Our brand is a simple way of offering the customers an idea of what the product actually is. It helps them make a clear distinction between competing producers within a particular sector, therefore the decision-making process is less complicated. In addition, the brand is designed to be a representation of the company’s reputation and since most buyers have realized how significant customer satisfaction is, they believe in reliable brands and return to them, which is also known as developing brand loyalty. Thus, branding is one of the most influential and valuable methods for expanding a consumer group (Brown, 2016).
We represent a brand named Rimowa – a company with a wide collection of polycarbonate and aluminium luggage, as well as leather accessories for men and women. It is a symbol of ancestry since it comes from Richard Morszeck Warenzeichen – the son of the initial founder Paul Morszeck. The brilliant innovation of the company dates back to 1930s when the first aluminum trunk was introduced in the market. The distinctive characteristic of Rimowa products is the parallel-grooved aluminium structure which was launched in 1950 (Rimowa, 2017). Our company seized every opportunity to expand its product range and develop the design of the luggage throughout the years. The quality of each piece of Rimowa luggage is shown not only in the high-class design, but in the smaller details such as the engraved frame of the suitcases. Our main competitor on the market are Samsonite, which create products with very similar features, however Rimowa stands out with unique and stylish designs for connoisseurs. Our brand has already been cast in 130 different movies and as a group we think that the James Bond movie is a perfect opportunity to represent one of Rimowa’s most elegant collections Topas Stealth (Rimowa, 2017).
Main body- –
Rimowa is one of Europe’s leading luggage manufacturers, producing lightweight luggage utilising “state-of-the-art” materials. SWOT and STP analyses highlight the benediction of Rimowa’s Topas Stealth range, the intended product placement beneficiary within the “Bondscape”. With the latest release of Spectre (2015), grossing £102.9m at the domestic box office, it’s the highest grossing film spawned within the UK (Davidson, 2015). Regardless of it being panned by critics as “the worst 007 movie in 30 years” (Mendelson, 2015), the cultural staple being James Bond ensures prodigious product exposure (See Appendix A). Lamentably, the entrenched popularity of James Bond guarantees exuberant product placement costs. For example, Heineken compensated Eon Productions £45 million for the marketing privilege of appearing in Skyfall (Flood, 2012). Although, as the renowned phrase coined by John Wanamaker implies, “half the money I spend on advertising is wasted; the trouble is I don’t know which half”. I.e. the effectiveness of product placement is often disputed as contemporary audiences are savvy to brands’ marketing efforts (Gail, 2011). This is discernibly evident during Spectre’s opening weekend, as fans’ disparaging remarks surrounding Heineken’s seemingly unsubtle and rationally detrimental product placement highlighted numerous headlines.
This begs the question – is product placement worth the investment? Abundant evidence declares product placement’s capabilities of ensuring increased future cash flow through enhancing “consumer awareness and “brand attitudes” (Wiles & Danielova, 2009). Product placement innately increases market value through heightening a consumer’s intent to consume. This derives from placements increasing “purchase intent”, leading to impulse purchases and accelerating cash flows (Gould, Gupta, and Grabner-Krauter, 2000). Product placements tend to expand the existing consumer base, increasing lasting value amongst potential consumers. Greater Red Stripe sales shortly following The Firm’s release is ample evidence of increased value. Alternatively, Rimowa may utilise tie-in advertising – this occurs when a placed product appears in a film before its release, enabling consumers time to process Rimowa’s placement. Ideally, media coverage surrounding the announcement of brand partners itself generates behemothic exposure, raising awareness of the film and the product in question. Ultimately, the lasting impact of participating in the “Bondscape” is an unmissable opportunity.
Audience-consumer cohesion:
Product placement success inherently relies on audience-consumer cohesion; for example, Muslim demographics are insusceptible to alcohol-related product placement. Rimowa-Bondscape cohesion is axiomatic – Rimowa demographics appeal to: AB consumers; males; aged 30-59 (See Appendix B). Similarly, the Bond franchise arguably appeals to males between the ages of 12-55 (statistical yearbook audiences, 2015). Counterintuitively, UK cinema audiences are dominated by 15-24 year olds, at 29% (statistical yearbook audiences, 2015), indicating problematic audience redundancy. However, Spectre received above-average audience share from the AB group, cementing 38% of Spectre’s total viewership (statistical yearbook audiences, 2015).
