MARKETING NEWS: Game Group to close 43 outlets

Below is an excerpt of a news article posted on the Marketing magazine website today:

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LONDON - The Game Group, the video games retailer and operator of Game and Gamestation, has announced store and concessions closures across the UK after poor Christmas trading.

 

The group is to close 18 of its 682 stores, six of which are Gamestation stores, and all its 25 concessions within the Debenhams department store chain.

The move is expected to affect up to 250 employees and follows Game Group like-for-like sales falling 15% in the 49 weeks to 9 January.

To compound the difficult annual trading, like-for-like sales over Christmas, when games retailers expect to see an uplift in sales, also decreased by 13.8% in the five weeks ending 9 January 2010 group. The Group said that the results were reflective of the current gaming market.

Game has been hit hard by mainstream retailers moving into the gaming category, with both Tesco and Sainsbury's among the biggest supermarkets to heavily push games, through discounting.

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This was going to happen eventually but sooner than I had predicted. The competition in the games market has never been as fierce as it is right now. Games retailers like HMV and Game cannot compete with the discounts made by supermarkets for the same product.

MARKETING NEWS: Starbucks plans coffee shops in service stations

The following news article was posted on the Marketing magazine website yesterday:

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LONDON - Starbucks has agreed a deal with Welcome Break to open coffee shops in 29 motorway service stations.

The deal will see Starbucks opening the cafes over the next 16 months as part of a franchise deal replacing Welcome Break's Cafe Primo outlets.

Darcy Willson-Rymer, managing director at Starbucks UK, said: "Being alongside some of the best quality brands in the UK makes this deal a perfect fit for us and is part of our drive to offer the best quality coffee wherever our customers are.

"Customers' expectations are rising and they want their coffee shops to be as good on the go as they are at home. We'll meet those expectations by setting a new standard for coffee on the UK's motorways."

Starbucks recently secured a US deal putting its Seattle's Best coffee into Burger King, replacing the fast food chain's own BK Joe's brand, but said there were no plans to replicate the agreement in the UK.

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Good news for Starbucks' customers then. I'm actually quite surprised the coffee giant hadn't opened outlets near motorways already. At least now, customers will gave a better choice in hot drinks.

MARKETING NEWS: Toyota and Eurostar launch brand rescue campaigns

The following news articles covering the recent Toyota and Eurostar scandals were posted on the Marketing magazine website yesterday, where the right way and wrong way to perform brand recovery was shown.

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LONDON - Eurostar is planning a marketing campaign to reassure travellers that the train service is now fully operational.

Eurostar's activity is scheduled for April and will attempt to convince consumers that the rail operator has recovered from a series of breakdowns.

Emma Harris, director of sales and marketing at Eurostar said: ‘The campaign will not directly address what has happened, but will be relevant to consumers and, in its familiarity, seek to reassure them about our return to normal service.'

Harris is working with creative agency Fallon on a strategy to improve perceptions of the brand following a damning independent report of Eurostar's handling of difficult weather conditions this winter.

The report, commissioned by Eurostar, said the company had made ‘insufficient' contingency plans, and claimed its communications strategy was ‘not satisfactory'.

Last week, Marketing revealed that Eurostar is planning to launch an, as yet unnamed, monthly magazine to flag up its green credentials and build customer loyalty. Contract publisher Ink has been appointed to produce the title.

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Unbelievable.

'The campaign will not directly address what has happened'? THEN WHAT IS THE POINT?

Firstly, hiring an advertising agency to spin the brand image of the company will not improve customer perceptions unless the campaign focuses on what the company has done to deal with the technical problems that lead to the breakdowns.

Secondly, Eurostar need to sort out their health and safety conditions before they launch a magazine in which they can brag about their green credentials. Customers prioritise service delivery to be more important than corporate social responsibility.

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LONDON - Toyota GB has launched a new ad campaign to reassure consumers it is taking action to recall faulty vehicles.

The full-page print ad carries the line 'We're pulling together to put things right', and emphasises that the manufacturer has 10,000 employees trying to rectify the situation.

It claims that of the 300 UK automotive recalls in the past two years only four have affected Toyota. It also refers to the training of over 1,100 Toyota technicians to repair the vehicles.

The ad says the response of Toyota customers has been "inspiring and humbling". It said: "At Toyota, building safe cars for the UK is what we have been doing for over 40 years – and we are committed to continuing that legacy for decades to come."

