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Burberry

Burberry's target is younger than other luxurious brands. I believe Burberry's brand success is because of acquiring young royal customers including those in their 20s and teenagers.

In Japan, many high school students, both boys and girls, wear Burberry-check mufflers in winter. The Burberry-check muffler has been popular for over 30 years, and I was one of them when I was a high school student. I was happy and comfortable wearing a classic color (Beige) Burberry-check cashmere muffler.

I wore it because I felt the design was cool and many friends of mine wore it (network effect). After that, Burberry became my favorite brand, and I bought some Burberry items such as a trench coat when I became a business person.

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Four Products: Predicting Diffusion

I like a Collapsible Wheel idea. There are 3 reasons.

1.     TAM of Collapsible Wheel is huge. For example, the global wheelchair market size is expected to reach USD 4.9 billion by 2028, according to a new report by Grand View Research, Inc. The market is expected to expand at a CAGR of 8.0% from 2021 to 2028.

2.     Aging society is a megatrend. Increasing in life span and numbers of elderly persons at a global level is one of the key reasons expected to contribute to the market's growth. For example, aging society is the one of the most serious issues in Japan, my home country.

3.     The market is not so price sensitive. Although there are many segmentations in a collapsible wheel, a high-end user is not so price sensitive.

After reading the case, WHEEL, a Japanese innovative auto wheelchair company, came to mind. The company has created amazing innovative folding models (https://whill.inc/jp/model-f ), sold products with a high price such as $ 2,500 and $4,200, and offered a subscription service. Although an innovative design, technology, and service are required, there is significant potential to expand its business.

In our Branding Lab project, since Cosmosii is a SaaS-enabled marketplace for customized costumes, it is challenging to add value tangibly. However, I believe both players, a customer and a designer, become less price-sensitive when the platform establishes a great relationship with a customer and a creator through a great customer experience such as gamification.

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Singapore Airlines

Singapore Airlines is good at involving its customers to develop its services. The company defines itself as a service company, not an airline company. It is crucial to catch up with the customer trend from the company's perspective. To do so, there are two critical points:

1.     Enhancing service quality by talented and trained employees.

2.     Capturing the customer insights, especially loyal customers' insights and reflecting them to a new service.

To enhance employee service training, offering high-quality training and developing employees' skills is vital to keep loyal customers. The company offers a great four-month training including functional skills and soft skills - service behavior.

To capture customer insights, Singapore Airlines uses effectively in-person and online feedback touchpoints such as getting direct feedback in a real situation and feedback via the online survey. However, it is essential to get the customer’s feedback through a real customer experience directly. During the COVID-19 period, Singapore Airlines opened Restaurant A380 @Changi, special temporal dining in Airlines' Airbus A380, to offer a first-class meal to make a customer touchpoint and get the real insights. It was an interesting strategy.

https://simpleflying.com/singapore-airlines-restaurant/

(Brand Lab)

When it comes to Cosmosii, our Brand Lab project, a SaaS-enabled marketplace for customized costumes, it is essential how to nurture a customer's and a creator's royalty to the platform in both ways. Although it is hard to make an in-person experience, it is important to check the real situations such as negotiations between a customer and creator and how to deal with requests from a customer.

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Market Research

Although my team has not decided our Brand Lab project yet, one of our options is NISSAN, one of the largest Japanese auto manufacturers. NISSAN is an EV leading company among the Japanese car companies such as Toyota, but the company's profit has fluctuated recently. It is good timing to think about rebooting its strategy. After reading the Market Research case, I understand "Sample Size" is essential, but “Sampling frame” is more important. It is because the definition of a potential customer for NISSAN is broad, e.g., time frame – some people are thinking of buying a car within a year, but others are just interested in purchasing a car within ten years.

Another topic about "Sample Size." I engaged in TV business in Japan, and "Sample Size" of monitoring TV ratings was an issue. Many clients understood the TV rating from Video research, the most famous TV monitoring company in Japan, was statistically correct, but they said 2,700 households out of 18,350,000 in Kanto area including Tokyo, is too small. In addition, it is another issue, but the clients want to use actual data like the digital world now.

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Corona Beer

I believe that a simple message and consistency in advertising are key success factors when the product is global and a commodity, especially when a company tries to expand its market rapidly. In Corona beer, “Fun, Sun, Beach” is a strong message. Although I am Japanese and was born and raised in Japan, I love Corona beer. The “Fun, Sun, Beach” concept resonates with me. I always drink Corona beer or Coca-Cola when I have a vacation in a beach area. However, the strong image sometimes becomes an obstacle to sales, i.e., the strong image that Corona beer with a lime sometimes makes it difficult to sell the product in a retail store. Honestly, I have an experience that I hesitated to buy Corona beer in a liquor store because I didn't have lime in my house.

Another story about Corona beer. One day, I found the bottles with a small lime sash in Japan. It was Corona Beer's promotion, but it was a breakthrough!