A Mouthwatering Brand Experience at B&G Oysters

Last week when I was in Boston on business, a colleague of mine recommended we try B&G Oysters for dinner. My creative director (Bob) and I were already staying in the South End, so a short walk down Tremont Street seemed like a no brainer. And let me tell you, although it was a brisk walk on a cold New England evening, it was well worth it! Bob and I are already planning our next trip back to B&G.

We sat at the far end of the bar, away from the doorway and close to the grill. It was warm and we had a great view of the chefs as they prepared each meal.

We started with the fried oysters with homemade tartar sauce. This was the best thing I have eaten in ages. The oysters we lightly fried and delicious. The tartar sauce, of which I was suspicious, was tangy and the perfect complement to the oysters. I could have made a meal out of the fried oysters. But truth be told, I wanted a lobster roll! Every time I go to Boston I crave the lobster rolls; In my experience, Legal Seafood has one of the best. It has tons of lobster in big chunks and they go very light on the dressing so the lobster is the star.

For the main course at B&G, Bob ordered the roasted littleneck clams in a spicy red sauce with garlic bruschetta. Wow. It looked so good I had to take a picture. In fact, I took before and after pictures! Check it out.

I’ve already decided that the next time we visit B&G, I want to order the Lobster Cassoulet and more of those fried oysters. Although, the fried Ipswich Clams also look appetizing.

So, if you find yourself in Boston, I recommend you give B&G Oysters a try. Get there early and grab a seat at the bar. You may very well see me there. I aspire to become a regular. You can check out B&G online at http://www.bandgoysters.com/. They’ve got a decent website. Simple and attractive – like their food.

Finally, a special shout out to my friend Tim Brennan, man about town, for recommending  B&G. Tim, Bob and I owe you a debt of thanks.

Post by Dan Dunlop, Brand Expeditions

Truliant Federal Credit Union Launches Social Media Campaign

One of my firm’s clients, Truliant Federal Credit Union, headquartered in Winston-Salem, North Carolina, made its official foray into social media this week – and they did so with a bang! Not quite a week into the campaign, they have 3,797 fans on their Facebook page. One key to driving people to become fans, beyond their positive feelings for the credit union, has been a special Facebook promotion.

Everyone that becomes a fan of Truliant’s Facebook page will be instantly entered to win $1,000 (random drawing held on February 15, 2010). And you don’t have to be a Truliant member to enter the contest. Check out Truliant on Facebook at http://www.facebook.com/TruliantFCU. Winning the money is a great reason to “fan” Truliant on Facebook, but there are other good reasons as well. Truliant will use Facebook to share important information with its members:

* Financial tips

* The latest Truliant news

* Promotional offers

Truliant also has 367 followers on Twitter (http://twitter.com/truliant) and recently launched an amazing new blog at http://www.truliantfcu.org/blog. Check out the image of the blog below. And they’ve hit the ground running with a number of posts from official Truliant bloggers.

I’m excited to see how Truliant’s social media marketing will evolve over time. Social communities represent a wonderful opportunity for the credit union to connect with its members and potential members. Reading the comments from fans on Truliant’s Facebook wall has been an incredible experience. This is a brand that people generally love. They seem to welcome this level of engagement with the brand. If you have time, visit their Facebook page and read the comments on the wall.

Truliant is also promoting its social media campaign on its website. See the screen shot below. My philosophy is: If you’re going to do it, then do it right. If you’re trying to build a social media program, don’t hide it from the world; tell them about it! That’s exactly what Truliant is doing.

Post by Dan Dunlop, Brand Expeditions

Branding Our National Parks, Part II

On the heels of my post about branding our National Parks (http://tinyurl.com/yzpywv5), The Daily Green has published a list of the 10 National Parks you must visit before you die. More evidence that our National Parks are enjoying a sudden boost in brand relevance. Check out the post on The Daily Green at http://tinyurl.com/yht2vje.

And by the way, if you have an interest in the green movement and sustainability, I recommend subscribing to The Daily Green. You can find it online at http://www.thedailygreen.com.