Over the past month, Toyota has recalled over eight million cars across the globe, after a fault was found with the accelerator pedal in some models.

A subsequent recall was launched for Toyota's hybrid models, after consumers complained of losing braking power when the manufacturer's successful Prius model.

After rolling out a PR and marketing drive in the US, Toyota GB launched its own apologetic print campaign on 5 February, by Saatchi & Saatchi.

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Toyota have a long way to go before they can relax over their recent disaster but the above article shows they are tackling the problem with a campaign a lot better than Eurostar.

The Toyoya advert clearly shows the public what the company is doing in order to fix the problems. Unlike Eurostars intentions, Toyota addresses the problems directly and explains the details properly.

MARKETING NEWS: International Confex (London), 23-25 February 2010

The 2010 International Confex exhibition and conference at Earls Court in London began today and runs until Thursday 25th February 2010.

Registration to attend is FREE and so are many of the seminar presentations that take place at the event, however certain parts of the programme may cost.

Confex brings together people who organise any kind of event with a colourful array of venues, destinations and event support services both in the UK and across the world.

I attended the first day of the event and enjoyed it a lot. It was much better than last year and I strongly recommend it to anyone working in events.

I spoke to quite a few of the compannies exhibiting and everyone was friendly and helpful. Although I was unable to attend all the seminars or keynote speeches, personal highlights included a keynote speech by acclaimed journalist/politician Martin Bell covering the current state of journalism and politics and secondly, an interactive body language seminar run by Richard Newman of body language consultants UK Body Talk.

Almost everyone who attended the body language seminar by UK Body Talk approached Mr Newman personally at the end to thank him for the guidance on body language. He was very generous and paid attention to everyone's queries. Not only did Mr Newman deal with the many queries on a one-to-one basis after the seminar had finished, he also promised to give away free copies of his new book to at least 40 visitors!

If I can, I will definitely try attending the exhibition for the rest of its duration and already look forward to attending next year as well.

MEDIA NEWS: FREE classic novels with The Times this week

I stumbled onto this by pure luck in Sainsbury's earlier today. I couldn't even see any sign of the offer on the newspaper's website.

Judging from the list of 5 classics printed on the back cover of the book, I'm assuming these are the books to be given away in the order they are listed. They are as follows:

'Julie and Julia' by Julie Powell

'Notes on a Scandal' by Zoe Heller

'The Curious Case of Benjamin Button' by F Scott Fitzgerald

'A Streetcar Named Desire' by Tennessee Williams

Some of these books are almost £10 in bookshops. I think I'll get my copy of A Streetcar Named Desire for a Pound on Friday...

MARKETING NEWS: 'Sci-Fi Channel' rebrands as 'Syfy'

The following news article was posted on the Marketing Week website today:

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NBC Universal’s Sci-Fi channel is rebranding as Syfy in the UK to expand the perception of the channel.

The rebrand is part of a global strategy to broaden its appeal and follows the channel’s name change in the US.

The channel wants to move away from being associated with exclusively “sci-fi” content and hopes that the name change will allow for a smoother move into genres such as fantasy, supernatural, reality, mystery, action and adventure programming.

Click here to find out more!

The new name will come into play on 13 April and will coincide with the premiere of US alien invasion series V and action drama Human Target.

The channel will be redesigned and will use the new tagline “Imagine Greater”.

The rebrand is part of NBC Universal’s repositioning its pay-TV channels around five core brands Syfy Universal, Studio Universal, Diva Universal, 13th Street Universal and Universal Channel.

The channel is available on Sky, Virgin and TalkTalk pay-TV platforms.

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This has got to be one of the worst decisions to rename a brand in a very long time. SyFy looks crap and sounds even worse (See-Fee?)

What was wrong with the current name? It was the best name possible. The Ronseal approach to the channel name was one of his strongest aspects - the Sci-Fi Channel was a TV channel that broadcasted sc-fi. What more could you want?

Also, the decision to broaden the channel's horizons by moving into other genres is another stupid move. The whole appeal of the Sci-Fi Channel was that it was what you switched over to for sci-fi shows because you didn't want to watch stuff like reality TV and action shows! The brand has weakened.

Another point to make is that the goal to show more supernatural content is almost laughable (unless you don't 12-rated horror flicks).

