Mark Vandegrift (00:01.294)
Welcome to another episode of the Brand Shorthand Podcast. I'm your host, Mark Vandegrift. And with me today is our prognosticating positionist, Lorraine Kessler. Lorraine, welcome back. It's been a few weeks. How are things with you?

Lorraine Kessler (00:15.22)
it has it yeah, it has been. Yeah. So

Mark Vandegrift (00:18.882)
So we are wrapping up. Are you ready for this? Our fourth season. Can you believe that? Yeah. The fourth

Lorraine Kessler (00:23.406)
Mm-hmm. That's unbelievable. Yeah. Does that mean that's how long I've been retired from his majority? It's good because I can't remember. I can't remember. Yeah.

Mark Vandegrift (00:31.458)
Actually, yes. Yeah. It has to have been because we only do one season equals one year. So yeah. So it's our fourth season, the brand shorthand podcast, all gone. Like it's done already. But you know, we do this every year. We we go through some of the news and trends that we covered throughout the year. So in 2026, we had quite a few things that happened, but I think the most

Lorraine Kessler (00:40.13)
That's it's that's amazing.

Lorraine Kessler (00:46.141)
Lorraine Kessler (00:58.99)
Mm-hmm.

Mark Vandegrift (01:01.123)
prognosticated thing that was adjacent to us saying it and then it happening. And I think my daughters call it manifesting it. in September we discussed Wendy's and their rise and fall from fame. And we were talking about, you know, what made them great and what caused them to lose substantially. And you had a suggestion for them and you said what

What did you say would get them back on track? You said it's critical that they return to their roots. Come on.

Lorraine Kessler (01:32.854)
I don't remember. I'm retired. I I Okay, well good. Good. fresh not frozen.

Mark Vandegrift (01:44.781)
So guess what? About three weeks ago, Wendy's released its all-new fresh never frozen campaign. So they went back to their roots. And folks, you heard it here first from our prognosticating positionist. She said, get back to your roots. And we said their advantage when they started was the fresh, never frozen. And they literally

Are talking about that now. That is the name of the campaign. So yes. Yep. That's what the whole TV commercial is about. It's showing their trucks. So it's kind of an odd way to dramatize it, but at the same time, it's right there in big bold letters on the side of a truck. So I guess you would call that a moving billboard. And they didn't even get they didn't get cute with it. They just said what it used to be.

Lorraine Kessler (02:14.968)
I know it's on their trucks too, like I've seen trucks. Yeah. Pretty awesome. Mhm. Right.

Lorraine Kessler (02:34.67)
Well, I think yeah.

Lorraine Kessler (02:39.596)
Man. And you know, I I think when we've done those moving billboards, like one of the greatest ones we ever did, and I'll come back to Wendy's in a minute, but Pro Via for professional grade, windows, doors, whatever. That was the position, named it Pro Via, which is Pro Way or Pro Road, Via being the road. those trucks, I swear to God, every time I see I think, I wish we charged a royalty. We'd be so

Mark Vandegrift (02:49.914)
yeah.

Mark Vandegrift (02:53.504)
Yeah. Yep.

Mark Vandegrift (03:07.203)
my goodness. They're beautiful, aren't they? Yeah. It's that lime green, I think.

Lorraine Kessler (03:09.496)
Rich Mark. They're gorgeous. They're just absolutely gorgeous. And yeah, so Wendy's that green and that gray, way before anybody was doing that chartreuse and gray, but it's just so beautiful. Jeff Moner did an absolute beautiful job with that design. And I think it was Jeff. But yeah, Wendy's, I saw an actual TV commercial about this, and they showed the square burger being and juicingly fried and like.

Mark Vandegrift (03:25.654)
Yeah. Yep.

Lorraine Kessler (03:39.318)
Wow. So I actually subconsciously, not even thinking about I haven't been to Wendy's forever. I drove to Wendy's and I got just a single cheeseburger, not all the whole shebang that Dave's does because I like it plainer. It was delicious. I mean, I was like, this is the best fast food burger I've put in my mouth in years. So

Mark Vandegrift (03:58.133)
Really?

Mark Vandegrift (04:05.602)
So they must have done something, 'cause the last time I had a burger there, I didn't get that sensation. Okay.

Lorraine Kessler (04:09.634)
Yeah. Well, go back now and and try one. they're just another story that we're gonna talk about about brands that have gone back to the future to find the future. And these are success stories. so yeah, fantastic for them. Good.