Post by Dan Dunlop, Brand Expeditions

Branding our National Parks: America’s Best Idea

With the release of Ken Burns and Dayton Duncan’s documentary series “The National Parks: America’s Best Idea,” our parks system has enjoyed a sudden resurgence in popularity and brand relevance. At a time when American’s have been suffering through a painful recession, Burns and Duncan reminded us of at least one facet of the American experience that has set us apart: our commitment to the preservation of natural wonders. This has stimulated within Americans a renewed sense of national pride.

This resurgence goes far beyond the recent documentary series. The people at the National Parks Foundation have seized the day, jumping on the bandwagon and doing their best to leverage the attention brought on by the film.

My wife and I have been supporters of our national parks for years. Beginning in the late 90s, I started taking annual week-long treks to the North Cascade Mountains of Washington State. My goal was always to go at the end of October or beginning of November, when the tourist traffic had disappeared due to the onset of cold weather and snow. Some friend of mine have rental cabins at the top of Lake Chelan in a remote area called Stehekin. (Kathy & Randall Dinwiddie of Silver Bay Inn – http://www.silverbayinn.com) This isolated community is only accessible by boat, plane or hiking.

Lake Chelan is a narrow 55-mile-long lake, and the third deepest lake in the US.  The upper lake regions of Lake Chelan take visitors into the wild, spectacular fjord-like region of glacier peaked mountains and deep blueish-green glacial waters of the upper lake area. The photo at the top of this blog shows the view from the property in Stehekin. When I’m in Stehekin, I get up every morning at 5am, make coffee, and then head out to some chairs on the edge of the lake. Then I drink my coffee while waiting for the sun to rise over the mountains. It is amazing to sit there and watch the bald eagles feed on Salmon. About three years ago we took a family summer vacation to Stehekin and I was able to introduce my wife and daughter to the most beautiful spot I’ve ever known. The trip was long, and everyone was cranky, but once we arrived at Stehekin they understood why I make this journey each year. The natural beauty is just amazing. This experience has made us huge fans of the North Cascades National Park and the Lake Chelan National Recreation Areas.

When we go on vacation, we love to hike and get out in the woods. We’ve had wonderful experiences in the North Cascades National Park, the Blue Ridge National Park, Shenandoah National Park, Cape Cod National Sea Shore, Cape Hatteras National Seashore and Colonial National Historic Park, to name a few. My daughter is a junior ranger in at least four different parks! As donors to the National Parks Foundation, we receive their Parks Magazine. It was there that I began to notice the marketing and rebranding effort that was taking place. If you haven’t visited their website, I recommend it: http://www.nationalparks.org. They are doing a terrific job of creating a brand experience online! And they are taking advantage of the popularity of social media. Check out the screen shot below of the home page of their website:

This is a great time to hit the road and rediscover our national parks.

Post by Dan Dunlop, Brand Expeditions

Getting Back to the Garden

One notable trend during this recession has been the emergence of victory or recession gardens, even the urban garden. These often take the form of small space gardens, or what some call postage stamp gardens. The green movement in America has impacted these newcomers to gardening, leading to more sustainable practices such as the elimination of harsh chemicals and pesticides. In all, this is a welcome trend! Americans are definitely getting back to the garden and rediscovering the joy of growing their own food. This summer my 11-year-old stepdaughter and I planted our first garden in our backyard. We grew primarily organic vegetables: cucumbers, heirloom tomatoes, peppers and herbs. It was such a great experience for the two of us to share. Each evening we would venture out into the garden, water the plants, and take pride in what we had achieved. We had a bumper crop of cucumbers that lasted well into September!

Riding the wave of this trend is a company called Garden in the Koop (http://www.inthekoop.com). Emerging from a regentrified chicken koop in rural Hillsborough, North Carolina, founder Laura Baldwin is hoping to bring American families together in the garden by offering families organic and heirloom seeds in complete kits called a “Garden in a Box.” These all in-one starter kits have everything the beginning gardener needs to start his or her vegetable garden on a windowsill. When spring rolls around you’ll be ready to transplant everything, carton and all, into the garden. Each kit contains an egg carton (your container for starting seedlings), coir disks made of coconut fiber to serve as the germinating medium for the seeds, and seed packets with certified organic and often heirloom seeds.