Through the Bond movie, we are trying to achieve a higher brand awareness and recall of the product. The viewers can more easily remember a brand when the visual placement approach is compatible with the storyline (Williams et al., 2011). With consideration to both visual and aural placements throughout the film, it has been highlighted that consumers find product placement in a movie more realistic, if for example, the placement help them imagine a narrative that naturally suits the subject of the movie (DeLorme and Reid, 1999; Sung, De Gregorio, and Jung, 2009; Van der Waldt et al., 2007). Therefore, the key criterion for the successfulness of our product placement, is the complete and ready association of the idea in the public mind between both the brands of Rimowa and bond brandscape, presented both naturally and effortlessly throughout the film. This being the case we believe our brand can provide a natural fit within two key situations during the film: the first playing that a complementary role to that of both characters of Bond and Q (The innovation genius). The strong-featured and innovative nature of our brand provides a natural fit to the characters presented in your film, and as such will fit effortlessly into scenes. Secondly we would ask that a majority of the luggage presented throughout the film exist within our branded range of products, especially in iconic areas with the Bond film such as airports and hotels. We believe this will not only benefit our brand from the increased exposure but also to add an element of realism to the scenes which is an influential determinant of audience enjoyment (Ang, 1985) and may also increase positive attitudes towards your movie (Koordeman, Anschutz, and Engels, 2014). There are many opportunities that both Rimowa and the Bond brand can take to incorporate both interests and values. One of which is Co- branding, Co- branding is when a partnership is formed between two brands with similar interests to provide a product or service with different values and features continued (Blackett and Boad, 1999). In an article on brand management, Grossman (1997) looks at the success of many co-branding partnerships such as the movie GoldenEye is credited with the success of BMW’s Z3 and Mastercard improving its position by teaming up with General Motors and AT&T; both of these were a huge success for both brands.
Method 1- Covert advertising
The key criterion for successful product placement, is the complete and ready association of the idea in the public mind between the brand Rimowa and bondbarnaca. This works best when natural and effortless, on the other hand is less effective when inappropriate, when imagery is at odds with the well established bond brandscape, it therefore cannot be force fitted into screenplay.
The method that will be used to display the brand throughout the film is covert advertising. Covert advertising. This enables products and brand to create awareness through the use of films, TV shows and music videos. This method of advertising is very cost effective for both the brand and the film as the placement is discrete among the image of the film although provides efficient exposure. There are various examples of covert advertising in previous bond films such as Heineken in Skyfall. As mentioned above the ad
vertising cost Heineken £45 million, Darryl Collis, a director of one of Britain’s leading product placement agencies said-
“Forty-five million sounds like a lot,” he says, “but Bond is a global property. If you break it down into all the different countries that the company would be advertising in, anyway, it doesn’t seem so much. Heineken also knows that people will be watching a Bond film for decades, so it’s not as if they’re paying for a one-off ad. They’re paying to become known as a premium brand in the long term. It’s more about shifting perceptions than shifting products.”(Barber, 2015)
Simply covert advertising within the ‘bondscape’ is not something that has little impact or usages. The vast scale of the Bond Empire is more desired than the film itself. For Rimowa the diverse and worldwide audience will develop their brand throughout the world taking a ‘not so obvious’ approach to marketing. Apparently, when the branded product is not directly connected to the storyline, the product placement turns out to be more successful and memorable for the audience. What we are trying to avoid with Rimowa is a prominent placement, since it is considered to be unrealistic and distracting from the actual plotline, which might cause a negative backlash from the audience (Cain, 2011). Although aligning with the ‘bond’ theme which may have some drawbacks, such as competitor brands that take a more dominant approach may hinder the success of our campaign.