Mark Vandegrift (04:21.206)
Yeah.

Mark Vandegrift (04:29.015)
Yeah, well let's talk about a few more. What look looking at this whole season, and that goes back to February, what was your most memorable brand move this year or multiple moves, if you if you can think of multiple ones, and why did why did they work?

Lorraine Kessler (04:33.601)
Mm-hmm.

Lorraine Kessler (04:48.13)
Well, it's funny because I think y you didn't plan to talk about Wendy's until it just broke this campaign originally when we talked about this episode. so my two picks, big picks, were Back to the Future brands that went back to the core and said, What made us great? And let's reconnect it with that. And the first one is spot Starbucks with the new strategy of their CEO Brian Nickel. It's working.

Mark Vandegrift (04:54.432)
Yeah. Yep.

Lorraine Kessler (05:18.336)
What what did he try and do? He said, Look, we gotta have drive-throughs, we know that, but that's not what we're about. We're about the experience, the coffee experience. we're gonna get back to that experience, we're gonna get back to employees being happy people, not preaching politics of any kind. we're going to redo our stores to make them again what they used to be community centers and community hubs, and all of that is paying off dividends. I mean

Mark Vandegrift (05:36.033)
Yeah.

Lorraine Kessler (05:47.022)
they've had four consecutive quarters of positive growth this year, almost eight percent. That's in in huge for a brand it's been around. and look at all the coffee competition today. So that's to me, that's huge. they have also earned higher operating margins on that. so they've had positive transaction of growth for the first time in two years.

Mark Vandegrift (06:00.108)
Mm-hmm.

Mm.

Lorraine Kessler (06:16.354)
So perfect. Then Burger King is my second one that went back to the future with their CEO Tom Curtis's play, to come back to the idea that you're the king or you rule, right? Rather than some weird king. But you know, it used to be have it your way made you the king if it w of your world, and they've updated that with you rule, same concept.

Mark Vandegrift (06:33.963)
Yeah, have it your way.

Lorraine Kessler (06:44.44)
in my opinion, just said differently. they put a whopper guarantee, their food looks amazing. They had reclaimed the flame promotions that upgraded food quality and consistency, better packages, packaging, many store innovations. And again, they've had sales growth to the extent that they've now replaced Wendy's as number two in the burger chain.

Mark Vandegrift (07:09.366)
Hm. Okay.

Lorraine Kessler (07:12.182)
So I Wendy's is coming back, so we'll see how that ends up. But I I'm really happy to see that.

Mark Vandegrift (07:15.436)
Yeah.

Mark Vandegrift (07:20.066)
Do you see the Burger King commercials running right now on their chicken nuggets? I found it was very interesting. If you take those and put them against Domino's, when Domino's was saying you told us our pizza recipe is awful, it's almost identical advertising. And they're saying you told us our chicken nuggets were awful and we're re we've reformulated and now they're, you know, rated the best. I thought it was an interesting take because.

Lorraine Kessler (07:26.254)
Well, I haven't seen that. Mm-hmm.

Lorraine Kessler (07:35.682)
Yeah, yes, we fixed it. Mm-hmm.

Mark Vandegrift (07:49.857)
Remember, we went back and we talked about Domino's owning pizza delivery, but they first had to get their product back to, you know, whatever we call acceptable in the f fast food market. So I don't know what's in those chicken nuggets, but now I guess they're considered the best chicken nuggets on the market. So it was interesting they're doing that.

Lorraine Kessler (07:58.178)
Right. Table stakes, I mean. Right. Right.

Lorraine Kessler (08:08.696)
Well, if you've ever had if you've ever had a chicken nugget that's like polyurethane. Right, which I've had. but there's a difference between the nuggets and tenders, like, you know, so i it's a weird kind of thing. You have to kind of be in the chicken know to understand what you're ordering. and just one more and this one isn't a back to the future one, but I just I just think I get tickled by it. I think it was one of your picks last year.

Mark Vandegrift (08:15.67)
Aren't they all?

Mark Vandegrift (08:29.078)
Yeah.

Lorraine Kessler (08:39.066)
liquid death, the water, you know, that really makes a joke in order to disrupt the category about liquid death. and they treated bottled water as a joke, if you will, and using heavy metal kind of imagery, horror film inspired inspired ads. you know, very punk bandish, if you will. well

Mark Vandegrift (08:40.906)
Mm. Yeah.

