Under the Influence with Terry O'Reilly - S9E21 - Fix It Again, Tony: Brand Nicknames

Episode Date: May 21, 2020

Some people call Under The Influence UTI for short. It’s not a good nickname. But some brand nicknames are positive and extremely valuable - like Coke and Chevy - and some nicknames like “Whole Paycheck” don’t make Whole Foods happy. Join us this week as we explore the implications of brand nicknames. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Hi, it's Terry O'Reilly. As you may know, we've been producing a lot of bonus episodes while under the influences on hiatus. They're called the Beatleology Interviews, where I talk to people who knew the Beatles, work with them, love them, and the authors who write about them. Well, the Beatleology Interviews have become a hit, so we are spinning it out to be a standalone podcast series. You've already heard conversations with people like actors Mark Hamill, Malcolm McDowell, and Beatles confidant Astrid Kershaw. But coming up, I talk to May Pang, who dated John Lennon in the mid-70s. I talk to double fantasy guitarist Earl Slick, Apple Records creative director John Kosh. I'll be talking to Jan Hayworth,

who designed the Sgt. Pepper album cover. Very cool. And I'll talk to singer Dion, who is one of only five people still alive who were on the Sgt. Pepper cover. And two of those people were Beatles. The stories they tell are amazing. So thank you for making this series such a success. And please, do me a favor, follow the Beatleology interviews on your podcast app. You don't even have to be a huge Beatles fan, you just have to love storytelling.

Subscribe now, and don't miss a single beat. This is an apostrophe podcast production. Your teeth look whiter than no nose. You're not you when you're hungry. You're a good hand with all the teeth. You're under the influence with Terry O'Reilly. According to Reader's Digest, there was a reason nicknames were so prevalent a generation back. In the 1930s and 40s, the pool of first names was very small.

There were less than 10,000 popular first names at the time. It wasn't unusual to have about five or six Johnnies in a classroom. So, there needed to be a way to tell everybody apart. Hence, the nickname. And while nicknames have gone out of fashion in everyday life, they are alive and well in the music business. One night after he joined a new band called the Phoenix Jazzmen, Gordon Sumner showed up wearing a yellow and black striped sweater.

A fellow band member thought he looked like a bee and dubbed him Sting. Sting stuck. Bruce Springsteen is often referred to as The Boss. The origin of that nickname goes back a long way too. Before his band was big enough to have management, Springsteen acted as the band manager.

He negotiated with the club owners, collected the money at the end of the night, and made sure everyone got paid. So his band began calling him The Boss. Interestingly, The Boss doesn't like his nickname. Some musical nicknames have become inseparable from the musicians themselves. See if you can guess the real name of the following artists. The King of Rock and Roll.

The King of Pop. The Queen of Soul. The Fab Four. I had to do it. The Man in Black. And Chairman of the Board. Sports is another goldmine of nicknames. Seven-foot-one Wilt Chamberlain had a couple of nicknames. One was The Big Dipper,

which was an awesome nickname for his dunking prowess. But it was the rhyming one that stuck, Wilt the Stilt. Baseball great Lawrence Berra was nicknamed Yogi Berra by a friend

after they watched a movie about a Hindu yoga master. His friend said Lawrence always sat with his arms and legs crossed, like the yogi, and the name stuck. And I always thought the nickname came from Yogi Bear. Then there's Bernie Boom Boom Jeffrey on.

He got his nickname from a journalist in the 1940s. One boom was for the thundering sound of his slap shot, and the second boom was for the sound the puck made when it hit the boards. I worked with Bernie once, and he was hilarious. After the recording session, we went out to lunch. A waitress recognized him and flirted a bit. When she walked away, he looked at me and said, Women, they love the boom.

Some celebrities even have nicknames. When Arnold Schwarzenegger became governor of California, the Terminator was dubbed the Governator. Destiny Hope Cyrus was a happy baby, and dad Billy Ray Cyrus nicknamed her Smiley, which they later shortened to Miley. Calvin Brodus Jr. was nicknamed Snoop by his mother because she said he looked like Snoopy from the Peanuts

cartoon. When he started performing, he called himself Snoop Dogg. And Karen Elaine Johnson was a stand-up comedian who couldn't stop passing gas on stage. A fan said she was like a whoopee cushion. The nickname stuck, and Karen changed her name a whoopee cushion. The nickname stuck and Karen changed

her name to Whoopee Goldberg. A lot of nicknames stick in the world of marketing too. When a brand becomes popular and familiar,

customers often coin a nickname for the company. Sometimes brands love their nicknames. Other times, not so much. Memorable brand nicknames can become very valuable. They can also lead to court cases. But one thing is for sure.

Try as they might, brands have no control over their nicknames. Brand names are very valuable things. As we've mentioned often on this show, the brand name alone of a popular product can be worth millions. Even dead brand names like Pan Am and Polaroid remain valuable because they still have over 80% awareness with the general public. While brand names are valuable, so are brand nicknames. Many of the biggest brands have nicknames, usually coined and given by their customers.

