What is it about rebranding or renaming of not just
products, but companies and in the UK’s case, whole Government departments?
Where did it come from, how did it stealthily get under our finger nails? And why
did they bother?
I suppose it’s an art, an extreme test of
creativity and, when done right, results in a bouncing baby brand. You get
visibility, findability, differentiation, relevance – a great renaming evokes
an appropriate emotional response in the target market: hipness or gravitas or
whimsy or dignity or aspiration. It’s the beginning of a compelling brand
narrative. But when renaming is done badly as seems to happen in government
circles it’s just a confusing waste of public money.
Snickers of
Ulay
One of the early re-brands was that of the nutty chocolate
bar Marathon which changed its name to Snickers, and then there was the likes
of Oil of Ulay which morphed into Olay. Norwich Union became Aviva. All well
and good in the private sector, it’s their money; they can do what they want
with it really but it does cost money !
Aviva must actually rate as the best. Once you had
Commercial Union, General Accident, and Norwich Union. Through various
incarnations they became CGU, CGNU then NU and finally Aviva. All product literature
and all stationary gets reprinted each time with the old stuff being chucked. So
not just expensive but environmentally unfriendly too!
Gove’s
Fluffy Fun Factory
When it comes to the Government though, now that’s
our money they’re using. I didn’t realise how often they did these things but
it’s more common than you think. Can anyone remember, for example, what the
government department responsible for schools is called at the moment? Is it
the The Department for Children, Schools and Families, Department for Education
and Skills? Department for Education and Science? Department of Education or
Department for Education? Or maybe it’s just Michael Gove’s Fluffy Fun Factory?
I could look it up but to be honest I really can’t
be arsed with it. The task appears even more hopeless when you realise that
just about every other government department goes through a similar rebranding,
wasting hundreds of millions of our pounds in the process.
I suppose If they are going to waste our money on
changing the names of their Departments how about eradicating the word
"Defence" from "The Ministry of...." and sustituting the
word "War" which is what the Department used to be called, and is
more akin to what it’s been for the last 15 years.
Labour were
worse for it
The last Labour government spent a small fortune on
department rebrands. In 2009, one rebranding project, the Department for
Communities and Local Government (DCLG) was renamed Communities and Local
Government (CLG). The change involved producing a new logo for the department’s
website and headed paper. In a parliamentary answer, a Minister explained that
the name change was deemed necessary to
‘emphasise the mission of the department’. Freedom of Information documents
revealed that the rebranding cost £24,765. The DCLG was only established in May
2006, after the Office of the Deputy Prime Minister, under John Prescott, was
abolished following a string of revelations about him shagging his secretary. Interestingly
Prescott spent £645 of public money on a new brass plaque for his office,
replacing a sign saying Office of the Deputy Prime Minister with one which read
Deputy Prime Minister’s Office. He was given the sign as a memento when he left
his office in June 2007.
The Department of Trade and Industry (DTI) was
renamed twice between 2005 and 2007 at a cost of £250,000. Then in 2009, Lord
Mandelson decided to change its name for a third time to the Department of
Business, Innovation and Skills!!!
Why change these departments names at all? We all
know that virtually all departments should be called: "Department for
waste and sabotage and perks for the few at the expense of the many"
Why bother?
Why do they continually rebrand? Well In the
private sector three points are usually considered
- It could be the existing company name has become inappropriate or faded or failing, even these judgments put storm clouds on the horizon because they are subjective.
- There are always timid people who believe names shouldn’t change, which adds rumblings of thunder to the clouds.
- There are fears of losing brand equity/visibility/reputation/whatever if the transition is badly handled.
These rebrands aren’t always successful; the
company I work for has rebranded and renamed itself 4 times in the 10 years I’ve
been there. The name now has gone back to virtually what it was when I joined.
But do these really apply to Government
Departments? I doubt it somewhat. Perhaps ministers really do believe things
can mask the truth about something.
One Success
So They Kept Doing It
We’ve all heard of Sellafield in Cumbria, well many
moons ago it had the name Windscale and the reputation of an evil, radiation
leaking, nuclear reprocessing plant, something it still is by the way. But some
bright marketing spark decided the best way to get rid of the reputation of
Windscale was to rebrand it as Sellafield, a place which has only ever
dispensed love and fairy dust into the Irish Sea. It worked and since then it’s
been an unbridled success. It’s even a tourist attraction with its own Visitor’s
Centre.
But that was the only real success they had.
Government ministers conveniently forget the £2million that got lost when the
Post Office tried to deliver a disastrous name change to ‘Consignia’ more than
a decade ago.
A benefit cheat who claimed this sort of money
would be prosecuted and publicly shamed. But ministers can waste millions to
billions and get away scot-free. There are many ministers and departments of
government in need of serious rebranding to reflect their true worth. My choice
of name for both would be Unemployed and Defunct. This would solve a very large
part of our financial problems. If we did not employ so many idiot ministers
they would not be available to waste public revenue on these idiotic schemes.
Marketing a
Junior Industry
The only thing I can put all this down to is the
emergence of marketing as a bonafide industry in itself. This triumph of style
over substance in Government didn’t simply start with Mrs Thatcher’s voice
coach or with Tony Bliar’s orthodontist. Rather it was when someone decided
that “marketing” was a proper career rather than something the secretary turned
their hand to. Astonishingly, the universities were persuaded that you should
be able to get a degree in it.
So, from the early 80s, thousands of talented and
otherwise intelligent young people were persuaded to pop on a pair of
red-framed specs, grab a brightly coloured waistcoat and some yellow socks and
talk rubbish at us for the next 30 years.
So, having just demolished an entire ‘creative’
industry, I’ll leave you with one question. What’s best: name change or real
change?
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