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Number
22: October 1, 2003
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This week in Katydid:
It May Take an Einstein
When I look at a company I like to see their brand carried forward consistently through all forms. While companies spend tens of thousands on their print and broadcast media, some fall short when it comes to online media. For comparison, let's look at two powerhouse brands in food services: Einstein Bros, and Starbucks.
New World Restaurant Group owns Einstein Bros Bagels, and five other food service companies. They go so far as to define their style as 'quick casual' – comfortable, friendly environments featuring sophisticated furnishings along with high-quality food at a reasonable price. According to their web site:
The concept of quick casual is more than a trend. In fact, the $5.7 billion segment is one of the fastest growing niches in the restaurant industry. This significant growth is attributed to aging baby boomers who are willing to pay a little more for quality food in a comfortable environment and a youth culture that needs a place to, well, hangout.
This could easily describe the Starbucks target market as well. While New World focuses on providing that casual place to hang out, Starbucks eases your conscience while you do so. Their mission statement focuses on their commitment to environmental preservation and fair trade.
Starbucks reflects its west coast roots with an informal, laid-back presentation; Einstein Bros reflects its east coast origins with a casual and self-deprecating style. For example, Starbucks has trademarked the phrases, "commitment to origins™' and 'contentment by the cup®' where Einstein Bros has trademarked 'fancy schmancy catering™ and 'darn good coffee™'.
Their web sites strongly reinforce their marketing strategies. Starbucks uses a pin-striping background effect that matches the recycled paper and cardboard used in their printed material. Their information architecture guides visitors to one of their many channels: grocery stores, online catalog, etc. It is a very sober, straightforward site. You can order products and learn about coffee.
The Einstein Bros web site uses a whimsical site map for navigation; although, they conveniently duplicate every link in standard menu form at the top of the page. Their web pages use humorous rollover graphics that make the site seem friendlier. Coupled with the casual, slangy writing style, the site very consistently conveys New World's quick casual branding.
Starbucks' site is very professional and has excellent information architecture, but it doesn't express the experience of a Starbuck's coffee shop. The closest connection the site makes to their stores is posting information on local events.
Both establishments are popular meeting places for professionals. I like to think of them as the only conference room you can rent for $3.50 and get a free cup of coffee to boot. It would be great to see that reality reflected on the Starbucks web site. Right now, that utilitarian, polished style makes them seem much more corporate and commercial than their mission statement would lead one to believe.
As a marketing strategy, this seems to be what Einstein Bros is counting on. As the nation's largest operator of bagel bakeries, New World is hardly less than corporate. However, they've picked up on the popular backlash in popularity of Starbucks and have positioned Einstein Bros as a less pretentious alternative.
Whether Starbucks' support of environmental and social causes insulates them from America's ambiguous feelings about corporations remains to be seen. Einstein Bros has a strong strategy and they are applying it consistently. With the long recovery from this last recession, yuppie money is harder to come by – the competition may be, in the parlance of Einstein Bros, darn hot.
(Lastly, for the record – and bar bets – the Einstein Bros are Melvyn and Elmo. Melvyn wears the hat and Elmo wears the glasses. I have no idea if the Starbucks' mermaid has a name.)
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Who's Aware of Your Behavior?
Spammers for one, and internet advertisers for another. With all the focus on spam lately, there's one more insidious thing to worry might be lurking in your computer – tracking software called spyware.
These are applications that track your web browsing behavior and report it back to advertisers. Companies use the information for benign purposes such as recommending products you might enjoy, or serving targeted advertising. Others may use the information to spam you or even to steal your identity.
The simplest varieties are cookies deposited by advertisers. They merely record the pages you visit. You end up installing the more sophisticated applications yourself. Just visiting a web site might be enough to install spyware on your computer. Windows unfortunately will not always ask you for your permission to install software.
The more serious programs will report the information you enter into online forms. Usually, this in encrypted when posted to the web server, but the programs on your computer may track your keystrokes. This information may then be used to duplicate your identity and apply for credit cards in your name.
One way you can protect yourself is never enter information such as credit cards, or social security numbers into any web form that does not use secure socket layers (SSL). You can always tell when you're on an SSL connection by the lock icon in your browser window.
Even if this frightens you enough never to use the web for commerce again, it's worthwhile to get rid of these things because they're so numerous that they slow down the performance of your web browser and occasionally cause system faults.
Virus scanning software does not work with spyware (yet). There is software that will identify these pesky trackers and remove them from your system. Lavasoft produces Ad-aware, a program that locates and removes spyware. They have a free basic version where you can just remove trackware, and they have upgraded version, which automatically prevents the applications from running on your machine. Another source is Enigma Software's Spyhunter utility. There is also SpyKiller from SwankSoft.
With viruses, adware, spyware, and spam, does anyone doubt that security and privacy will be the next big boom in IT?
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Thanks for Reading
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Kind regards,
Kevin Troy Darling
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