castle hill cider

  

West of Richmond and slightly East of Charlottesville, Castle Hill Cidery is one of the several emerging hard cider brands in Virginia. They use two methods of production: hard pressed and kvevri. Kvevri, an ancient style of wine production with terracotta vessels, is a painstaking and slow process that produces a premium champagne-style cider product. The grounds and structures are gorgeous and have been well-designed to accommodate both day trips and formal affairs alike.

From top: 1) the entrance to Castle Hill Cider, 2) the stately and well-preserved barn at Castle Hill, 3) Castle Hill Cider tasting room, 4) the Castle Hill brand is promoted similarly to a French-style cider in wine glasses versus a traditional English-style cider, which would be served in pint glasses, 5) Sissy, 6) James, 7) the kvevri yard, 8) James revealing the inside top of a kvevri vessel.

Here is a map I created of current and emerging Virginia hard cider brands: Virginia Cider Trail.

creativity for president

A brand is a calculus, the sum of which fluctuates depending on a consumer's interaction with it (O'Keefe). A brand manager is responsible for building or reducing infrastructure to implement change around the 5 P's; position, product, price, place, promotion. A consumer is also a content creator.

Our next President needs to recognize voters as content creators. He or she needs to be a better brand manager, not for his or her own personal brand, but for the USA brand. During the presidential race, the candidates needs to clearly define the current state of the USA brand and which pieces of infrastructure he or she would build or reduce to implement change. The earlier that the candidate can build a vision for cross functional partners (ie voters), the better the chance that the vision will be implemented. I highly doubt that any of the candidates are listening to me; however, I thought that I would offer some free advice from the perspective of a brand manager, just in case.

Position

The most creative nation in the world.

Creativity is neither Democratic nor Republican. Creativity is American. Creativity is also a currency right now. Just look at the value that Facebook placed on Instagram ($33 per user). The candidates need to inspire all individuals to feel like they have the capacity to create more than they are creating right now. After all, it's the collection of little business owners who pursue their dreams that will put the economy back on track.

Product

Intellectual Capital

A vehicle and a computing device are relatively similar things. They take you from point A to point B. You encounter other "drivers" along the way. The government requires a license to drive a car, why wouldn't they also require a license to navigate the internet? Implement a license to navigate the internet. Teach topics of personal privacy, intellectual property and content creation. Use it as an opportunity to create awareness about government websites. Hire the most creative digital agency in the US (R/GA) to make it fun and entertaining so that for a middle schooler, using the internet becomes an exciting stage of life. Give people a customized badge to pin once they have been awarded their license. At $10 per internet license for people on Facebook in the US alone, that is $1,690,000,000 in revenue. Have 5 year renewals as technology and related topics evolve.

Price

GDP + Personal Income

Penny profit. It's a simple and easy way to manage margin that works for both small businesses and large corporations alike. Allow the US residents to take a margin on their own personal content creation as measured in traffic per piece of content. Traffic ("bandwidth") is good not only for the corporations and advertisers, but an individuals own personal brand. Encourage citizens to produce quality thinking, not just quantity. Increase our exports. Pay for it by charging two pennies per international view. Keep a penny for yourself. Make our thoughts count to the local and international economy.

Place

Access

In the most thoroughly modern sense, if citizens cannot create digital content, they cannot contribute to the economy. Work on bringing internet access to every inch of the US. Improve infrastructure and encourage states to go wireless. Innovate. Empower each individual to become a contributing factor to the intellectual capital of our economy.

Promotion

We have a Nobel Peace Prize. Institute an Intellectual Capital Prize. Allow content creation to become a revered and respected philosophy. Let the reward be a break from taxes during the year in which the prize is awarded and give him or her international exposure. Praise individuals who contribute in valuable, compliant and legal ways. Create an emotional connection with your voters / consumers / content creators.

disney on dreaming big

When I went away to college for the first time, my Dad encouraged me to take the Myers-Briggs test. He gave me the little blue Please Understand Me book and away I went on my journey. Taking the test, and studying its meaning, was one of the most important things that I did for myself as I navigated a very open-ended time in my life. I learned the implications of what it meant to be creative, both positive (intensely curious, generating excitement) and negative (being too abstract, having a hard time finishing what you start).

As an ENTP (extrovert intuitive thinker perceiver), I am defined as an Inventor and have the same preferences and personality as people like Walt Disney and Julia Child. Today, as I briefed my experiential agency on our events campaign for the year, I was reminded of how much this Walt Disney quote connected with me as a young girl, and continues to do so as a brand manager today. In marketing, if you can dream it, you can do it. The difficult part is aligning your cross functional partners to make the momentum of the dream a reality.

reducing churn

Yesterday we had the pleasure of hearing John Adams, Chairman of the Martin Agency, speak during our brand leadership class with Peter Coughter. John is a tall, striking, yet soft-spoken man. When he raises his voice, you know he means business.

Mr. Adams spoke about the importance of operating at a high level while still being able to execute the smaller, more insignificant details. "Have bifocal vision," he said.

One point he raised was particularly interesting. That was the topic of churn. "The only enduring setting for the creation of brilliant advertising is a powerful, deep, collaborative relationship with the client." I have so much admiration for this man. I felt honored to be sitting in front of him. We should always be faithful to our own companies, to the people who believe in us enough to put food on our table. However, we should honor the fact that how we behave toward our clients will ultimately have an economic value, whether that is positive or negative. Relationships, then, are the most important element in the reduction of churn.

"culture" vs. "brand"

How is culture different from brand? Would it make a difference in peoples' minds if I were attaining my master's degree in creative culture management and not creative brand management?

Ultimately, I think the individual responsible for building a brand is just as responsible for building culture. The only difference - a brand has to do with how a product or service fits into the mind of the consumer and a culture has to do with how one feels when they make a commitment to be a part of a brand.

A brand is driven by external perception, a culture by internal clarification.