Month: February 2021

How a little hard pressed creativity with the core business hit the mark (twice)

/ Paul Christopher Walton / Leave a comment

The Brand Historian’s Timeline: 1960

Harold Macmillan was right on the money when he talked about the winds of change. 

In 1960, they were blowing strong, and they weren’t just signalling the end of the British Empire but also beaching fading flotsam like the News Chronicle, Farthings and National Service. The winds were also bringing us surprising new stuff like Coronation Street, black plastic dustbin bags, and an achingly cool TV advert for a new presentation of a very old drink. 

Cider fermented from the juice of apples and pears was probably first introduced by the Normans and soon developed strong roots in the west and south west of England. It wasn’t always a rustic habit. There had been a time in the 18th century when, thanks to John Scudamore and the cider apple he grew called Redstreak, English cider became, at least momentarily, quite the fashion in European society.

But it’s the Bulmers of Credenhill, Hereford who more than anyone succeeded in bringing cider permanently out of its farmhouse bucolic haze and into the Major League of international drinks brands. Cider has always been a somewhat schizophrenic drink. On the one hand, it was known as an easy drinking alcohol for debutante drinkers, and on the other, for an altogether harder, more edgy glass, characterised by park bench drinking and the street legend of the Snakebite. Over successive generations, the Bulmer family proved to be skilful brand managers and created two differently positioned brands to represent this dichotomy. The first was called Woodpecker, a copper coloured, medium-sweet cider made by Percy Bulmer in 1894, which featured as its pack icon a little Green Woodpecker. This will be familiar to many ageing Baby Boomers would have taken it in flagons to parties 50 years ago. 

Strongbow, launched in 1960, was a very different proposition. Made with bitter sharp apples and a little culinary fruit to tame the tartness and the tannins, Strongbow was an attractive presentation of the more adult side of the cider box. Named after one of the great medieval Marcher families famous for their prowess at biff and bang along the border, Strongbow was launched with a black and white TV ad by Leo Burnett which starred a cool, Bond-like archer whose draw and subsequent release symbolised the brand’s ability to cut through thirst. The advert also introduced the double-arrow-thud-thud which has since served as a superb brand Mnemonic and identifier.

Soon, Strongbow became the premium dry cider that took on the lagers which all the major brewers were now investing huge amounts of money in. In a bigger long drinks game of share-of-throat, Strongbow grew aggressively by successfully innovating in packaging formats (keg, cans, PET bottles) and to a lesser extent with brand derivatives and line extensions, and became the prime engine of HP Bulmer’s growth in the UK and far beyond.

The Brand Historian has always had a soft spot for Bulmers, having worked for the company and its portfolio of brands since his rookie days in 1977, and especially when in 1986, it became a founder client of The Value Engineers.  The cider market has had its ups and downs over the years. Like the rolling border hills which surround Hereford, cider sales will no doubt continue to rise and fall as fashions and seasons change, but I am quite sure that Strongbow will be refreshened by the prevailing winds of change and those famous arrows will hit the mark once more.

A Bulmers 1960 Playlist:

Woodpecker Yellow Dot Bikini Brian Hyland

Strongbow Apache The Shadows

The Sauce of Milord!

/ Paul Christopher Walton / Leave a comment

From the Brand Historian’s Timeline: 1837

Conventional marketing wisdom says that versatility is the Fool’s Gold of brand positioning, because nearly always it’s more of a theoretical benefit than an actual one. As the new tech software brands like Lotus 123 (with spreadsheets) and Harvard Graphics (with presentation charting) showed in the 1980s, what customers respond best to is the killer app. 

But Lea and Perrins Worcestershire Sauce is the flavoursome exception to that rule. Since its mysterious appearance on the first cruise ships in the 1830s, Lea and Perrins has been perking up posh cheese on toast, sprinkling oysters, boosting burgers, spiking Blood Marys and adding a little relish to crisps and steak tartare. As the early advertisements promised, Lea and Perrins Worcestershire sauce ‘adds a peculiar piquancy applicable to every dish.’

Whilst the exact circumstances of its creation are still a little hazy, the brand appeared during the Golden Age of lotions and potions, elixirs and snake oils that found their way into the marketplaces of the new industrial landscapes of the mid-nineteenth century. John Wheely Lea and William Henry Perrins were Worcester pharmacists who sold a goodly variety of this stuff, including patent trusses, worming tablets for horses, hair restorer and Cheltenham Salts. But it was the dark meaty sauce of decomposed anchovies, fruit and spices brewed up in their kitchens behind their chemist shop which made their name.

With claims to be the secret recipe of an English milord (who may or may not have been the Duke of Wellington’s wingman), brought back from India, and patronised by the Gentry, this umami power pack of taste was soon being exported all over the world where it fired up the locals and their dishes from dim sum to Creole stews, satay to barbecues. Brits on a Grand Tour loved it too, keeping a bottle or two in their luggage as a handy tastemaker and a secret medicine to keep the nasties away.

Lea and Perrins and their sauce did very well, and the Perrins family became serious benefactors, including building the huge St John’s Parish Church of Barmouth in Snowdonia which I note looks to be a similar brownstone colour to that of Worcester Sauce.*

Following its sale to HP Foods in the 1930s, the brand has become something of a rich orphan passed from one large corporation to another. Since 2005, it has been part of Heinz Kraft where I have no doubt it continues to be a strong contributor. In the time of COVID, travel is sadly denied to us, but when, before too long I hope, we are flying again, and the drinks trolley arrives with all the usual suspects including the familiar bottle of L&P, please raise your Bloody Mary and toast the chemists of Broad Street, Worcester whose salesmanship transcends all the known laws of brand positioning. A little piquancy can go a long way….

