• “Nothing great in the world has ever been accomplished without passion” – Anon
• “Man’s greatness lies in his power of thought” – Blaise Pascal
• “We are no doubt in the great age of the brand” – Tom Peters
• “Truly great brands are far more than labels for products. They are symbols that encapsulate the desires of consumers” – Anon
• “It is the nature of all greatness not to be exact” – Edmund Burke

New regulations come into force in the US next week, banning the use of the word ‘light’ on cigarette packaging. The move is clearly based on the insight that ‘light’ connotes a healthier product to consumers  – not something that goes down well with the regulators. Marlboro’s cunning response (see below) has been to communicate heavily that consumers need only ask for the ‘Marlboros in the gold pack’ instead, but this manoeuvre is also now under investigation by the FDA.

It’s interesting news in and of itself but is made even more interesting by the fact that regulation in tobacco has in the past acted as a forewarning of impending regulation in the alcohol industry, eg. advertising bans, sports sponsorship bans etc. So it sparks the thought: what may happen to the marketing of beer in coming years, where in the US Bud Light and Coors Light outsell their standard counterparts? If the same thinking is applied to alcohol, will  we see consumers in the future having to ask for  “a Bud in the blue bottle?”. Or will Budweiser respond to this as an early warning and try to adopt a new subtler proxy for communicating the lightness of Bud Light?

Australia’s regulations have banned the use of words like ‘mild’ and ‘light’ on tobacco packaging for years now. So just as the tobacco industry may indicate the likely regulatory future for alcohol, Australian regulation has tended to act as the forerunner to regulation in the US and the wider world. So,  it’s interesting to note that the Australians are currently considering banning all on-pack branding for cigarettes, allowing only a small reference to the brand name at the bottom corner of the pack in a homogeneous typeface. As they protest the proposed move, the cigarette manufacturers are desperately trying to prepare for them, even redesigning the cigarettes themselves to act as one of the few communications media they have left. So, it’s interesting to think: will we see differently coloured beers in the future as beer cans and bottles potentially come under attack and become bland and unidentifiable?

Marketing cigarettes and alcohol used to be seen as glamorous. For marketers, at least, they’re just becoming bloody hard work!

• “What can be measured and manipulated statistically is not only seen as real; it comes to be seen as the only or whole reality” – David Boyle: The Tyranny of Numbers
• “We look – however uneasily – for ways to quantify quality” – Jeremy Bullmore
• “When you are a bear of very little brain, and think of Things, you sometimes find that a Thing which seemed very Thingish inside you is quite different when it gets out in the open and has other people looking at it!” – Winnie the Pooh
• “Data is not information, information is not knowledge, knowledge is not understanding, understanding is not wisdom” –  Clifford Stoll
• “The life-cycle of a brand is dependent upon its ability to continue to satisfy in the quantity that makes it viable to continue its production, supply” – Anon

Recent research by Mum Poll highlighted the fact that having a child can be the cause of extreme emotions, both pleasurable and painful.

Whilst ‘most’ mothers acknowledge that having kids is the best thing that has happened to them, many also struggle to come to terms with their new identity, financial pressures and new found responsibilities. Fundamentally many mothers feel they lose a sense of personal identity as they become the ‘Mother of Sam’ rather than the individual they once were. Emotionally many can also be overwhelmed by the challenge of providing moral guidance, home security and nutritional meal times, made even more fraught by judgemental peers and mixed messages from the media and childcare specialists.

The Mum Poll study’s primary finding was that mothers are becoming increasingly competitive, with around 4 in 10% claiming that they cannot help but brag about their children’s achievements. Additionally there was a high incidence of mums who admit to being ultra competitive in dressing their children in the latest fashion attire, a dynamic that is being tapped into by high end trainer brand ‘Onitsuka Tiger’ which this week launched a pre-school range of footwear in Harrods and Selfridges (starting at £35 per pair).

Beyond this level of parental vanity, many brands are well aware that this can be such a difficult emotional phase and duly provide plenty of support and guidance via ’Mother & Baby Clubs’ delivering a constant stream of material through websites, email newsletters, direct mail, bounty packs and so forth. However whilst many brands tap into the angst and peer competitiveness of young mothers, there are far fewer that play to the emotional highs.

Of course it’s important to avoid the saccharin ‘Werther’s Original’ approach to brand communciations but at a time when parents are being placed under huge pressure from all quarters, it would be refreshing to see brands taking a more balanced approach to family marketing, acknowledging not only the pain but also the pleasures of parenting.

As you may have heard, the Dutch beer brand Bavaria has been fined by FIFA for its ‘ambush’ advertising of girls in orange mini-dresses.

Giles Lury, our Director of Branding, was invited to comment on this incident and the perils and pitfalls of guerrilla marketing campaigns, on Simon Mayo’s show on BBC Radio 2 yesterday.

To hear what Giles has to say you can listen again here (from 1:32.25 onwards).