6 Uniqlo Rebrand Plans

I also found a problem that Krispy Kreme sells fatty food so it is opposite to stylish.
I would like to keep eco friendly campaign, but it is enough to make a difference from competitors and rebrand Uniqlo?
Uniqlo needs to rebrand first before doing other campaigns. Setting up brand recognition is priority for Uniqlo to invite people.

Instead of Krispy Kreme, I will choose Bath & Body Works to make original Uniqlo fragrances because they sells a variety of scents and they may have a technique to create special Japanese scents.

Bath & Body Works is a company, which sells body care products in the US. Their product is similar to Body Shop.

For Uniqlo rebranding:
=Uniqlo copies Gap's business model, but they needed to create own business model as Gap's business is not good now. In addition Uniqlo needs BRAND PERSONALITY! If the personality or business model is similar, customers simply follow brand loyalty. (Customers keep going to Gap store.)

1. I set up target audience (17 to 24+). Currently, their target audience is youth and late youth.

2. Current brand personality
•functional beauty
•modern simplicity
•high quality
These three above is not UNIQLO's brand personality because most Japanese companies use the personalities.
Personality should be one uniqueness by one company!
High quality is not personality. It is a product benefit!

Change to...
•casual functional
•exotic
•freely playful mind
•Modern simplicity

3. Change store image
Too much space and less customer (empty image=UNIQLO is not popular image so new customers will not try to use UNIQLO)
-->more crowded image (I won't do this for this semester)

4. Improve UNIQLO name recognition.
Based on research, many people don't know about UNIQLO even though the company is located on Oxford and Regent Streets.
I will think how UNIQLO can improve the recognitions.

5. Make a new brand image with scent for UK customers.
(Enhance brand personality and memorize the brand images using fragrance: What kind of fragrance? Eco?

6. Image making by flash and choose music.
However, I will conduct primary research to see if changing music is effective for rebranding. If so, I will do this for the last semester.

Japanese company

It was hard to find a design for rebranding for Uniqlo because most Japanese companies in the UK are electronic products, cars and some companies, which sell techiniques. They do care about quality, affordable price, and some other factors such as simplicity and hospitality. If the product is very expensive and durable products, quality is important. People use that, but it is not attached on someone's body like clothes or shoes.

If it is attached on body, people think more personal things. "I want to be cool" "I am like ..." Brand personality is important for a clothing company.

Market research about uniqlo

I went to Uniqlo (3 stores in Oxford street), Levi's, Gap and Abercrombie & Fitch.

I discovered several problems before making a concept of eco friendly campaign by three companies.

1. Uniqlo has a very weak brand image.
I conducted qualitative research to several young people in London and asked store workers in Gap and
Uniqlo about Uniqlo's brand image.

The answers are the following:
Uniqlo is too standard. (1 young people in the tube station)
Uniqlo is not stylish. (4 young people on the street in London area)
We never heard of Uniqlo. (4 young people in the tube station)
I only know traffic advertising, but never shopped. (1 young people in the tube station)
Uniqlo is just cheap. (Uniqlo store manager)

2. There is no consistent image among adverstising, a store image.
Advertising just shows high quality and affordable price. There is no attractive to give emough attentions to people.

A store image is far from magazine and brand personality. There is NO CONSISTENT IMAGES. Uniqlo uses UK fashion models, who wear very stylish clothing, but it is hard to understand how I can coordinate clothing like a model from the store display.

3. There is music, but I couldn't hear what kind of music they ran. It was very small volume and not a good image.

From research result, Gap is simple and functional, and stylish. Uniqlo just copied Gap according to the website information and it is a famous story in Japan. However, the store images between are very different.
Levi's was focused on the trends now.
Arbercrombie & Fitch opened the store in London recently, and has already succeeded in business in the UK. The main concept is sexy. The company uses a male model and hire many males for store workers. The store image is like a club. (It is very dark inside,but looks cool.) Their price was higher than Uniqlo's. They use original fragrance for making an impact in the store.

Gap, Levi's and Abercrombie had a long queue, especially Abercrombie. They sell expensive clothes, less item, no brand identity on the store building, but many people got in the store in a short hour. (Perhaps, Arbercrombie advertised many places before opening?

Important points:
They have unique selling position.
They do not copy competitors.
They have original brand personality.

Design Future Event

I attended design future event at Brunel University.
Date: 17 March 2008



Important note:
Image, Identity, reputation
5 Major Trends: Distributing Cocreation, Consumers as creators, New media noise, The cloud, the Brics
a brand's unkept promises or faults are top google search results

DO
1, Be open, honest and transparent, 2, Engage with existing communities, 3. Listen and respond
4, Recruit and monitor carefully, 5, Guide the growth and development, 6, Remain adaptable,
7, Make founder users feel special, 8, Ensure the right balance of users.

