oriental virgin

Take a look at this logo photographed by John at Sinosplice from the side of a Shanghai construction site:


Oriental Virgin. Brilliant. I won't even make the jokes. John points out that this sign, aside from being hilarious, is an obvious knock-off of the Sony Ericsson logo. Clever marketing, Chinese company.


Writes John:

Apparently the recipe for their English name and logo went something like this:

1. Take a successful foreign company’s name and add “Oriental” to the front. Base the Chinese name on the English name.
2. Copy the logo of a different company, altering it a bit.

Everyone knows Chinese companies never steal the ideas of others or anything dastardly like that. This must be the rare exception to the rule.

presidential candidates on youtube

Some of these guys (and gals) get it, and some of them just don't. Clearly candidates are trying to appeal to the internet generation--that would be us--by making YouTube videos so we can blog and MySpace and FaceBook about them and do whatever it is kids do these days. Message to campaign media managers: new media is all about user generated content and posting the same video that you're going to run at your party's national convention is not going to sell to a generation that is more media savvy than you are.

Take, for instance, Mitt Romney's video, titled "Unplugged". First of all, this is one of the only videos on all of YouTube that uses quotation marks in the title, and I know that's hypercritical of me, but it's an early sign that the video is going to be detached from YouTube's audience. Second of all, it's called "Unplugged", which might have been a cool pop culture reference in 1995 when that show was still on MTV, but now it sounds tired. Then there's the video itself: a slick, well-edited montage of Romney (using the word Jihadist, no less) and his wife, narrated by someone who sounds like he's from the National Geographic channel. This video might impress a 50-year-old, but word on the street is that they're not so hip to YouTube. There is, in fact, nothing "unplugged" about it.



Let's contrast this with the videos coming out of Barack Obama's campaign. Obama has hired Joe Rospars, a young, cool guy who co-founded Blue State Digital, as his New Media Director, and Rospars' team has produced a series of videos that I actually enjoy watching. They don't seem scripted, they're edited like other YouTube videos, and a good majority of them build on Obama's "I'm the grassroots candidate" theme by relying heavily on interviews with people off the street. The videos are effective because they don't bore the audiences with Obama's stump speeches--rather they play up the buzz surrounding Obama. In this next video, Obama is comes off as a rock star surrounded by his adoring fans. Talk about hitting the target audience nail on the head:

nau is the time

After much delay, Nau has finally launched its official webstore and the new company is "open for business unusual," as the index page reads. Nau's clothing line attempts to blur "urban endeavor and backcountry" while simultaneously melding "beauty, performance, and sustainability." The company is working to develop myriad new fabrics to achieve these ends. Much of their clothing is made from organic cotton and recycled synthetics. The clothing is highly functional--much of it is stretchy, fitted, and water and wind resistant. Nau will be opening four retail stores in CO, OR, WA, and IL. Rumor has it, these stores will be "webfronts" places for customers to try out clothing, but customers will be encouraged to order clothing from the webstore to cut down on the company's carbon footprint (doesn't that mean more shipping? I guess we'll see how this works in real life).

With Nau's extensive use of sustainable and psuedo-sustainable fabrics (I'm sure recycled polyester involves extensive chemical processing to produce), their product line is perfectly situated to take on earth-concious labels like Patagonia and Edun. But unlike Patagonia, Nau doesn't advertise your eco-awareness so readily and would thankfully look out of place at a Yonder Mountain show. At the same time, the clothing is designed to take you from your favorite fair-trade coffee shop to a Big Sur bouldering trip or even your weekend in the backcountry. The clothing is clearly targeted at the young, urban, tech-savvy, yoga-practicing, Prius-driving, Whole Foods customer, a target market that is unfortunately devoid of a good moniker except for the tired term "yuppie".

The clothing will also be a hit with the virtually untapped flashpacking market, as the clothing appears to be lightweight, easily packable, odor resistant (merino wool is, anyway), and wrinkle resistant (anything with high polyester content). But so is GoLite. The key with Nau is that the clothing doesn't wear its technical features on its sleeves (get it?). You can wear Nau while hiking around Chiang Mai and leave it on when you go out to Bed in Bangkok without looking like a member of the sandals-and-socks crowd.