MUSIC NEWS: Post-BRIT awards sales boosts at HMV

The following news article was posted on the NME website yesterday:

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Robbie Williams has seen a 150 per cent gain in sales of his latest album 'Reality Killed The Video Star' following his appearance at last night's (February 16) Brit Awards.

The top ten biggest gainers at HMV (percentage gain in brackets):

1. Robbie Williams – 'Reality Killed The Video Star' (150 per cent)
2. Florence And The Machine – 'Lungs' (140 per cent)
3. Lady Gaga – 'The Fame' (90 per cent)
4. Alicia Keys – 'The Element Of Freedom' (80 per cent)
5. Cheryl Cole - '3 Words' (77 per cent)
6. Kasabian – 'West Ryder Pauper Lunatic Asylum' (75 per cent)
7. Jay-Z – 'The Blueprint III' (68 per cent)
8. JLS – 'JLS' (65 per cent)
9. Dizzee Rascal – 'Tongue N' Cheek' (60 per cent)
10. Lily Allen – 'It's Not Me, It's You' (50 per cent)

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Every act in the top 10 chart benefited from at least a 50% increase in sales due to an involvement with the 2010 BRIT Awards. Robbie Williams is very fortunate to achieve a 150% increase since his comeback album failed to match the success of his previous albums. The real winner here of course is HMV, which much like other music retailers benefited from an industry award ceremony that generated plenty of publicity.

MEDIA NEWS: Readers Digest UK files for administration

The following is an edited excerpt of a news article posted on the Marketing Week website today:

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Reader’s Digest UK (RDA UK) is to file for administration after failing to secure a deal to reduce its £125m pension deficit.

The administration follows the decision by the UK Pensions Regulator not to support an agreement between RDA UK, the trustees of its pension scheme and the UK Pension Protection Fund (PPF) to settle a longstanding pension scheme liability.

Reader’s Digest dropped out of the Top 10 actively purchased titles in the most recent ABC figures last week, and is down 20.4% year on year.

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So no more Readers Digest for the UK market? It would be a shame if the publication ceased to exist since it's been around for over 70 years.

BOOK NEWS: James Cameron is writing ‘Avatar’ novel

Below is an excerpt of a news article posted on the Wall Street Journal website today:

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James Cameron has the two biggest movie blockbusters of all time: “Titanic” and “Avatar.” So what’s left for him to conquer? The world of literature.

At a reception held in his honor on Tuesday night in New York City at the Four Seasons Restaurant, Cameron confirmed reports that he’s turning his Oscar-nominated movie “Avatar” into a novel.

“There are things you can do in books that you can’t do with films,” said Cameron.

“Avatar” tells the story of a disabled Marine who travels to a distant moon called Pandora, inhabits a surrogate body, and falls in with a nature-loving alien race fighting military and corporate forces seeking to exploit their land for profit.

He says the book version of “Avatar” will follow the film version “quite closely” in terms of the plot. But the novel will also include “interior monologues” and provide details about the characters and Pandora.

Cameron said he first considered writing the book when he was filming the movie. “I told myself, if it made money, I’d write a book,” the director said.

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Will the novel be as well recieved as the movie? Traditionally, the novel comes first and then the film adaptation - the opposite is the case here and I'm not sure it has been attempted with such a high profile project before.

Also, I'm a bit skeptical about Cameron's ability to write a novel. Typically, the novelisations of Hollywood films are written by writers who were not involved in the filmmaking process. With Avatar, the film's writer/director/producer intends to be the one responsible for the task of bringing the film to bookshelves.

MEDIA NEWS: 2009 deadliest year of the decade for journalists?

The following is a news article posted on the Guardian website yesterday:

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The noughties have seen the deaths of 725 journalists around the world, and 2009 was the bloodiest year

Sad statistics to end a decade, culled from the International Press Institute's new world press freedom survey. Number of working journalists killed on duty through the noughties: 725. Most dangerous countries to be a journalist in: No 1, Iraq (170 dead); 2, the Philippines (93); 3, Colombia (58); 4, Mexico (38); 5, Russia (35). Most dangerous region: Asia, with 238 journalists murdered – followed by the Middle East and north Africa (202). And don't think things are getting better – 110 died in 2009, making last year the bloodiest of the lot.

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Shocking results, to say the least. I would be interested to see how dangerous it has been for journalists operating in the UK. I imagine the death count would be very low but the danger faced by British journalists would make for interesting reading.