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Branding   URGENT - Need Help Fast!  
 
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New Color For Machines - Need Advice
Posted By: bpease* on 4/26/2005 11:25 AM (CST) 50 Points
Traditionally, our equipment has always been white with black and pms 240 [magenta] striping along the sides. We have recently come out with a new product & the engineering development team has changed the color scheme to a gray body with orange/red striping.

These colors appear no where else in our product line and have no relation to the colors in our logo. Will this hurt us in the market?

Posted by: NuCoPro Accepted Answer
4/26/2005 11:40 AM (CST)
I don't know if it will hurt you, but it sure isn't going to help you. If it's not too late, you should discuss reverting to the original color palette with Engineering.

If it is too late, then you need to find out how this product is SO unique from the rest of your products, that it needed to stand out on its on, and then use that in your marketing.

Good luck!
 
Posted by: damomc* Accepted Answer
4/26/2005 11:46 AM (CST)
Have to agree with vevolution. Keeping the colour scheme uniform will do no harm to your brand recognition. If your brand is strong and recognisable that is. If however you feel that your brand image is tired this may be an ideal opportunity to inject some new life into it.
 
Posted by: W.M.M.A. Accepted Answer
4/26/2005 11:46 AM (CST)
I must agree w/Gary.

If you can not change the scheme...your marketing department will have to be very creative. You will be changing the appearance of your entire company. Your branding must begin again.

If these are 'better' products, then introducing them as Premier Line or something similar could be a boost for you. If it is a lesser line...creativity will be the key.

Randall
WMMA
 
Posted by: mccarthy* Accepted Answer
4/26/2005 11:46 AM (CST)
Wow, from near magenta / white to gray /red is a serious shift. (What do you expect from engineers?)

In a word, "yes" this is a serious blow to your brand identity. Machinery is one of those items that is clearly associated with the brand. It's packaging. And any time you change packaging, you risk confusion in the marketplace. First of all, why change from high contrast:high visibility to low contrast? Did this come from consumer input or engineering? (My guess is that it is the latter.)

Changes in equipment design are expected, but changes in color schemes (your brand identity) signal outsourcing of manufacture, change in quality, change in ownership (did these guys just get bought out?) and a myriad of messages that may or may not be correct.

The bottom line question is this:
Does your current color scheme (brand) hurt sales? If the answer is not a resounding "yes" then only a real rookie (or engineer) would even consider doing a Michael Jackson treatment to your visual trademarks.

If you'd like to set up a conference call, I'd be more than happy to grab the engineers by their fuzzy little ears and give them every reason that unless they want marketing to start re-engineering, that they should not even think about re-branding.

Good luck!
 
Posted by: pkemper* Accepted Answer
4/26/2005 12:47 PM (CST)
I think there is a more fundamental issue: engineers should not concern themselves with product colors. They should concern themselves with making technology work. Product design is driven my brand and thus marketing, more than by engineering. Of course egineers will have influence, but only to try to build product casing that fits as closely as possible with the brand and would still be feasible to manufacture.
 
Posted by: W.M.M.A. Accepted Answer
4/26/2005 1:15 PM (CST)
HERE-HERE.
Make that new Policy, bpease.

Leave marketers to marketing.
Look what happened to the US Navy....now everything is Gray.
Randall
WMMA
 
Posted by: NuCoPro Accepted Answer
4/26/2005 1:51 PM (CST)
It would be helpful if you could convene a joint meeting of all the "stakeholders" in launching a new product. Everyone needs to understand that the path to success is via close coordination, not one group making unilateral decisions.

Every area has unique perspectives that need to be considered when launching new products to ensure success. Your engineering group needs to understand that the days of, "If you build it, they will come." are long past.

It's been said that, "It takes a village to raise a child." Well, it also takes all parts of a company's operation to launch a successful product.
 
Posted by: bpease* Author Response
4/26/2005 1:57 PM (CST)
All of your answers are extremely helpful and is backing up my position on this issue since the inception of our latest product.

I am printing all of these responses thus far and am going to use them as part of my ammunition when I go in and present my case to top management.

I appreciate all of the feedback & quick responses. Your knowlege and expertise is greatly appreciated.
 
Posted by: kwinters* Accepted Answer
4/26/2005 3:03 PM (CST)
I am going to go against the grain here, but I do not think it is that big of a deal...as long as you still identify the machinery with your name and logo the same as before...

New colors mean new products and hopefully more color will communicate better product....

