Would you like an “Angry Birds” coffee after smelling like Jack “24” Bauer?

Angry Birds – the world’s best selling Mobile Game has recently ventured into toys, t-shirts ( I bought one recently), books and lots of other ‘brand extensions”. Trade analysts are predicting Angry Birds to be the next Mickey Mouse!!

 

 

I got a little confused however when I read that Angry Birds was now making ‘cakes’ in China.

 

 

Maybe Angry Birds Coffee is next?

 

 

 

 

I LOVE 24 the Action Serial and I personally IDOLIZE Jack Bauer. I mean, if there is a hero in the world that I identify with, its Jack Bauer, what he does and stands for.

 

 

BUT:

 

 

– Would I like to SMELL like Jack Bauer???

 

 

eeeks…..

 

 

This is an ad I spotted on Facebook yesterday:

 

 

 

 

 

So, the theme of this POST is to question if BRANDS should have extensions that are NOT the core offerings of themselves, and to what distance should those brand extensions travel ?

 

 

My belief:

 

 

– BUILD THE CORE BRAND for a long, long time TILL it becomes a PART of consumers lives.

 

 

I mean Mickey Mouse was NOT made in a hurry. Its taken years to establish Mickey Mouse and only TODAY do Grandfather, Dad and Son relate to him.

 

 

Once there is the massive ENDEARMENT about a product or character do I guess its ok (yet risky) to be taken into extensions.

 

 

Reasons:

 

 

A NEW Product, Service or offering can DO ONLY ONE THING RIGHT at a time.

 

 

So lets agree that Angry Birds is the BEST Mobile Game ever. My view is on the basis that Angry Birds is the most downloaded game in the world (and hence lets say its the best).

 

 

BUT – Is an Angry Birds T-Shirt the best T-shirt also??

 

 

I am the proud owner of my Angry Birds T-Shirt and its doing OK, but will the Angry Birds Cake taste as good as Cakes should? Will an Angry Birds book be as compelling as a Noddy or Secret Seven Story?

 

 

My kids saw the Angry Birds movie – RIO and didn’t care too much for it…

 

 

Essentially, if a brand ‘extends’ itself into products that are NOT its core, then bad extensions COULD ruin the core brand.

 

 

I mean what if a kid buys an Angry Bird T-Shirt FIRST and wears it to school and figures that his friends make fun of him (they did when I wore my T-Shirt to a party recently)…. Will the kid then BUY the real Angry Bird Game from his iTunes Store?

 

 

PEOPLE MADE FUN OF ME AT A PARTY WHEN I WORE THIS T :-((

 

 

Another point is so question if the rush into brand extension will HARM the MOTHER BRAND irreparably?

 

 

– Is the brand promise being preserved??

 

 

I mean what does a 24 FRAGRANCE mean??!!! Is this what Jack Bauer smells like when he is in action?

 

 

Just because some poor ‘Bakra’ (Sucker) agreed to pay the 24 owners lots of money to make the Fragrance, is it fair that the 24 Brand owners DO not care whether the Brand is being positioned in a negative way and hence damaging both Mother and Extended Brand just because of some extra bucks??

 

 

– When Brands appear all over the place, COUNTERFEITING begins to happen.

 

 

That’s because, pirates discover lots of products of a supposedly ‘popular’ brand appearing in all kinds of products – shows, bags, dresses, footballs etc and then make their own counterfeit version of what they are good at counterfeiting.

 

 

This creates lots of supply of all kinds of nonsensical products bearing the Master Brand name and in my humble ruins the Original IP and Brand.

 

 

In Mumbai, all the guys who wash cars in the morning wear all kinds of interesting T-Shirts – given to them by the housewives whose husbands no longer want to wear those T’s. Some of the new young guys picked up T’s in the flea markets. I use what kind of brand T’s are these chaps wearing to gauge how ‘ubiquitous’ brands have become.

 

 

I’m betting my car washer man is gonna be wearing an Angry Birds T-Shirt very soon, and it ain’t gonna be my T!

 

 

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