Here’s an except from Garden in the Koop’s website:

“Housed in a reclaimed, two hundred foot chicken house on a historic farm-yes chicken house, we are carefully observed by our peaceable kingdom of goats, chickens, cats, dogs, an occasional skunk, the rabbits and of course the deer! This is where we created the idea and where we grow some of the seeds. Each box is packed, inspected and shipped from our chicken house. We continue to test and grow the different plants so that we can give you the best advice possible. In Reba’s Garden (one of the trial gardens named for an old friend whose happy bark is still missed) we are growing as fast as we can. What we can’t grow ourselves we have sourced from only the best of growers and vendors, keeping it heirloom if possible and always organic.”

It is worth visiting the site just to get a feel for this new company. Their kits are named things like: The Giggling Garden and Here Comes the SunFlowers. The Giggling Garden, a kit to be shared with kids, contains a wide variety of strangely named seeds including Rattle Snake Pole Beans, Dinosaur Kale, and Red Dragon Carrots. Come on, who wouldn’t love growing and then devouring some Rattle Snake Pole Beans? If every anything was going to get kids to eat their vegetables, involving them in their cultivation is a good bet. Feel free to visit them online at http://www.inthekoop.com.

Post by Dan Dunlop, Brand Expeditions

New Study: Journalists Turn to Social Media

Are reporters using social media as a resource when writing stories? I’ve always maintained that most reporters would prefer to do online research as opposed to speaking with a live person for background research. It’s just easier; so why not take the path of least resistance? With all the buzz around social media, it’s not surprising that blogs and social networking sites are now viewed as important research sources by a majority of journalists, according to a new survey conducted by Cision and George Washington University.  The study, titled “2009 Social Media & Online Usage,” reports the results of  “an online survey of Print and Web journalists from September 1, 2009, to October 13, 2009, to measure use of, and attitudes toward, social media for researching and reporting stories.” The report is available for download from Cision at no charge. Just go to http://tinyurl.com/yeagdeq and enter your information. (Source: Cision, 2010)

Here are some of the findings from the study:

• Most journalists – 56% – said social media was important or somewhat important for reporting and producing the stories they wrote.
• Almost nine out of ten journalists reported using Blogs for their online research (89%).
• Approximately two-thirds reported using Social Networking sites and just over half make use of Twitter for online research.
• Newspaper journalists (72%) and those writing for Websites (75%) use Social Networking sites such as LinkedIn and Facebook for online research significantly more often than those at Magazines (58%).
• It is important to note that Corporate websites, press releases and especially PR professionals remain consistently used resources for journalists when writing or producing stories.
• Three-quarters of those responding take the number of website visitors (76%) and number of comments or views (74%) into account when measuring the impact of their stories. Number of Twitter followers and number of inbound links are the next most-used metrics (43% each).
• Experience makes a difference: Those with less experience consistently utilize online and social media metrics to measure the impact of their stores more often than do those with more experience.
• Most journalists responding (84%) said news and information delivered via social media was slightly less or much less reliable/vetted than news delivered via traditional media.
• Lack of fact-checking, verification or reporting standards is the number one reason (49%) for journalists’perceptions on the reliability of news and information from social media sources.

This is an interesting study, and extremely valuable for PR professionals who are advising clients on social media strategies. Again, check it out on Cision’s website by going to http://tinyurl.com/yeagdeq.

Post by Dan Dunlop, The Healthcare Marketer

The Pixie, The Fexy and The EMPixx?

