I’m reading Scott Bedbury’s book “a new brand world.” He’s a good writer and tells fascinating stories about his time at Nike and Starbucks. It’s hardly a surprise that he has great stories; Scott presided over Marketing during the rapid expansion of these two remarkable companies.
Bedbury says the purpose of his book is to take the mystery out of branding with eight principles that the reader can put into practice. Bedbury observes that:
…if you understand your brand – its values, its mission, its reason for being – and integrate it consistently into everything you do, your entire organization will know how to behave in virtually any and all situations. Behavior and quality, over time, build trust.
A New Brand World shows with logic and examples the importance of demonstrating consistent values and experience to the customer. But what is less clear is how you or I would go about accomplishing this consistency in our own company. Brand is used so broadly in the book that the meaning of the word becomes diluted or confusing.
The question is, exactly how does a company “integrate the brand consistently into everything it does?”
Toyota and disciples of Lean Thinking would answer, by looking at how to create value for the buyer in every situation. By removing waste (that which the customer does not want) and providing a product or service that meets the needs of the customer at a specific place and specific time. By identifying a value stream, all the actions needed to deliver the value. By enabling the value stream to flow in a continuous stream to the customer. By letting the customer pull from the precise product at the precise time.
Starbucks provides an easy example. It creates value (a superior cup of coffee compared to what restaurants typically served before 1995). It identifies a value stream, from the highland coffee growers to the cup handed over the counter to you. It enables the value stream to flow with each cup made to the individual customer’s specifications (the subject of many jokes on late night television). And Starbuck’s lets the customer pull the precise product at the precise time by locating stores on every corner and in every mall in the country.
Lean thinking is a way to apply Bedbury’s ideas about brand to any company’s products and processes.
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