Raiders of the lost Brand

The author of this article deserves a quick introduction from us. He is a collaborator we hope to to be reading a lot in the future; a collaborator who’s not a part of Globulart per se, but who has been, and remains, a friend, an adviser and a teacher or master. All in all, a restless mind who will surely inspire us and make us all think.
Ángel Domínguez - Globulart Diseño.

and now for the real thing…

Raiders of the lost Brand

by Adolfo Rosillo

http://www.elpais.com/articulo/internacional/vale/nombre/elpepiint/20080427elpepiint_12/Tes/

Today I am re-reading the article in the above URL, only in the printed version of El País, and the question comes to my mind automatically: differences aside, is there a list of the most valuable brands that are Made in Andalucía? What’s more, are there brands that are Made in Almería? Do they even exist? What I mean is… once a brand or company is entered in the Register of Companies, and has operated at a local, regional, national, european or even global scale, are those brands known outside our local sphere? There’s the evidence of companies from Almería in global markets such as agriculture or marble, but are their products recognized and noticed because they carry a specific brand and because they are produced in Almería?

Reading Moisés Naím provides us with enough data to estimate the profitability of building brands rather than just building companies: a classic marketing motto reminds us that “a product collapses, a brand holds up”. A brand doesn’t only provide an income flow because of its prestige, it becomes a safeguard for the products or services designated by it.

I said it right: designates, gives them much more than a recognizable name and an attractive look. Google may have come from the word “goggle”: a lesson in simplicity and visual efficiency (the double “oo” reminds us of a pair of staring eyes) in the identity building process. The famous Wii console by Nintendo has such a name because it sounds like “oui” (”yes” in french) and “we” at the same time: two words that everybody understands without speaking a foreign language, words that sum up the spirit of the product, the type of interaction proposed by the gaming console.

And now, the bad news. How many companies based in Almería are named after the founder, or as a succession of syllables taken from names and surnames, more or less cacophonic? Another lost opportunity of communicating who we are, what we offer or where we come from, something important about our product or service.

Worse yet: if you haven’t got your own identity, others will make one up for you when you least expect it, and generally a negative one: when central Europe distributors want to put pressure one the producers in Almería, “somebody” finds the way to put Almería in the headlines of international news outlets: pesticides, labour conditions, you-name-it. Nobody talks about us except when it is intended to cause harm.

(provisional) conclusion
If anyone can answer any of the questions raised here about brands and corporate identity, his or her ideas will be welcome. I am not referring to what the textbooks have to say on the subject, but rather to what we can contribute to creating an identity for companies based in Almería. You know: “think global, act local”.In any case, thanks for your time.

Adolfo Rosillo has been teaching Art History and Theory of the Image at the Art School of Almería since 1997. He studied in the Fine Arts School of the University of Granada, and is particularly interested in unraveling the tangle that is contemporary visual culture. He often finds knots. The identities that companies and public intitutions provide themselves with is one of the knots he most enjoys disentangling.