An improvement?

BMC - The Austin Seven. Shaky, leaky, not too good in the wet (it kept cutting out). But a cross-class leveler used by Royalty, Stars and The Common Man. Sliding half windows at the front. Affordable by many.

So what did we do? The Mini brand was so strong that it was applied to a car that is not that affordable, is in no way innovative, is cramped in a new way despite being so much larger and so much faster.

What a pity that Alec Issigonis's 1959 - 2000 flawed masterpiece became the flawless, electric-windowed piece of retro nostalgia that it is today. And let's not get started on the Fiat 500.

Making businesses design ready

This article is the basis of two features published in the Business Pink supplement of the Harrogate Advertiser last Friday:

Making businesses design ready

Brian Minards is a Harrogate based, independent consultant operating in the area of business integration, new product development, corporate and brand strategy, creative direction, and design management. He is a past Vice President of the Chartered Society of Designers, an academic, and a past director of WPP, a World leader in marketing communications.

Three years ahead of the economic downturn, The Cox Review of Creativity in Business expressed the importance of creativity, design and innovation to business performance and the UK economy. Sustained success in business, regardless of sector, Cox said, increasingly depends on the ability to innovate: to exploit new ideas and new opportunities ahead of the competition.

The Design Council maintains that to survive in challenging economic conditions and stay ahead of overseas competition, UK businesses must add value – designing innovative products and services instead of cutting prices. Design is a significant source of competitive advantage. Companies that invest in their design capability and develop a reputation for innovation can avoid competing on price alone. In the UK, 45% of firms that do not use design compete mainly on price; only 21% of firms where design is significant do so.

The Design Council’s research finds that for every £100 a design-alert business spends on design, turnover increases by £225. There are many instances where this success can be measured and evaluated, making design a tangible asset to any company.

Embedding design at the heart of a business’s strategy is crucial, but where do businesses look for advice and support in this minefield? Clearly, directly approaching design suppliers without a wider knowledge of the ways in which they may integrate with your business is ill advised. A current support scheme for businesses is Designing Demand, a programme managed nationally by the Design Council and delivered by the RDAs and their delivery partners. Designing Demand has recently gone live across Yorkshire.

Design is no longer a cosmetic, superficial bolt-on used to make products and services prettier for market, it’s firmly embedded in the operation of those UK companies that are growing.

The integration of design at all levels – from corporate strategy, through products and services, to internal and external communication – is important to the wider success of a business.

Making businesses design ready involves the strategic management of design at board level, linking design and business to deliver service or product development across R&D, brand strategy and realisation, the marketing mix, environment (interior and exterior), engineering, and the manufacturing process.

The quest is to source a strategic design consultancy that understands this and will work with your business from the outset to identify direction and routes to market.

It is both possible and necessary to design our way out of the recession, ready and healthy to come out fighting at the other end.

© Brian Minards 30 June 2009

St Pancras

What was I thinking? Why can't all major railway stations in the be like St Pancras? And when I say railway stations, I mean RAILWAY STATIONS, not train stations.

A sense of place. A sense of arrival and departure. An operational precision that is long forgotten (if, indeed, it ever existed). St Pancras is a brand that defines UK railway travel. A home for that dream.

Steam! I recall duplicated notes handed out on school trips to London or Bristol on Great Werstern warning us not to hold our heads out of the carriage windows (and you could do) because 'a smut [in the eye] on the way can spoil the day'. A smut on the way can spoil the day.

Reminded of that smoky danger, I crossed the road to Kings Cross, which tells a different story, and returned via National Express to Leeds, walking past Starbucks, Wetherspoons and the like, housed in what was, and should still be, a great concourse and I was reminded that Mick Jagger once told me that you can't always get what you want!

Bendall's Tea

Bendall's Tea: the aroma of tea and roasting coffee on the corner of Gloucester and Sommerville Roads in Bristol for many years.

This sign stood proud on the prominent corner site for many years and represented quality of provisions and service until such a shop became outdated. Then, over 25 years ago, Bendall's closed and the shop became a carpet shop (and now 201 Gloucester Road is an estate agent), and the solid wooden sign (painted black in many coats over the years on top of the original gold leaf) was removed and lay discarded in the back of the shop until I rescued it and had it refurbished it to its former, gold-leafed glory.

The T-E-A letters are 3ft high, and the BENDALL'S letters are 12in high. It took hours to letterspace these on the wall in the picture.

A potentially forgotten Bristol tea brand lives on above my dining table in Harrogate, home of Yorkshire Tea!

National branding

Like the World Cup in England in 1966 and Concorde, some events define a nation for years to come.

Whether it was filmed in Hollywood or they actually landed on the Moon does not matter. America was first and it has not been repeated by any other country.

40 years on, the record remains. 40 years on the astronauts still hold a mystery and, though presidents come and go, the first men on the Moon have defined a nation's brand over and above so many more events.

Who knows? Whether or not that one small step for man ever took place, it does not matter. It is believed in by the majority over time, and that's exactly how brands work.

The value of a good concept and an excellent brand

I went to hear Jim Averdiek, the founder of Gü, speak about how he did what he did and how it was such a success.

First, he'd thought seriously about the concept and the market, then he approached his brand design consultant to think about a name and the way in which the brand might be positioned.

Going back to the designers after a week, Jim was told that they'd researched the chocolate pudding market and there was already a company in Belgium that did what he wanted to do. They showed him what the company and packaging looked like and how he would have difficulty breaking into their market.

Seeing his disappointment, the designers admitted that they'd made it all up and that Gü was his for the taking.

Then he tested the market, found it viable and partnered with a manufacturer to make the product.

The rest is history - from £0 to £25m in six years.

Lucky or clever, or both? Innovative products and excellent brand strategy underpins the whole process.

What sort of zone?

What sort of zone is this in Praha? A haven for really bad icon designers or what?

PR or PR

This brand mark was made in the last century. The client was a PR company that wanted to break the stuffed shirt mode. Running badly behind with the deadline, I got up at 3am, drew the mark, designed the stationery range, brochure ideas etc, mounted the presentation and made the coffee just in time for the clients' arrival at 9am. They loved it!

This was before the Tories used it!