Nau has a lot of growth potential and should be a brand to watch over the next few quarters. The company is committed to social and environmental change through business and may find itself at the forefront of the social business movement. The one prohibitive factor is cost--Nau isn't cheap--but Nau's target market has generally shown a propensity to pony up for well-designed, value-added products, especially products fitting their social values. Furthermore, as the inevitable competition arises, the supply of sustainable fabrics should increase, bringing prices down. Who knows--maybe someday we'll all be able to recycle or compost our shirts.

More: check out Nau's blog, The Thought Kitchen.

project (red)...so, how's that going?

In 2006, Bono and Bobby Shriver created the (RED) campaign to raise money for the Global Fund to Fight Aids, Tuberculosis, and Malaria. The initiative (the campaign insists it's a brand, not a charity) teamed up with a bunch of major international firms that agreed to design, market, and sell (RED)-branded products. Portions of the companies' pre-tax profits are then channelled to the Global Fund. Current corporate partners include American Express, Converse, Gap, Emporio Armani, Motorola and Apple. So if you buy a (RED) iPod or (RED) panties, Apple or Gap will respectively give some money to the poor Africans who can't afford either item.

(RED) has been hailed as a creative, market-based solution to financing the Global Fund. Theoretically, the campaign could raise serious money for the Global Fund as long as partner companies' bottom lines are continously met. As Shriver told the New York Times in 2006, "We want [our partner companies] to make money. We don’t want anyone to be thinking, ‘I’m not making money on this thing,’ because then we failed. We want people buying houses in the Hamptons based on this because, if that happens, this thing is sustainable.” The campaign raises money by playing off of the self-interest of corporations and the vanity of consumers (perhaps (RED) phones will be the new LiveStrong bracelets?). Furthermore, consumers do not have to change their behavior--they're already buying iPods, phones, and sneakers. Why not buy the (RED) ones and give money to charity without having to actually donate money ? Capitalism at its finest.

On the other hand (RED) also has it's share of critics. Recently, WPI launched BUY (LESS) CRAP, a campaign aimed at "rejecting the ti(red) notion that shopping is a reasonable response to human suffering." According to Ann Handley,

WPI founder Ben Davis says his big beef is that the donations aren't transparent: "When donations are based on percentages of profit and the accounting methods are not transparent, you can spend $100 on a (RED) product with the notion that you're helping to save lives in Africa—but there is no assurance that any of that $100 will actually reach the cause. Not one (RED) cent."

According to Project (RED), the campaign has raised over $20 million for the Global Fund, certainly a substantial amount of money that may go a long way in the developing world. At the same time, that sum pales in comparison to the $100 million that that Davis reasonably projects must have been spent by (RED) partner companies on marketing since the project's inception.

It appears that (RED) partner companies' marketing budgets probably could have gone further if the companies just donated the money directly to the Global Fund. What remains to be seen, however, is whether or not (RED) will gain enough momentum to be a sustainable source of finance for the Fund. (RED), therefore, needs to snowball into a trend, or it will be a wasted effort. One of the largest problems facing (RED) is the fact that consumers don't seem to assosciate it with a cause. There simply isn't enough buzz, and the marketing doesn't really provide consumers with any information about the HIV/AIDS pandemic or the Global Fund. Most (RED) television spots only point to the cryptic joinred.com link, and as Seven87 points out:

The joinred.com link doesn’t even talk about the issues, it just has a sparse page with the 6 RED branded products. The “Manifesto” has an overview, but only the “Global Fund” link has any info on the issues… A single page with the issues. Even the information design of the animation with drill down data was not as compelling as it could be.

Perhaps they didn’t want to go overboard on the scary/sad messages, but it still seems rather underwhelming. They really aren’t educating anyone. They aren’t even playing the “ace card” that charities have… emotional and guilt triggers.

Finally, (RED) products just aren't that cool. Advertising your charitable inclinations is simply not trendy. Consumers are searching for products that are their social values (ie: Toyota Prius, American Apparel), not just branded to represent their values. Perhaps (RED) is just too much like it's creator, Bono. Cool for awhile, but ultimately overly persistent, lacking in substance, and not something that hip people would be caught dead assosciating with.

is anyone else watching tv?

Apparently, this is a real commercial for a new feminine hygiene product. I know, because I actually saw it on TV. Enjoy.