DON'T
1, Spin, 2. Make users feel like targetmarkets, 3, Ignore user concerns, 4, Aim for the maintain (tastes change so
all niches need to be catered for) 5, Be corporate-speak as a person, not a representative, 6, Try and control the community, 7, Let the community grow too fast

Learn more: books:
Corporate Identity (Olins)
Legendary Brands (Vincent)
How Brands Become Icons (Holt)
Re-Imaginel (Peters)
Competitive Identity (Anholt)
We, Me, Them, It (Simmons)
On Brand (Olins)
Emotional Branding (Gobe)
Building Strong Brands (Aaker)
Brands and Branding (Economist)
Pattern Recognition (Gibson)
Blink (Gladwell)
Freakonomics (Dubner and Levitt)
The World is Flat (Friedman)
The Long Tail (Anderson)
The Wisdom of Crowds (Surowiecki)

Information is provided by Saffron and LBi

Today's lectures were very useful for me because lecturer gave me information about actual jobs in the branding consulting companies. In addition, I could learn how to present in front of audiences. They had an ability to get attentions from audiences.
I think doing many presentations in front of people and having confidence are important to get used to present in front of people. I hope I can do the better presentation in class.

Krispy Kreme important information

"There was no mention, however, of when the first stores were expected to open, or indeed where, though London is obviously a primary target. Doughnut retailers are not widespread in the UK, despite the fact that Krispy Kreme's main rival, Dunkin' Donuts, is owned by the UK's Allied Domecq group, but the recent proliferation of US-style coffee houses has shown that there is still clearly a great deal of interest in American food culture."

"Even the better-established Dunkin' Donuts is only present in Spain, Germany and Greece, having withdrawn from the UK market a few years ago."
"Many European countries have a well-established patisserie culture of their own, making it hard for doughnuts (or indeed donuts) to make a major impression."

Resources: http://www.bakeryandsnacks.com/news/ng.asp?id=13633-krispy-kreme-to

Some important information about Uniqlo

Key words
-functional beauty
-modern simplicity

Other key words
-modern Japanese retail culture
-beautiful, clean, well-lit and organized
-true hospitality
-quality and basic
-high quality and affordable clothing and accessories

"openings, which were accompanied by much fanfare, including a
performance by hip-hop artist Dizzee Rascal"




A fact:
"Openings, which were accompanied by much fanfare, including a performance by hip-hop artist Dizzee Rascal"
"This is Uniqlo's second bite at the UK cherry. It made its first foray in 2001, quickly opening 23 stores around the country. But its designs -essentially low-priced basics - did not find public favour and, within two years, it closed 18 shops. An uninspiring advertising campaign created by the now-defunct Soul, focusing on price, did not help."

"Of more immediate concern is striking a balance between the brand message and the promotional price positioning that was Uniqlo's undoing six years ago. "We've been trying to get the brand story and personality across in magazines such as Grazia and Dazed & Confused, as well as the London daily papers, and on Tube and bus posters and billboards.""

"its more subtle approach emphasises the Japanese focus on quality, simplicity and attention to detail."
"Fashion basics are fashion basics, and you need more than a fancy store and compelling advertising to persuade people to buy them."

"Hyman believes Uniqlo could struggle to differentiate itself from brands such as Primark and Zara, whose six-week stock turnover provides a compelling reason for people to shop there frequently."

Resources: http://www.designtaxi.com/news.jsp?id=5648&monthview=1&month=10&year=2007
http://www.brandrepublic.com/InDepth/Features/766906/News-Analysis-Uniqlos-second-surge/

Tutorial

Tutorial with Damian Chapman
How am I doing?
I discussed an idea of my project with Damian.
A big idea was that Uniqlo, London night bus and Krispy Kreme have an eco campaign together to create a synergetic effect. I drew this idea on my sketchbook and thought about target audience, locations for advertising, campaign tools, eco materials and so forth.
I discussed with my group members about my project. I decided to research about each company’s eco activity and brand.

Why am I doing this?
To discover an innovative branding strategy.
To build the ability to create a major campaign on my own.
To create a brand reputation and enhance consumer buying behaviors.

What am I going to do?
I am going to think about strategy and graphic design for this campaign. 


I am also going to think about more unique campaigns as well.



Recommended books: The Art of Possibility by Rosamund Stone Zander and Benjamin Zander