Music to relish:

Piano Concerto No2 Mendelssohn

* For more on Barmouth and St John’s, please visit mariansonthemawddach.com

The Green revolution that began with a sausage

/ Paul Christopher Walton / Leave a comment

From the Brand Historian’s Timeline: 1889

Knorr was one of the first famous food brands that the Brand Historian worked on. It was in the early 1980s, when CPC International owned the brand.  I was working on innovation projects for its CMO, Anthony Garvey – clever, soft spoken and one of the most inspirational clients I have ever worked with. Tony was also a great champion of one of his products, Aromat which came in a plastic tube dressed in the familiar yellow, green and red house colours of Knorr.

Aromat is seen all over Europe, especially in restaurants where it remains one of the essential table condiments. On the label it says, at least in the UK, All-purpose Savoury Seasoning, and we might think of it as the Swiss Army Knife of culinary sprinklings. As his rookie strategic planner, Tony took me aside and explained how important this product was to the retailer, the hospitality industry, and to the end consumer; it was also supremely profitable to CPC and was thus my introduction to the value-creating magic of culinary ingredients. 

Apart from being one of Unilever’s biggest food brands today, Knorr is also a superb example of how brand meaning can and should be evolved overtime to take account of social, technological and economic change. 

The brand had its origins in the in the late 1830s in Germany, when Carl Heinrich Knorr opened a factory in Heilbronn in Baden – Württemberg, where he had moved to follow his love. Originally the firm he founded supplied ground chicory to the coffee industry; but in the second half of the 19th century, there was also tremendous interest and experimentation in the dehydration of vegetables and seasonings to extend their shelf life. In this new technology, Carl Heinrich saw the opportunity of evolving the scope of his business. Knorr’s first great gift to the world came in 1889 with the launch of his recipe for Erbswurst – a pea soup dry mix packed in a sausage-shaped roll that became a famous feature of the German Army’s Iron Rations. It also was the foundation of Knorr’s huge soup business in Europe. With its new mission in dried ingredients, Knorr followed up with its first sauce mix in 1908, and a bouillon cube in 1912.

After the end of the Second World War, Knorr was acquired by Corn Products in the USA, by which time it was one of Europe’s leading culinary brands; its success was due at least in part, because it reinforced rather than challenged local cooking habits. By the time Knorr joined the Unilever portfolio in 2000 for a whopping $24bn, it was one of the world’s top food brands renowned for its embrace of cuisine diversity and for highlighting its vital connection to chefs and chef know-how. 

Today, Knorr is in the vanguard of Unilever’s green agenda, and its newly refreshed mission is about extending what it considers the limited range of foods people eat. With its products, recipes, tips and tricks, it aims to show consumers how we can all build a greener, sustainable future. Carl Heinrich would no doubt approve, and I just hope there’s still a place for Knorr Aromat to perk up that kale lasagne. 

Music to enjoy with your Erbswurst out in the field:

Das Rheingold Richard Wagner 

Empire Building

/ Paul Christopher Walton / 1 Comment

From the Brand Historian’s Timeline: 1759

Early on the morning of September 13th, 1759 a young British general is dying on the battlefield at the very moment of victory. He’s dying from a bullet hole in his chest, but now the French army which he has taken by surprise on the Plains of Abraham is on the run, and not just from Québec but across the whole of North America from the Saint Lawrence to Florida. 

In what has been called the first proper world war, but which is more familiarly known to us as The Seven Years War, 1759 is the annus mirabilis for Great Britain. Across five continents, by land and sea, the British and their allies have triumphed, and their blast of empire building will now transform the world. 

Back nearer home, another great chain of transformations is about to start. Arthur Guinness is just two years older than James Wolfe and both have been brought up in middle class Anglican households. Arthur’s godfather is an Archbishop, and he’s left him a legacy of £100 – no small sum in 1759. But whilst James Wolfe has met his date with destiny on the Saint Lawrence, Arthur Guinness has chosen the Liffey in Dublin, and taken the lease on an old brewery at Saint James’s Gate. He plans to build upon his father’s reputation for brewing good beer. 

It is at this stage that we have to put out of our minds, at least for the moment, the dark black beer with a thick creamy head that we think of when we think of the brand Guinness. We must also have no thought of its famous surge and long pour because in 1759, Arthur Guinness is actually brewing a classic Irish pale ale.

But Guinness has considerable ambition, and a good nose for opportunity. He’s picked Saint James’s gate because it’s close to the new Grand Canal which connects Dublin with the River Shannon and Limerick and will make his supply chain both efficient and economical. Shortly, he will further shake things up when he starts brewing an English style of beer called Porter which is brewed with darker malts. Porter is associated with the labourers who work the London markets and Stout Porter was a popular variant. By 1779, Arthur’s new brews were a success and from now on, he decides that Porter will be the only beer he will brew. By 1821, his beer is called Guinness Extra Stout and it was already selling well throughout the Empire.

Thanks to its founder’s vision, Guinness has always been a brand that celebrates transformations, and today it is one of the world’s biggest and most distinctive brands of beer. It also one of the most innovative, having launched the iconic Guinness Draught in 1959 (with the Nitrogen and CO2 mix), and Canned Guinness, powered by the widget in 1988. The Brand Historian played a small role in this last innovation and has many happy memories of meetings at Saint James’s Gate and Park Royal, eventually being awarded a small pewter trophy with the inscription For Stout Service. 

Today, the Guinness empire still stretches across the world, but it is interesting to list its top five markets by volume which are in order: UK, Nigeria, Ireland, USA and Cameroon. 

Who would have imagined this when Arthur Guinness pulled his first pint at the old Rainsford brewery in 1759, the Year of Marvels?

Music to enjoy your pint with:

Heart of Oak William Boyce and David Garrick

Or check out a poem at:

The Transformation (Under the influence of Arthur Guinness)