Method 2-Tie-in Advertising:
The product tie-in is a marketing method, created to attract more customers and boost sales immediately through a TV show, movie, etc. It will be a good starting point for the promotion of the Topas Stealth Range because it will allow us to focus on a particular target audience. As a matter of fact, tie-in advertising will combine brand loyalty and movie loyalty (Tooley, n.d.) Our brand will attract all the admirers of the Bond movie through a tie-in ad before the release of the movie, dedicated entirely to the product, though containing certain elements of the plotline. For instance, in 2015 the Dutch beer manufacturer Heineken partnered with the producers of the newest Bond film ‘Spectre’ to create a tie-in ad with Daniel Craig who is known to have the leading role of James Bond in most of the movies (Schultz, 2015). This smart marketing method was not beneficial only for Heineken, but for ‘Spectre’ as well since the content of the ad and the participation of the main actor contributed to the promotion of the new movie.
We as a company believe that one of the most effective way to promote both the brand of Bond and Rimowa would be a means of partnership that cross-advertises both trademarks effectively. Cooperation with a high-value partner such as yourself could enhance the focal brand image of both our brand and increase brand value perception created by our partnership (Washburn, Till, & Priluck, 2000). It is highlighted within resource based views that brand partnerships with varying combinations of assets can have a positive effect on the future cash flow expectations of the two partners when used effectively to increase brand touchpoints (Cao and Yan, 2017). When analyzing both the resource we own and ones held by the Bond brandscape, we concluded that we can best contribute to the partnership would be through our product range, which can not only create value for your intended audience but also so that we can benefit from the “halo of affection” that belongs to the high equity brand such as Bond (Rao & Ruekert, 1994). To do this we aim to create product line inspired by the Bond films and bring such line to an exclusive market. This will be including the production of two new beautiful product ranges to celebrate the release of the forthcoming James Bond film. While we have noted that previous brands such as Globetrotter have followed a similar route, we however would look to go further than pure cosmetics and truly create a line of products inspired not only by the lustrous elegance of Bond, but also combined with the technical innovation that makes the bond franchise so state-of-the-art, in an attempt to create a purely unique product that even James Bond would be proud to use. Within the design element we would work with influences from both Jany Teminie (Bond Lead costume designer) & Daniel Craig management to present the most accurate representation for the brand. Furthermore, we would want to incorporate ground breaking technology inspired by both characters of Bond and Q into the product range. This innovation Includes but not limited to touch security activation and secret compartments so that every time one opens such case they get that little sensory experience of what it is like to be an international super spy.
With a global franchise that is as successful as bond there will already be very clear guideline and how to approach media advertising, whether it be appropriate or inappropriate. Once we have discussed with the brand and know the media landscape we can move onto the most effective and appropriate measure, whether that be exposure to premium brands, high associate audience publications or online. With this in mind to increasing exposure of both brands, we believe the use of Social media and Competitions would be inappropriate for the caliber of our brand, as such we argue that the best way to expose both our brands to the high-worth demographic would be through luxury magazines such as the economist or GQ. Within these magazines we would present the new product ranges marketing both Rimowa and Bond.
Main body- –
Rimowa is one of Europe’s leading luggage manufacturers, producing lightweight luggage utilising “state-of-the-art” materials. SWOT and STP analyses highlight the benediction of Rimowa’s Topas Stealth range, the intended product placement beneficiary within the “Bondscape”. With the latest release of Spectre (2015), grossing £102.9m at the domestic box office, it’s the highest grossing film spawned within the UK (Davidson, 2015). Regardless of it being panned by critics as “the worst 007 movie in 30 years” (Mendelson, 2015), the cultural staple being James Bond ensures prodigious product exposure (See Appendix A). Lamentably, the entrenched popularity of James Bond guarantees exuberant product placement costs. For example, Heineken compensated Eon Productions £45 million for the marketing privilege of appearing in Skyfall (Flood, 2012). Although, as the renowned phrase coined by John Wanamaker implies, “half the money I spend on advertising is wasted; the trouble is I don’t know which half”. I.e. the effectiveness of product placement is often disputed as contemporary audiences are savvy to brands’ marketing efforts (Gail, 2011). This is discernibly evident during Spectre’s opening weekend, as fans’ disparaging remarks surrounding Heineken’s seemingly unsubtle and rationally detrimental product placement highlighted numerous headlines.