I thought I’d seen it all when I received a mailer a couple of years ago promoting the Blingy Awards. In general, awards competitions have gotten out of hand. Then today one of my co-workers handed me a promotional piece produced by the American Pixel Academy. The headline on the piece read: “Add new life to your Awards shelf.” It was promoting three different awards competitions:

• The Pixie Awards (Deadline November 5, 2010) – The Pixie Awards honors outstanding work in the fastest-growing area of the moving pixels industry: Animation, Motion Graphics and Effects. http://www.pixieawards.com. If you win, you get one of these statues of a figure resembling Tinkerbell!
• The Fexy Awards (Deadline March 5, 2010) – The Fexy Awards honors outstanding use of Photoshop®, Illustrator®, After Effects®, Flash®, Apple Motion®, Final Cut®, filters and other FX software in Print, Web and Moving Pixels. http://www.fexyawards.com.
• The EMPixx Awards (Deadline July 2, 2010) – The EMPixx Awards honor excellence in the production of five categories of Moving Pixels: TV Commercials, TV Programs, Corporate Videos, Internet Moving Pixels, and Independent Films & Videos. http://www.EMPixxAwards.com.

As if there weren’t enough awards competitions out there already, you’ve got three new beauty contests to enter. Enjoy!

Post by Dan Dunlop, Brand Expeditions

The Life and Art of Stephen Huneck

One of our national treasures, Vermont folk artist Stephen Huneck, died last week of a self-inflicted gun shot wound. I met Stephen and his wife Gwen in Vermont, my homeland, back in the early 90s. I’d been collecting Stephen’s work since 1985. In 1994 Stephen suffered from Adult Respiratory Distress Syndrome after a severe fall down a flight of stairs which left him in a coma for two months. This was a scary time, but Stephen eventually recovered and went on to build his now famous Dog Chapel in St. Johnsbury, Vermont.

What made Stephen special and relatable was more than just his love for animals – particularly dogs. For me, it was his sense of humor. He was wiling to laugh at some of our largest institutions including corporate America and the Church. Below are some examples of his work so you can get a feel for what made Stephen special. To check out Stephen Huneck’s work online go to http://www.dogmt.com.

Post by Dan Dunlop, Brand Expeditions

Let’s Be Frank: New Arts Collective Gets Brand Identity

Meet Frank! That’s right, Frank – the new arts collective in Chapel Hill, North Carolina. The press release from the Town of Chapel Hill, North Carolina, said it best:

“Frank has attitude. Frank commands attention. Frank speaks up and speaks out, letting the world know there is a vibrant arts community in the Triangle, whose epicenter just happens to be at 109 E. Franklin St.(in Chapel Hill).” (Source: Town of Chapel Hill Press Release, 12-14-09)

A Frank Explanation: The gallery is 3,400 square feet of space that will be operated by 25 member artists and include another 50 regional and national artists. The project was made possible through these 25 artists with support from the Town, the County’s arts and tourism directors and several leaders in economic development. The Town of Chapel Hill, in conjunction with the Chapel Hill Downtown Partnership, approved the $40,000 loan to fund the collective through its Small Art Business Loan Program. The gallery, expected to open in early 2010, will feature a diverse collection of varied art forms.

As part of yesterday’s ceremony, the group unveiled the logo and brand for Frank, which were designed pro bono by Jennings (that’s my company). We crafted  an identity that is bold and  highly representative of this innovative project to bring new energy and diversity to downtown Chapel Hill.

To access the Town of Chapel Hill’s press release announcing Frank’s birth, go to http://tinyurl.com/y97dkze.

Post by Dan Dunlop, Brand Expeditions

Amazon Kindle “Fly Me Away” Commercial

Working in advertising, it’s rare that I run across a TV commercial that I absolutely love. And when I do, it usually involves great music. That’s the case with the new TV spot for Amazon Kindle. Annie Little’s “Fly Me Away” is the kind of song that captures your imagination much in the same way Feist’s song “1234″ intrigued viewers/listeners in the Apple iPod Nano commercial. Amazon’s use of great music and strong art direction also reminds me of some of the best work done for Volkswagen. I’m thinking in particular of Volkswagen “Pink Moon” commercial for the Cabriolet. The spot features Nick Drake’s “Pink Moon” – an incredible tune. Check out these spots below and let me know what you think:

Here’s the Kindle spot:

Here’s the Apple iPod Nano spot featuring Feist:

And here’s the Volkswagen Cabriolet spot:

Post by Dan Dunlop, Brand Expeditions