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Month: July 2017

Think Sideways – Don’t constrain your innovation.

Think Sideways – Don’t constrain your innovation.

3M has a well-deserved reputation as an innovative company.

innovative compnaies

The invention of the Post-it note is perhaps the most famous story of what 3M does, but there are numerous other examples of how it creates new things in new ways.

In my book “The Prisoner and the Penguin”, I told the story of how a banjo-playing, engineering school dropout and 3M employee called Dick Drew created masking tape.

Two tone car4.1.1

Two tone cars were all the rage in the 1920s but were causing a serious problem for mechanics in body shops as they tried to create this effect. The problem was the masking – no one knew how to do this well, so most improvised. They glued old newspapers to the body and windows with library pastes, homemade glues or surgical adhesive tape. While this helped create a sharp demarcation between the two colours, the adhesives stuck so firmly that trying to remove them often ruined the paint job.

Drew vowed to solve the problem and finally did using ingenuity and a little bit of cheek to get around the procurement people and get his prototype made. The answer was in effect sandpaper without the sand and a sticky but not permanent adhesive.

This was the end of my story but in fact was really just a chapter in the bigger book of 3M innovations.

Drew

 

One of the next chapters features Drew again. Working on another project and now technical director of 3M’s Product Fabrication Laboratory, he was immediately intrigued when one of his team showed him a sample of a new moisture-proof packaging material from Dupont – Cellophane.

 

cellulose tape

He saw the potential for it as a new backing for masking tape and despite having to reformulate the adhesive used, he and his team went onto produce what was originally called Scotch® Brand Cellulose Tape, was later renamed Scotch® Transparent Tape and nowadays is known simply as Scotch® Tape.

So ended another chapter, but the 3M’s innovation book continued as Larry Wendling, VP of Corporate Research 3M explained in ‘Imagine: How Creativity Works’ by Jonah Lehrer.

“You might think an idea is finished, that there’s nothing else to do with it, but then you talk to somebody else in some other field. And your little idea inspires them, so they come up with a brand-new invention that inspires someone else. That, in a nutshell, is our (3M’s) model”

Masking Tape bumped into panelling and this led to the development of sound dampening panels. The idea was based on the adhesives used in industrial strength masking tape.

This in turn led to the development of another product for another market – Scotch-Weld a super-strong adhesive foam.

The adhesive from Scotch® Tape was the basis for much of the smart screen technology and coatings and also the more specialist light refracting films invented by 3M.

As Wendling aptly concludes, “The lesson is that the tape business isn’t just about tape.”

Dirty Harry, the blue star and the broon dog

Dirty Harry, the blue star and the broon dog

newcastle cap

BenjaminFranklin

“Beer is proof God loves us and wants us to be happy” is a quote often attributed to Benjamin Franklin and is just one of the many examples of celebrity endorsement of beer throughout the ages.

Beer brands play a major role in the history of marketing and demonstrate many of the traits of great, well-loved brands.

 

bass-pale-ale

 

Bass’ Red Triangle was the first trademark to be registered In the UK under the Trade Mark Registration Act 1875. The Act actually came into effect on 1 January 1876 and legend has it that a Bass employee queued overnight outside the registrar’s office on New Year’s Eve in order to be the first in line to register a trademark the next morning.

 

heineken eHeineken’s logo contains the distinctive ‘smiling’ e’s. The story behind them is that in 1964, Alfred Henry Heineken, the grandson of the original founder decided to change the look of the brand name on the label. He wanted to make the logo ‘more friendly’ to women who were more often the ones buying the family groceries so rotated them to appear as if they were smiling.

corona ad

 

 

 

Corona developed a distinctive drinking ritual and communication equity with the addition of a wedge of lime. A clever solution to the problem of ‘light-struck’, which demonstrates marketers’ ability to see opportunities where others see problems.

 

However, there is another British brand that demonstrates not one of these marketing characteristics, but all of them and a fewmore. The brand is of course Newcastle Brown.

Secret recipe
Newcastle Brown Ale was created by Lieutenant Colonel James (‘Jim’) Herbert Porter. Porter, who came from a family of brewers, served in the North Staffordshire Regiment in the First World War and was awarded a DSO and Bar (of course). Returning form the war he moved to Newcastle. It was there that he worked with chemist Archie Jones to develop and refine the recipe. Like lots of other brands it is a “secret” recipe as he explained “We tried for a long time, all ends up. I wanted something different but not far too strong. No one was allowed to mention what was going on, but we varied it so much that few really knew.”

Premium pricing (reassuringly expensive)
Newcastle Brown Ale went into production at Tyne Brewery in 1927 and that first brew had an original gravity of 1060º and was 6.25 ABV, and it sold at what was then a premium price of 9 shillings (45p) for a dozen pint bottles.

On April 25, 1927, Newcastle Brown Ale was advertised for the first time in The Newcastle Journal. Five days later, Newcastle United were crowned league champions (their last league title to date) providing a good excuse to try a locally named brew.

Drinking Ritual
Brown-Aleand glassOver the years, it developed its own drinking ritual but one that has nothing to do with limes! Newcastle Brown was traditionally sold in 1 pint (568 ml) or more recently, 550-millilitre bottles but is served and drunk from a 12-imperial-fluid-ounce (340 ml) Wellington glass. The reason being is that this allows the drinker to regularly top-up the beer and thereby maintain a frothy “head”

Distinctive logo

The blue star logo was introduced onto bottle in 1928, a year after the beer was launched. The five pointed star chosen to represent the five founding breweries of Newcastle.

For a brand proud of its heritage, it not unsurprisingly applied and was granted protected brand status under the European Union Protected Geographical Status in February 2000. However, more surprisingly and a little disappointingly in late 2007 this was removed when brewing of the beer moved wholly away from its place of origin to Tadcaster in Yorkshire.

Affectionate nicknames
Like many things, people and brands, it has a number of affectionate nicknames, it is widely called Newkie Brown but in its hometown and local areas is often given the nickname “Dog”. This refers to the British “seeing a man about a dog” or in reference to taking the ‘dog’ (real or imaginary) for a walk. In both good excuses for going to the pub. The dog in question of course is always Broon, (“brown” pronounced in the Geordie dialect).

Celebrity endorsement
Which leaves celebrity endorsement and they don’t come much bigger or better than multi-Oscar winning actor director Clint Eastwood who is a long-time fan and has often said it is his favourite beer.

DirtyH