This begs the question – is product placement worth the investment? Abundant evidence declares product placement’s capabilities of ensuring increased future cash flow through enhancing “consumer awareness and “brand attitudes” (Wiles & Danielova, 2009). Product placement innately increases market value through heightening a consumer’s intent to consume. This derives from placements increasing “purchase intent”, leading to impulse purchases and accelerating cash flows (Gould, Gupta, and Grabner-Krauter, 2000). Product placements tend to expand the existing consumer base, increasing lasting value amongst potential consumers. Greater Red Stripe sales shortly following The Firm’s release is ample evidence of increased value. Alternatively, Rimowa may utilise tie-in advertising – this occurs when a placed product appears in a film before its release, enabling consumers time to process Rimowa’s placement. Ideally, media coverage surrounding the announcement of brand partners itself generates behemothic exposure, raising awareness of the film and the product in question. Ultimately, the lasting impact of participating in the “Bondscape” is an unmissable opportunity.
Audience-consumer cohesion:
Product placement success inherently relies on audience-consumer cohesion; for example, Muslim demographics are insusceptible to alcohol-related product placement. Rimowa-Bondscape cohesion is axiomatic – Rimowa demographics appeal to: AB consumers; males; aged 30-59 (See Appendix B). Similarly, the Bond franchise arguably appeals to males between the ages of 12-55 (statistical yearbook audiences, 2015). Counterintuitively, UK cinema audiences are dominated by 15-24 year olds, at 29% (statistical yearbook audiences, 2015), indicating problematic audience redundancy. However, Spectre received above-average audience share from the AB group, cementing 38% of Spectre’s total viewership (statistical yearbook audiences, 2015).
Through the Bond movie, we are trying to achieve a higher brand awareness and recall of the product. The viewers can more easily remember a brand when the visual placement approach is compatible with the storyline (Williams et al., 2011). With consideration to both visual and aural placements throughout the film, it has been highlighted that consumers find product placement in a movie more realistic, if for example, the placement help them imagine a narrative that naturally suits the subject of the movie (DeLorme and Reid, 1999; Sung, De Gregorio, and Jung, 2009; Van der Waldt et al., 2007). Therefore, the key criterion for the successfulness of our product placement, is the complete and ready association of the idea in the public mind between both the brands of Rimowa and bond brandscape, presented both naturally and effortlessly throughout the film. This being the case we believe our brand can provide a natural fit within two key situations during the film: the first playing that a complementary role to that of both characters of Bond and Q (The innovation genius). The strong-featured and innovative nature of our brand provides a natural fit to the characters presented in your film, and as such will fit effortlessly into scenes. Secondly we would ask that a majority of the luggage presented throughout the film exist within our branded range of products, especially in iconic areas with the Bond film such as airports and hotels. We believe this will not only benefit our brand from the increased exposure but also to add an element of realism to the scenes which is an influential determinant of audience enjoyment (Ang, 1985) and may also increase positive attitudes towards your movie (Koordeman, Anschutz, and Engels, 2014). There are many opportunities that both Rimowa and the Bond brand can take to incorporate both interests and values. One of which is Co- branding, Co- branding is when a partnership is formed between two brands with similar interests to provide a product or service with different values and features continued (Blackett and Boad, 1999). In an article on brand management, Grossman (1997) looks at the success of many co-branding partnerships such as the movie GoldenEye is credited with the success of BMW’s Z3 and Mastercard improving its position by teaming up with General Motors and AT&T; both of these were a huge success for both brands.
Method 1- Covert advertising
The key criterion for successful product placement, is the complete and ready association of the idea in the public mind between the brand Rimowa and bondbarnaca. This works best when natural and effortless, on the other hand is less effective when inappropriate, when imagery is at odds with the well established bond brandscape, it therefore cannot be force fitted into screenplay.
