Turn Logic into Magic (2)

By Dominique Trempont, Guest Author

A brand is a person’s perception about a company, a product and/or a service (support, training, customer service, straight service).

It is emotional and personal: each of us decides to recognize a brand positively, negatively or not at all.

A brand is what people say it is, not what a company tries to project as its image.

A brand becomes the reference point for people to compare alternatives when they buy.

Case in point: Whole Foods and Trader Joe’s, both popular grocery chains.

Whole Foods (WF) manages to appeal to a set of customers that want organic vegetables, nature loving staff and high quality products. Trader Joe’s (TJ) is incredibly resourceful in bringing interesting food and beverage products from around the world, at an affordable price.

Both chains have made a visit to their store a discovery: What is new? There is so much choice! Have you tried this? I like it!

The cashiers are involved and help you with their best buy recommendations in wine and food.

TJ is about 30-40% lower priced than WF.

Both supermarkets have loyal customers and strong brands.

It is the result of a very well designed end-to-end customer experience, including client services and packaging.

Contrast this customer experience with Safeway: always the same products, fairly high prices, nothing really special or original, helpful staff, open 24/7.

Safeway is a dull brand that is now scrambling to catch up in their premium locations and leverage their presence with organic produce, dedicated butchers and more interesting wines and breads.

The race is on but I would not bet that Safeway’s “gets it” all the way and re-ups the ante on WF and TJ.

Target is an interesting case. Starting from a low price leadership, it is now differentiating by injecting design and designers in its commodity clothing lines, cooking ware and home products. The staff is very helpful.

You now see Porsches parked next to beat up Kias at Target.

They are building a fairly hot brand in their space. Compare this to the shopping experience at Walmart or Costco, who have the number of customers but a terrible, non-experiential shopping experience.

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