Mark Vandegrift (08:53.825)
Mm-hmm.

Mark Vandegrift (09:04.566)
Mm-hmm.

Lorraine Kessler (09:06.658)
They got a billion dollar valuation simply by what I would call branding, not based on ingredients, but on identity. And I think that's that's kind of a something to pay attention to in this twenty what quarter century of the two thousands that we're in. It's really something to pay attention to is how much identity will overtake ingredients as part of the branding ploy.

Mark Vandegrift (09:17.174)
Mm-hmm.

Mark Vandegrift (09:34.539)
Mm-hmm.

Lorraine Kessler (09:37.1)
It's not new, it just seems to be certainly more acute with liquid death.

Mark Vandegrift (09:44.449)
Yeah. They do a tremendous job. I mean, there's i if if I had to guess, their their days are filled with sitting in a room figuring out what their next ploy is gonna be to disrupt themselves. Like how do we top ourselves? So Okay s yeah, marketing wise. Yeah, there I mean, product wise there's a lot of copros, but that's that's all marketing. That doesn't have to do with the product as much. But good. So

Lorraine Kessler (09:58.924)
Yeah. Right, marketing wise. Yeah. Mm-hmm.

Mark Vandegrift (10:13.376)
We you gave us the best. So what what are the worst brand moves that you saw this year?

Lorraine Kessler (10:15.352)
Mm-hmm.

Lorraine Kessler (10:19.17)
Well, kind of paralleling the burger pole thing that's going on. The worst was from our episode nine, Playing to Win in Brand Rivalries, where CEO Chris Kemzinski attempts in a viral promotional video to taste the big archburger with this small and then and then he adds insult to injury by telling the Wall Street.

Mark Vandegrift (10:36.98)
Mm-hmm.

That was good.

Lorraine Kessler (10:48.706)
Journal. Well, my mother told me not to talk with my mouth full. Well then well then don't make a commercial. It was like you're not in your mother's kitchen. the CEO of the number one burger train. You should like the product. And then he also doesn't in when we we I went back to watch the spot. He doesn't call this a delicious hamburger, right? He calls it a delicious product. Now

Mark Vandegrift (10:52.962)
Right.

Lorraine Kessler (11:17.716)
You know we did an episode on true crime and anytime you use words like d different pronouns, like past tense, so or that's not a pronoun, but you use different put like they over there kind of thing, you're distancing yourself. So by calling it a product, he's even further distancing himself from the from the hamburgers and the food, as if this isn't real food. So,

Mark Vandegrift (11:40.896)
Yep. Yeah.

Lorraine Kessler (11:43.68)
And then it just set it up so that Burger King and Wendy's were able to mock him, which it was like the worst possible. So that to me was a total failure. And you know, on one hand, we have other CEOs and they they're credible and they're passionate about their food, like there's Jersey Mike's, and we just talked about Wend Wendy's and we talked about you know, Burger King and Starbucks. Their CEOs are out in front, but like

you believe what they believe. So there's a real danger in your CEO not being the right kind of talent for this. Real danger.

Mark Vandegrift (12:24.631)
Yeah, you you mentioned Jersey and Mike's. I'd love to hear how their Danny DeVito promotions have done for them, but they have done such a good job of continuing that promotion now for what three, four years at least. And it must be hitting a home run because they keep running with them. And I just find Danny DeVito to be superb in every one of those commercials. And

Lorraine Kessler (12:41.379)
yeah, at least. Yep.

Lorraine Kessler (12:50.082)
Yeah. Yep.

Mark Vandegrift (12:52.395)
At first, when I saw it, I'm like, this this sucks. Just because, you know, it's Danny DeVito, and I thought this is a stretch. He's gotten better every time. And now you have the Eli Manning, you know, rivalry going on. And that's just such a great contrast, you know. It's almost like when Arnold Schwarzenegger and Danny DeVito were in twins. Remember that that movie? That was classic. And it it feels like they picked up some of that.

Lorraine Kessler (12:56.322)
Yeah.

Yeah.

Lorraine Kessler (13:11.502)
Yeah.

Lorraine Kessler (13:16.524)
Yeah, yeah. yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

Mark Vandegrift (13:22.29)
Zuj or whatever you want to call it. I love that. Good. Well, what was your biggest surprise for the year for for a brand? What do you think kind of was I don't know, it shocked you the most?

Lorraine Kessler (13:24.556)
Yep. Yep.