Don't think it is that big of a deal!
 
Posted by: ASVP/ChrisB Accepted Answer
4/26/2005 6:31 PM (CST)
Sorry to differ from kwinters but IMO it is a big deal.

Not so much because of the colour change, but because of what a unilateral decision to change the colour represents.

Look at it like this: Engineering redesigns a machine, and relaunches it with different colours. Next time, maybe they change the shape, and the time after, the manufacturing cost, the performance, who knows what?

What drove the decision to change the colour? It was no accident.

Who has to sign off on these things?

What do the people who authorised the decision know about the customer?

This is NOT about a Marketing vs. Engineering turf war. It’s about an issue of critical survival for the company: Who’s running it, who’s making decisions, and why? And what are the strategic implications of their decisions? And do they understand that?

Decisions like this MUST be made by the whole business leadership team with advice from the key areas where responsibility rests.

I don’t need to ask - it is clear - this company has no strategy maps to show everyone what their objectives are. It can’t… If it has, they need seriously redeveloping to align the whole business, and fast!


But before you go in all guns blazing, just check the political lie of the land and make sure the CEO hasn't short-circuited all the usual processes for a packaging change like this. If he has, well the rest of the team has their legs cut from under them, and you need to be careful how you proceed.

Nothing worse than a a moral, but pyrrhic victory!

Hope this helps.

ChrisB
 
Posted by: rob Accepted Answer
4/28/2005 8:52 AM (CST)
I agree with Chris, becfore you walk into battle with guns blazing, check out the scene for any snipers. Do a little research, if you haven't already, in what drove the color change. Certainly your engineers are smart enough not do do this kind of thing unilaterally. So, the command must have come from somewhere. And as marketing, you should be aware of who and why the call was made.

And if it was the CEO, then be prepared for the discussion in terms of potential impact on the business and ROI, rather than just talking about the actual colors themselves. There's plenty of content out there to support the statement that a strong brand, which includes being consistent in your presentations to the public, have better financial health then troubled brands.

Best of luck with this.

RobB
 
Posted by: stevea Accepted Answer
4/28/2005 9:17 AM (CST)
I agree with the members who think that this will cause damage. Most companies which develop a brand by accident are usually unaware of the value it has in the market. I have several examples of clients who, to their surprise, discovered that the value of their “Brand” exceeded their fixed assets when they came to sell their enterprise. No company that had paid a small fortune to establish such a market identity would endanger it by playing footloose with the paint pots.

I also agree with the cautionary notes: Find out whom, in the hierarchy signed off the design changes. If it was the chairman or the CEO, then you have a challenge on your hands to explain the potential downsides. If it was the engineering director, you have a different challenge – after all, under its unintended disguise, the product might well be a superb development and you will not wish to alienate a fine engineer. Educating engineers into the realities of marketing can be a rewarding experience for all concerned.

I have experienced seemingly innocent changes in the past. We used to make thermometers – bright orange ones which over 10 years had become well recognised in industry. Then the chairman spotted some very well designed little black numbers hailing from his German competitor along with a couple of me-too products from other manufacturers. He wanted black ones and after an extensive design review, he got them. Their performance in the market was poor. No one recognised our quality brand from the adverts and many would-be customers assumed that we’d had them made in the far-east.

Our next range was to be a set of data loggers and producing their large cases in bright orange plastic would have made them look like a child’s picnic box! However, we determined that the main market would be the food industry where for safety purposes; the accepted colour was white for sanitary applications. So we went with white as an acceptable colour with an orange logo and released them as the “Food Range” The market saw and approved of the connection, the PR opportunities were fantastic and after a couple of months they were selling way in excess of our expectations. The chairman loved it – he approved of the design and the colour and we had beaten his old rivals, being the first to produce a designer white box!

If your company wants to change the colours of their product, do it for the right reasons.

Good luck

Steve Alker
Unimax Solutions
 
Posted by: dwillis Accepted Answer
4/28/2005 12:49 PM (CST)
It's really quite simple. Call your field service techs. Have them identify one key account where you have multiple machines in one environment. Speak to the head of machine maintenance there. Ask him what your machines look like. You will have your answer. (If he can tell you off the top of his head, don't change a thing...)

PS I spent ten years selling capital equipment. I would venture that most of your team has never been in one of these environments, let alone picked your equipment out from across a 200,000 sq. ft. facility when stacked cheek by jowl against a competitor's.
 


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