When Gene Simmons and his cohorts took the stage at New York’s Popcorn Club back in 1973 with their makeup on and their new band name, KISS, and played for just three people, nobody was crowing about how Simmons, a former school teacher, was a marketing genius in the making. 

Since then, of course, Simmons has made a ton of cash not just releasing such hits as “Rock and Roll All Nite” and “Detroit Rock City,” but licensing the KISS name and logo to countless products. So much so that CNN has called KISS “the world’s most recognizable band.” Indeed, the band has sold more than $500 million in merchandise in the last 15 years.

Kiss cofounders Simmons and Paul Stanley debuted their own restaurant in April 2012, Rock & Brews, in El Segundo, Calif. Things must be going well because Billboard reports that the duo plan to open 100 more locations in the next five years.Continue reading...

One of the lasting memories of the London 2012 Olympics is hard to overlook: the measurable impact of women on the Games. More women competed than ever before, more women won medals and, Michael Phelps not withstanding, women garnered more of the media attention. In addition, it seems Procter & Gamble, Visa, and other brand marketers fell all over themselves trying to tie their brands to the success of  female athletes.

But now it's football season in the U.S. and, surprisingly, the focus remains on — you guessed it — women. The National Football League, never one to miss a brand marketing opportunity, is kicking off a campaign called "It's My Team." The target audience for a merchandising push that started last September is 85 million female football fans — almost half of the NFL's fan base. "We realized that while we had terrific products for women, we needed to build awareness," said Tracey Bleczinski, VP of consumer products, in an interview with Marketing Daily. "We have gone after it in a much more significant way and the response from our female fan base has been tremendous." Continue reading...

Fim: Snow White and the Huntsman
Total Products Spotted: 0
Standout Placement: N/A
Most Memorable Placement (positive): N/A
Most Memorable Placement (negative): N/A
Overall Product Placement Integration Grade (1-10): N/A
Comments: As the third major retelling of the Snow White story in the last year hits the screen, is it any surprise studios like Disney are moving to create fairy tales over which complete copyright control can be exercised?Continue reading...

The Yankees have had some odd brand extensions before: How about some Yankees Sod and Grass Seed at Home Depot for your own Field of Dreams? Or a Yankees Halloween lawn ornament? Or maybe you need a few $545 New York Yankees stained-glass hanging billiards light?

For the fan that wants to actually smell like a Yankee, though, they are finally in luck. The team has approved an official fragrance, and plans to unveil two different perfumes later this month, very simply entitled “New York Yankees” (for him) and “New York Yankees For Her,” according to ESPN.

Fox Sports points out that the team may have been inspired by the success of shortstop Derek Jeter’s Driven from Avon, which went on sale in November 2006. It’s done so well that Avon introduced Driven Black, which is “a mysterious blend of exotic saffron, blood orange and precious woods.” Who could ask for anything more?Continue reading...

The behind-the-scenes world of trademarking the US military was thrust into the public sphere earlier this year when it was revealed that Disney had filed to trademark "Seal Team Six" just hours after it was announced the elite group had killed Osama Bin Laden. Soon after the fiasco, we found various armed forces extensions moving quickly to trademark their respective intellectual property.

One US armed forces unit that has long understood the value of its brand is the Army. While most Americans are probably familiar with the Army's branding with regard to recruitment and retention efforts, from "Be All You Can Be" to "Army Strong," they are probably less familiar with brand extensions like the Army's new line of toys.Continue reading...

Instead of allowing its seminal marketing statement from Super Bowl XLV advertising to fade away into a digital afterglow, Chrysler is milking its “Imported from Detroit” tagline for everything it can — promoting it in unlikely new places and defending it against likely incursions as well.

It isn’t surprising that some Chrysler dealers would try to leverage the success of “Imported from Detroit” in their own, unique ways. US car dealers are independent business owners, after all, and some of the most entrepreneurial folks you’ll ever find, and Chrysler dealers have been uniquely starved for new models to show off for most of the last two years.

So in the Toledo, Ohio, area, a few Chrysler dealers began toying with the use of “Imported from Toledo” as their own marketing slogan. Some Jeeps are made in Toledo, and the town is the long-time home of the Jeep brand. Chrysler executives nixed their efforts right away.Continue reading...

The tears are barely dry on the Motor City denizens who were inspired by Chrysler’s Super Bowl ad above (now knocking on 10 million YouTube views) and already the carmaker is having to defend its “Imported from Detroit” slogan against intellectual-property theft.

In the same week that Chrysler unveiled its own line of merchandise based on the “Imported from Detroit” theme of its Eminem commercial, the company had to file a trademark-infringement lawsuit against Detroit retailer Pure Detroit for using the tagline in its t-shirt designs.Continue reading...