Grain’s Creative Director Madelyn Postman speaks to Aaron Heslehurst on BBC World News GMT and Talking Business about the landmark ruling that luxury brands can now prevent online retailers from selling their products.

With Chief Creative Office, Christopher Bailey, leaving Burberry this year and new CEO Marco Gobbetti unveiling his strategy to reshape the brand into a “super luxury company” with new lines at much higher prices, is the famous British fashion house alienating a significant percentage of their clientele? Core customers, and the stock market, have reacted … Read more

In fashion, how do you create brand positioning and differentiate yourself? Competition is tough, especially in the fashion sector. It’s a massive challenge to start a brand, produce at least the first three collections, and watch it take off. Your Brand Positioning, Brand Voice and creating a USP (unique selling proposition) in many cases are … Read more

Iconic brand Burberry may need its best-known piece, the check-lined trenchcoat, to stave off the rain in the years ahead. When the company’s new CEO Marco Gobbetti announced a risky strategy to “rationalise non-luxury wholesale and retail doors” (read: axe middle-market retailers) just one week after chief creative officer Christopher Bailey announced his departure, share … Read more

Sex: intrinsic to the oldest profession and one of the most powerful forces of human nature. Unsurprisingly, sex is used extensively in communications and advertising. The day after Hugh Hefner passed away, Grain director Madelyn Postman discussed the Playboy brand on BBC’s Talking Business with Aaron Heslehurst.  Whether men really think about sex every seven … Read more

Five strategic questions for FE Colleges to ask ahead of merger 1. How do we position ourselves to get maximum benefits from the merger? First and foremost, further education colleges (which mostly serve learners aged 16-18) need students and so a merged college needs a brand that is memorable and attractive. Existing students need to … Read more

Psychographic targeting threatens a dark future. I read an interesting article recently on how a large proportion of marketing professionals think they are spending too much on their digital marketing and are unsure of the returns but are still planning to invest more next year. It sounds like madness but of course this is true … Read more

TEDxLondon “Throw those curtains wide. One day like this a year will See me right,” we sing. Hugh Montgomery The Earth will survive But we, foolish humankind Have hit self-destruct. Emily Milan Rea Iron willed teenager Leaves behind a hundred no’s To find the one yes. Ndidi Okezie Teach First: achieving equality for children in … Read more

Square. Slack. Sea. These words could soon mean a lot more to you than their literal meaning. They are all on Interbrand’s 2017 list of Breakthrough Brands, the companies that are rising head and shoulders above their peers and breaking through to the level where they are soon to become household names. The 40 companies … Read more

Brand “Easter” – is it really Christian? Every year, for the past ten years, Cadbury and the National Trust have teamed up to run a joint chocolate egg hunt promotion over the school Easter holidays. A great idea that until this year was called the “Easter Egg Trail”. But after 10 years, a rebrand to … Read more

You can’t tick a box saying “exclude terrorist sympathisers” but you can exclude websites that are not aimed at your target market. For a company that built its billions by ranking search results, it’s surprising that Google and its subsidiary YouTube have not been able to properly rank their content providers according to how safe … Read more

Names – as Waitrose has just discovered – can be unintentionally misleading. Waitrose has found itself on the end of negative publicity from both the National Farmers’ Union and customers for calling its range of ready meals “British”. Waitrose chose the name to reflect the origin of the recipes, for example lamb hotpot and shepherd’s … Read more

The National Federation of Property Professionals (NFoPP) has rebranded and repositioned as the umbrella brand Propertymark and the changes, developed by Grain Creative, are aiming to significantly disrupt the estate and letting agency market in the UK. Through its membership associations, the National Association of Estate Agents (NAEA) and the Association of Residential Letting Agents … Read more

Relations between Iceland the country and Iceland the supermarket chain have been frosty for quite some time. And the cold war warmed up in November as the country announced it was going to legally challenge the use of the company’s trademark, arguing that while the supermarket has attempted to freeze them out from using the word … Read more

There are very few brands that are quite as Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde as Marks & Spencer. The marketing management must go through exceptional highs and lows during focus groups. First the moderator asks about M&S Food and Wine and hears the consumer perceptions of innovation, aspiration, quality and reliability, but when the questions move … Read more