it does with your company name or your logo or your slogan.

Finally, a brand refresh is the smallest of lifts, but will require you to stand in front of the mirror naked and assess what you see. A brand refresh is appropriate when you’re simply stale, outdated, old, and musty. Your website is in Times New Roman, and your color palette is forest green – like, that kind of outdated. A solid brand refresh requires a little consumer research and a cosmetic contemporizing of your overall look and feel – much like Buick has been trying to do for decades on end. (The Buick case study will be an entirely different and scathing blog).

So, which of these is right for your company? We’ve created a score sheet to help you decide.

Q: My boss likes stories. Can you give me some examples, so I don’t have to hit my head against a brick wall?

“Corner booths…sticky floors….”

Those are the first 4 words in the latest Miller Lite TV ad that has since been scrubbed from the internet. We can’t tell you for sure why…but maybe it’s because most of us heard the first two words as “corn boobs” instead of “corner booths.”

Lite is clearly going for a brand refresh here – one that focuses on social human interactions instead of the product itself. But, oops, they probably skipped some important focus groups here. If you watch much TV, especially sports, let us know if you don’t hear “corn boobs” the next time you see this spot.

Speaking of beer, the Bud Light debacle in Spring of ’23 was a brand refinement that ended up being a solution in search of a problem. In engaging a trans spokesperson/influencer, Bud Light ended up alienating far more consumers that it could attract. Was there some consumer demand for, “Man, I wish beer brands were more inclusive”? No.Was there a lot of toxic masculinity that took offense? Absolutely. While Bud Light’s intentions and social conscience were in the right place, its execution was poorly thought out.

Of course, the beverage sector is famous for mistakes like this. Who can forget New Coke? Or Crystal Pepsi?

It is an extremely rare occurrence when a thriving brand can make us want something we didn’t know we wanted. Apple has done it very well by expanding our imaginations and putting power in our hands. Home-delivery meal kits succeeded – albeit briefly – during the pandemic.

The lesson here is to do your research and never begin a branding or marketing strategy with “Wouldn’t it be cool if…?”

The moral to the story is really very simple: do what you’re doing for the right reason, and not because some VP is “bored” with your logo. Do your homework, set out goals, engage your audiences, audit your competitors, understand your space.

And if you need help with any of that, pop us a note.

‍