The Homa Files

Excerpted from Brand Channel “Campbell’s Soup un-canny” by Adam Sauer, November 10, 2008

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…Even before Warhol pointed out the obvious, Campbell’s was an iconic brand. From its humble beginnings as Joseph Campbell’s cannery of tomatoes, soups, condiments, vegetables, and mincemeat in 1869, it grew into a brand that identifies Americana as much as it identifies America.

While the popularity of the brand’s profile fluctuates over time—often depending on the economic health of its consumers—Campbell’s enjoys extraordinary brand recognition and an envy-inducing level of respect. For example, despite being the oldest of old-economy brands, a 2008 survey…found that Campbell’s was second on a list of the most socially responsible companies in the US, behind only Google.

Campbell’s owes a great deal of its success to technological innovation. Its turn-of-the-century breakthrough of halving water content to create a condensed soup helped to expand its wide popularity.

But just how does the brand fair online in the new economy?

Campbellsoup.com is the brand’s online gateway representing and linking to the brand’s stable of sites…

Much of Campbell’s online success can be attributed to what the brand hasn’t attempted to do. The brand, for example, understands the reasons to visit a soup website do not include Flash-based video games or social networking based on a love for chicken soup. (It should be noted that many similar consumer brands, or those brands’ agencies, are convinced otherwise.)

Also, Campbell’s realizes its brand’s place on the sex appeal spectrum; it knows it is not a high fashion label and it opts, wisely, to avoid flamboyance both online and on the shelf…

A final paradox of the brand is that while Campbell’s is known for the simplicity of its design and product (soup), the label is actually an umbrella for a conglomerate of products ranging from juice to seeds. The challenge is to differentiate the site enough to represent this family of brands without losing that simple Campbell’s iconography that captured Warhol’s attention.

Campbell’s likewise accomplishes this with links to its Pepperidge Farms, Prego and Swanson brand offerings… So, soup to nuts, Campbell’s online does all it should and none of what it shouldn’t. Simple. Effective. Just like the soup.

Edit by SAC 

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Full article:
http://brandchannel.com/features_webwatch.asp?ww_id=406

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This entry was posted on December 18, 2008 at 6:30 am and is filed under Internet - Soc Networking, Mktg - Brands. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.