Lorraine Kessler (13:35.554)
Well what shocked me was the blatant misogyny and soft porn in the ad that Sydney Sweeney did for that prediction app Novig or Nova I don't even know how to say it. where I mean I think you know your kids are gonna see this, your grandkids are gonna see this. I thought it was like pandering sex at almost a pornographic level.

Mark Vandegrift (13:56.386)
Mm-hmm.

Lorraine Kessler (14:03.574)
It was extremely offensive to women in my opinion. It's like going backwards, right? with this nudity or suggestive nudity. So to me it was totally tone-deaf and exploitative, and I'm not alone. it created a lot of controversy, a lot of women came out against it. but sadly, it was an advertising success. And I so that disappoints me. it the brand mention spiked it like nine hundred percent. Now

Mark Vandegrift (14:05.25)
Mm-hmm.

Lorraine Kessler (14:33.634)
A lot of that's negative, but it just shows that controversy can fuel a certain brand. and certainly I guess that predicted prediction apps isn't something everybody wants in their life as a moral fit. the trading value tripled after the campaign, so and the valuation quadrupled. So it just proves that shock, sex,

Mark Vandegrift (14:49.943)
Mm-hmm.

Lorraine Kessler (15:05.748)
media clamor they all sell and bad taste doesn't make I don't think it really goes out of style. I think we get immune. It's called that shock diminishation rule where we just get immune and we adapt it, adapt to it. So that was one.

Mark Vandegrift (15:30.252)
Do you how do you think that plays with the American Eagle series with her?

Lorraine Kessler (15:36.074)
I still don't prefer the American Eagle for I don't know, it's like becoming more about Sydney Sweeney in very provocative kinds of things. I think their their ads are much more tasteful, less expose. and she fits the brand or what they're trying to do with the brand a little bit more. But I I think the timing is really bad to have her in these you know, 'cause then it's like she's just a

Mark Vandegrift (15:44.759)
Mm-hmm.

Lorraine Kessler (16:06.066)
you know she's just a hack for hire. Yeah, she's just a sex kitten for selling. And so there's a you lose n integrity when you have the same celebrity so close together in similar genre. One is more you know blatant than the other. But I just feel like from a brand standpoint it hurts the credibility of the brand.

Lorraine Kessler (16:39.532)
Well, I would say episode six, Brand Shorthand's hundredth episode, right? why we in its majority focus on positioning. and I think that highlighted why we're dedicated to the principles of Jack Trout and Al Reese as partner and why and the relationship we have with Jack Trout personally.

And I'll just say that, you know, we were able to talk about how positioning changed Dick's life and his trajectory as an owner of an agency in the early 80s and and also my trajectory. We started almost at the same time in the business at two different ends of the state. And we both had a relationship with Jack Trout, which was unbelievably kismet when we finally did meet.

I just think that what what they were able to simplify the concepts that they codified, which by the way, weren't totally brand new. It was how they how they codified them, how they simplified them into principles, and then how they showed exhibits and examples. Because what they were standing on was one, a history of advertising success from the madmen era.

And two, the shoulders of the greats, like Rosser Reeves, who wrote Reality and Advertising and came up with the USP, and Bill Birmbach, who was one of the greatest of all-time advertisers, who is anybody should study him, David Oglevy. I mean, these were the original madmen of advertising. And nothing they said.

Countered what they said. It was a matter of emphasis. They picked out what those men said and they realized that positioning was all the more important because of overcompetition creating overcommunication in a society where choice now became tyrannical. So you know, and I always thought it was interesting that if you study like Michael Porter, who's very academic, right, Harvard, if you read his book.

Lorraine Kessler (19:00.762)
competitive strategy. It's really a hard read. But he has the five competitive forces. It's unbelievable as you study Porter how he moved more towards differentiation. Even the five competitive forces, I think is a homage to Reese and Trout. Warren Buffett talks about the moat building differentiation moat that people can't get in easily. So they're all preaching what I think

Trout and Reeves were able to simplify and make make applicable for advertisers. Like that's the other thing. It the way they wrote, it made it so applicable. You could understand it at a level where it could be shared and it could be practiced, where you read Marker Michael Porter's book, which is great. It's really hard to apply all those retain, much less apply everything that he has. So anyway, yeah.

