New marketing trend: "Unbranding"

Simon Doonan at New York Observer says that celebrity swag has become anti-swag in the case of some downmarket sub-lebrities. Using Jersey Shore's Snooki as an example, Doonan says that luxury houses are allegedly sending out competitors' products to keep their own brands from being associated with people in the news who don't match their brands' carefully-crafted images. Sounds as if Mary Bale is going to have a new wardrobe next week!

How Snooki Got Her Gucci: The Dirt on Purses
[observer.com] via Business Insider

(Image via Wikimedia Commons. Fake memo 'shooped in for funzies.)

Andrea James is a writer, director, producer and activist based in Los Angeles. Her work often focuses on consumer activism, the free culture movement, exogenous mysticism, humor, and LGBT rights.

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Doonan says, “luxury houses are allegedly sending out competitors’ products to keep their own brands from being associated with people in the news who don’t match their brands’ carefully-crafted images”.

Totally understandable since these companies spend a bloody fortune developing a corporate identity.

The “Corporate Image” though is something entirely different. Corporations have little control over that.
Anonymous

Watson, when working for NCR pre-IBM, used to buy competitor typewriters and cash registers, screw them up, and then sell them cheap to people.

Trashing the oppositions brand is not new.
blueelm

I’m annoying. Some one point a camera at me so I can look dumb in front of millions of people and get free handbags from it.

To be honest though I don’t even know anything about the show. I’m that guy the onion article is about. The one without a TV…

I can see how brands wouldn’t want to be associated with certain scenes though. Kind of ruins the image, but that is funny. After all if the image was all you were paying for you’re kind of a chump.
Hanglyman

From the title and picture, I’d guessed that maybe clothing brands had decided to either eliminate their logos from certain products entirely, or make them smaller and more unobtrusive, for people who don’t like looking like walking billboards.

Looks like no. I guess I’ll go back to being the only person on the planet with that particular fashion aesthetic.
fritz from london

“NEW” marketing trend? ‘Debranding’ has been happening at least since the dot come crash years.
Ben Acheson

No publicity is bad publicity. People regarded as having no class may still be regarded as aspiring to be classy – and plenty of customers will relate to that. Self-proclaimed exclusive brands will not really complain if more people clamour for their products – so long as they control and limit the supply and the price.
Pantograph

It must be hard for your band to be popular with the riff-raff.
Didn’t Burberry lose all it’s appeal to the upper middle class in Britain about a decade ago when it became the chav uniform?
social_maladroit

Wow, look at that orange glow – she could be John Boehner’s sister!
Pantograph

Make that “brand”. Although the same might apply to bands.
penguinchris

This makes a lot of sense because “luxury” brand items are rather expensive, and they lure you in by having a luxurious image. Ridiculous celebrities never help that image – most “luxury” brands I would never consider purchasing (not as a gift for a female either) because of the connotations they have.

It’s the same deal with a lot of upscale clothing brands – things that would have been perfectly benign a decade or two ago, and quite nice looking besides, are now associated with hip-hop or gang culture. You have to be careful what you buy at regular department stores these days.

You can avoid all this, of course, and still have actually luxurious items, if you know where to shop and what to buy. You can still judge items by their brand and not feel like a chump if you know which brands to look for. Of course, then you’ll really be spending a lot of money. Perhaps it’s best for everyday items to simply avoid branding altogether if possible. Most of the nice brands know this as well, and don’t put huge logos on their items, so it works out (remember the recent article about the actually nice brands not having logos on purpose – I think it was here on boingboing?)

That way, you can also mix in cheap stuff you bought at Target, which are not overtly branded in most cases; no one has to know and for many things the quality is fine.

I’m sure I sound like a snob in this comment, but I just like to have high-quality, highly functional, and durable items, and the only way to do that in most cases is to get things from nicer brands, and to pay more for them.
jeligula

This is a nice trend, actually. Let’s unbrand everything. Generic is wonderful. EVERYTHING is getting branded these days. The Idaho State Fairgrounds? Nope. It’s now EXPO IDAHO!!!!!! The Boise Museum of Art? Sorry. It’s BAM, thank you very much. Downtown Boise? Not that, either. It’s BODO. Market, market, market. Get the people through the gates because they are obviously too dumb to be attracted to a verbally descriptive label. Try cute, try flashy, try graphically colorful and seizure inducing, just do not try reality. Nobody wants it. Despite the fact that I have made my living for the past 15 years in advertising (or maybe because of it) I am sick of it all.
Osprey101

I’m in a bidding war between Nike and Reebok as to who will pay me the most not to wear their branded stuff.
primofex

Thomas Edison invented this too.
allen

I think trying to read and understand that article must be what it’s like for non-techies to troubleshoot problems. It’s amazing how much pop culture context I do not have.
Anonymous

I smell a blackmail opportunity –
send $5,000 or I’ll wear your hat!
I’ll do it!
Anonymous

I have to tell you – these kids are doing wonders for Seaside Heights. This whole thing could easily backfire in their faces.
- Anonymous
  
  “I have to tell you – these kids are doing wonders for Seaside Heights.”
  
  How? The target demographic is families with children, right?
  
  “This whole thing could easily backfire in their faces.”
  
  How? They profit no matter how much people on the whole may be making fun of them.
  - Anonymous
    
    I’m telling you that my family was there recently with the kids and seeing Snooki was a talk about moment. Even family people love/hate them.
    
    I think you got part 2 of my comment miixed up -I meant backfire in the fashion houses faces. The Jersey Shore kids are getting dollars no matter what and they should, they’re awesome!
    - Seraphim_72
      
      “The Jersey Shore kids are getting dollars no matter what and they should, they’re awesome!”
      
      No.
      
      Obnoxious, loud, ignorant, stupid. These are things we should not reward. They are smack dab on the line to “Ow! My Balls!”
      
      If it was a “talk about moment” for you and your family {shudder} how about you go to local VFW and take a Vet to lunch? Or talk to that Jewish man with the weird number tat on his forearm. Find a Little Brother, Little Sister or even take a pound dog for a walk. My nephew is off to his third tour of Iraq, I will buy lunch for you and your entire family if he gets to pull no punches when he talks about about his experiences there.
      
      My point is – These are worthless people. Utterly and completely worthless. Honestly I get it, there are Hollywood types I would love to meet, but the Jersey Shore Cows nor any ‘reality’ star even come close to that 100+ person list.
      
      In short, they are not “awesome” they are pathetic, moronic, vile, horrible. I would kiss Dick Chaney on the lips and crank his heart pump if it got that bunch of idiots off the air.
invisibelle

Ed Hardy on Jon Gosselin comes to mind. Not that EH was ever the epitome of classy, but it seems like the pairing could only have served to reinforce the douchiness.
Anonymous

this was used in “how to succeed in evil”, fiction presages reality yet again.