The method that will be used to display the brand throughout the film is covert advertising. Covert advertising. This enables products and brand to create awareness through the use of films, TV shows and music videos. This method of advertising is very cost effective for both the brand and the film as the placement is discrete among the image of the film although provides efficient exposure. There are various examples of covert advertising in previous bond films such as Heineken in Skyfall. As mentioned above the ad
vertising cost Heineken £45 million, Darryl Collis, a director of one of Britain’s leading product placement agencies said-
“Forty-five million sounds like a lot,” he says, “but Bond is a global property. If you break it down into all the different countries that the company would be advertising in, anyway, it doesn’t seem so much. Heineken also knows that people will be watching a Bond film for decades, so it’s not as if they’re paying for a one-off ad. They’re paying to become known as a premium brand in the long term. It’s more about shifting perceptions than shifting products.”(Barber, 2015)
Simply covert advertising within the ‘bondscape’ is not something that has little impact or usages. The vast scale of the Bond Empire is more desired than the film itself. For Rimowa the diverse and worldwide audience will develop their brand throughout the world taking a ‘not so obvious’ approach to marketing. Apparently, when the branded product is not directly connected to the storyline, the product placement turns out to be more successful and memorable for the audience. What we are trying to avoid with Rimowa is a prominent placement, since it is considered to be unrealistic and distracting from the actual plotline, which might cause a negative backlash from the audience (Cain, 2011). Although aligning with the ‘bond’ theme which may have some drawbacks, such as competitor brands that take a more dominant approach may hinder the success of our campaign.
Method 2-Tie-in Advertising:
The product tie-in is a marketing method, created to attract more customers and boost sales immediately through a TV show, movie, etc. It will be a good starting point for the promotion of the Topas Stealth Range because it will allow us to focus on a particular target audience. As a matter of fact, tie-in advertising will combine brand loyalty and movie loyalty (Tooley, n.d.) Our brand will attract all the admirers of the Bond movie through a tie-in ad before the release of the movie, dedicated entirely to the product, though containing certain elements of the plotline. For instance, in 2015 the Dutch beer manufacturer Heineken partnered with the producers of the newest Bond film ‘Spectre’ to create a tie-in ad with Daniel Craig who is known to have the leading role of James Bond in most of the movies (Schultz, 2015). This smart marketing method was not beneficial only for Heineken, but for ‘Spectre’ as well since the content of the ad and the participation of the main actor contributed to the promotion of the new movie.
We as a company believe that one of the most effective way to promote both the brand of Bond and Rimowa would be a means of partnership that cross-advertises both trademarks effectively. Cooperation with a high-value partner such as yourself could enhance the focal brand image of both our brand and increase brand value perception created by our partnership (Washburn, Till, & Priluck, 2000). It is highlighted within resource based views that brand partnerships with varying combinations of assets can have a positive effect on the future cash flow expectations of the two partners when used effectively to increase brand touchpoints (Cao and Yan, 2017). When analyzing both the resource we own and ones held by the Bond brandscape, we concluded that we can best contribute to the partnership would be through our product range, which can not only create value for your intended audience but also so that we can benefit from the “halo of affection” that belongs to the high equity brand such as Bond (Rao & Ruekert, 1994). To do this we aim to create product line inspired by the Bond films and bring such line to an exclusive market. This will be including the production of two new beautiful product ranges to celebrate the release of the forthcoming James Bond film. While we have noted that previous brands such as Globetrotter have followed a similar route, we however would look to go further than pure cosmetics and truly create a line of products inspired not only by the lustrous elegance of Bond, but also combined with the technical innovation that makes the bond franchise so state-of-the-art, in an attempt to create a purely unique product that even James Bond would be proud to use. Within the design element we would work with influences from both Jany Teminie (Bond Lead costume designer) & Daniel Craig management to present the most accurate representation for the brand. Furthermore, we would want to incorporate ground breaking technology inspired by both characters of Bond and Q into the product range. This innovation Includes but not limited to touch security activation and secret compartments so that every time one opens such case they get that little sensory experience of what it is like to be an international super spy.
With a global franchise that is as successful as bond there will already be very clear guideline and how to approach media advertising, whether it be appropriate or inappropriate. Once we have discussed with the brand and know the media landscape we can move onto the most effective and appropriate measure, whether that be exposure to premium brands, high associate audience publications or online. With this in mind to increasing exposure of both brands, we believe the use of Social media and Competitions would be inappropriate for the caliber of our brand, as such we argue that the best way to expose both our brands to the high-worth demographic would be through luxury magazines such as the economist or GQ. Within these magazines we would present the new product ranges marketing both Rimowa and Bond.