blog Karri Knuuttila Sun 22. January 2012 Jaa

German brand school vol. 1

Today I’d like to share a few thoughts about Germany’s greatest gift to the bright future of mankind – Lidl.

From year to year the Lidl direct mailings are some of the most effective, best-remembered and best-liked advertising according to consumer research – at least here in Finland. It’s almost like magic when you find out that a frozen Thai food box gets a price reduction of a whopping 10c from 2,99€ to 2,89€. A temporary price reduction of a bit over 3% begets a complete relapse of reason and people can’t help but to run to the freezer islands of their local Lidl.

I’ve often wondered what is the secret behind the mystical path that the marketing wizards of Lidl have taken to solve the cryptic mysteries of the arcane arts of what I would call Überadvertising - what is the dark, most likely truly evil, pact that they have made either with the devil himself or at least Jerry Della Femina. Or hey, maybe it’s just beer and sausages were talking here. That’s how they got me hooked.

Today however I got a sign from the heavens high above as I bumped into the latest direct discounts brochure of Lidl and discovered a brand of men’s “classically stylish” clothing. I’m sure everyone understands that there’s no point of discussing the contributions that Lidl has made for clothing “style”, but there’s something even more important here to consider.

In case I didn’t mention already, these Germans are also masters of engineering brand names (yes, emphasis on the word engineering). I really hope some day to get to meet the guru, the messiah-like German higher being who came up with the amazingly clever (not to mention efficient) idea of combining the concepts of living and energy - the resulting new brand name for the previously mentioned men’s clothing line… *drum roll*… Livergy®.

It’s really not every day that you encounter such concentrated bursts of pure creative power in brand name development.

 

No but seriously, I do love Lidl…