Right. And worthwhile. I mean it's a worthwhile exercise, but I love the handiness of all the work that Trat and Reese did. And I guess yeah, the the other one was episode sixteen, The Big Idea in Marketing. because I think what this emphasizes is that it's not just what you say, which it would be to me

Strategically differentiated. Like how can we find a niche or a hole that we can own uniquely, credibly, that people care a lot about that isn't occupied. That's strategy. Okay, that's what what you say. And then, but how you say it? That's where the creative comes in. And that's where I mean, to me, just to have the what, which is what I focused on.

is like building a car that never leaves the garage. You know, that has no engine. Because the rubber, the rubber meets the road when you figure out how to express the idea. And that's not just words, although words are most important in my opinion, but words, pictures and sounds. And that takes an extra element of creative inspiration and understanding

Lorraine Kessler (21:27.852)
what will stick in the mind and how an idea can become sticky. 'cause you can take the best strategy in the world and I've seen people do this. per cell, for example, the laundry so and like they have never found the magic of how to say what they're trying to say. It is the most boring advertising for a very strategically vibrant position.

So I think the big idea is everything. And I think the people who are able to add to that, our creative staff, our writers, our wordsmiths, our artists are they they are the ones who make that work. They make that alchemy work of advertising. and you know, the more stunning the campaign, the more memorable the better. And I just think of all the things we've done, like keep the family on full.

For Bell Stores, the Erasable Man, which is one of my all-time favorite, for the dry erase, stay clean, upholstery, stay irrational, renaming Maslow and Museum, Masmoo, the smart store identity for the library. I I just think it's your funeral by promoting a funeral home in a very unique way, by showing unique individuals who want very specialized.

funeral service that fits their personality or identity again. I think these are just we've just hit some thing home runs out of the park, but not the strategy was right and that's good. That's what you want. You want the best possible strategy you can have and authentically own. But if you don't communicate it in this way, you just get like a bunt. You know.

Lorraine Kessler (23:36.738)
Well, we've just dedicated our entire focus to that and everyone knows when you have a position as a company, it's the operating principle for everything. If you're making sexy cars, then e everything is held to that, like, all right, we're gonna re-engineer our steering wheel. How do we make it sexy? I mean it becomes the thing. And all of our creative people know that they've got to have a position first. They have to know what

It is we want to say, and then they figure out how to say it. So everybody, there's not a lot of questioning about, well, we could say this or we could say that or we could say that. No, that's decided. How we say it is the only discussion that has to happen. So I sometimes I have people who say, well, positioning is passe. I mean Jack Trout, Al Reese, 1981, blah blah blah.

And I always remind them, when they wrote this book, they identified positioning as the emphasis that we needed to put on marketing above all else because of over-competition, which creates over-communication. That was the problem. That is the problem of 1980. And I always say, are the problems of over-competition and over-communication less today?

Then in 1981. I mean, consider, take grocery stores. In 1980, 81, there were like 12 to 14,000 SKUs. Today, most grocery stores, conventional grocery stores, I'm not even talking the mega stores or big box, they're going to carry 40 to 50,000 SKUs. Competition, tyranny of choice. Also, consider the change in just the grocery landscape.

In the 1980s, you had conventional stores and you had mom and pop's. They dominated. Just starting were buyers' clubs like Sam's, Superstores, C stores, which got into the groceries, specialty stores. They were just kind of nascent. Today they're completely dominant and strong. And now we've added to them discount stores like Aldi's and Trader Joe's plus e-commerce. So is there less competition? I don't think so.

Lorraine Kessler (26:01.812)
And it competition breeds communication. and as for overcommunication, you and I know this, this is one of the biggest changes that we've seen in our business, is the media today is expanded. I mean it's so expansive, it's it's impossible to even put all the possible opportunities on one page. it's just fever pitch.

what you have is you know we I used to have three to four TV networks and now we have hundreds of cable channels and dozens of streaming channels yielding tens of thousands on-demand channels. There's video content now, right? We have TikTok, we have YouTube, we have billions of videos, AM and FM, yeah, AM and FM, Sirius, Spotify, Apple Music, Google Music.

Podcasts, digital news channel, I mean the short answer is just this. With all this overcommunication, because of all this competition, people just aren't paying attention and they can't take it all in. So if you don't stand out with a differentiated idea and a differentiated way of communicating that idea, positioning in other words, it's what you say and how you say it.

You're dead at the gate. I mean, you don't even don't even play. Don't even

Lorraine Kessler (27:53.543)
my gosh.