Often, those nicknames are terms of endearment. Sometimes, they are derogatory. Retailer Target has a long-standing nickname, Tar-jay. That pseudo-French pronunciation has long been attributed to the way Oprah referred to the store on her TV show in the 90s, but the nickname goes back much further. The store first heard shoppers using the nickname in 1962, the year the store was founded. Customers used the tongue-in-cheek Tarjay to refer to the store's cheap but chic clothing lines. Target only uses the nickname sparingly in its marketing. In 1970, for example, it featured a private label line of women's shoes called Miss Target. Miss Target.

Check Target's prices this week. The Target label is your best buy. In a recent television commercial, Target showed various fashions and accessories while flashing words across the screen like flambé, sway, and sorbet. The commercial ended with the usual red flambe, sway, and sorbet. The commercial ended with the usual red Target bullseye logo, but the word Target wasn't there, just a laxante goo

over the logo. Coke is it, the most refreshing way to make the most of every day. And wherever you go and whatever you do, there's something big waiting for me and you. Coke is it!

Coke is a nickname. The soft drink is officially called Coca-Cola. It is one of the most valuable companies in the world. Coca-Cola was also a mass marketing pioneer. Founder John Pemberton placed the first newspaper ads for Coca-Cola back in 1886. By 1912, the advertising budget was $1 million, or nearly $30 million in today's dollars. A huge ad budget for the times. Even with a budget that big, the soft drink company discovered people weren't asking for a Coca-Cola in stores. They were asking for a Coke.

It was a nickname that evolved very early in Coca-Cola's history. And the Coca-Cola company wasn't very happy about that. In 1913, the company actually created an advertising campaign to dissuade people from using the nickname Coke. The campaign theme was Coca-Cola, ask for it by its full name, then you will get the genuine. Clearly, Coca-Cola feared the short nickname

would erode its unique brand identity and could quite possibly lead to a genericized trademark. In other words, the company worried that Coke could become the catch-all word for any soft drink. Coca-Cola kept encouraging the public to ask for a Coca-Cola instead of a Coke for the next 30 years. But the public still insisted on asking for a Coke. The nickname was unstoppable.

So, the soft drink company had to make a decision. To either keep fighting that trend and risk another company grabbing the word Coke as a trademark or embrace it. The company chose the latter. To fold Coke into their trademark and brand identity, Coca-Cola

created an advertising character called the Sprite Boy in 1942. The mascot was illustrated by Haddon Sundblom, the same artist who created the iconic Coca-Cola Santa Claus image. This Sprite mascot was designed to look like an elf or a little pixie with just a face and hands, and it wore a Coca-Cola bottle cap as a hat. By the way, Sprite Boy was not connected to the lemon-lime soft drink of the same name. As a matter of fact, Sprite Boy was created and retired long before Sprite the drink was introduced. The purpose of Sprite Boy was to remind people

that Coke and Coca-Cola were the same thing. Print ads would show the Sprite Boy peeking around a bottle of Coca-Cola. You can feel how much the company was struggling with their nickname, as even the headlines were awkward. For example, one Sprite Boy ad said, Hello, I'm Coca-Cola, known, too, as Coke. There was even a P.S. at the bottom of the ads that said, Hello, I'm Coca-Cola, known too as Coke. There was even a P.S. at the bottom of the ads that said,

Everybody likes to shorten words. Abbreviation is a natural law of language. Coke is the friendly abbreviation for the trademark Coca-Cola. In 1945,

Coca-Cola gave in to the force of its customers and trademarked the nickname. The first advertising slogan to use the word Coke appeared in 1948. It said, where there's Coke, there's hospitality. Maybe the biggest sign the company had fully embraced the nickname came in 1971, when it launched this campaign. I'd like to buy the world a home and furnish it with love.

Grow apple trees and honeybees and snow white turtledoves. I'd like to teach the world to sing. Sing with me. Perfect harmony. Perfect harmony. I'd like to buy the world a home Then came New Coke in 1985, and you know how that went. When a company discovers it has a nickname, it has to make a decision whether to embrace it in their marketing or to leave it in the hands of their customers.

When I was about eight years old, the NHL old-timers played a hockey game in my hometown of Sudbury. I went with my dad and convinced him to let me hover by the dressing room after the game to see if I could get some autographs. And boy, did I luck out. Jacques Plante, Doug Harvey, Scotty Bowman, and Andy Bathgate, just to name a few.

I also got Maurice Richard's autograph. I was so thrilled, I could hardly move. But I noticed he signed his name simply Maurice Richard, not Maurice the Rocket Richard. That was interesting to me. The Rocket was just what everybody else called him. McDonald's is a huge international company that has a list of nicknames that everyone else calls them. One of the most popular is Mickey D's.

It's often difficult to determine exactly when a nickname was first used when generated by the public. In the case of Mickey D's, it may have been back in 1976. It appears the nickname came out of the African-American community. As it gained momentum, a big summit was held at the McDonald's headquarters. The VP of Marketing called in all the advertising agencies that created campaigns exclusively for the black target market. At that meeting, they discussed whether McDonald's should embrace Mickey D's as a nickname

in its advertising. Some of the McDonald's marketing department was vehemently opposed, but the ad agencies argued in favor of it. They felt the nickname was a term of affection

and that most brands would love to have that kind of relationship with their customers. That logic prevailed and McDonald's trademarked Mickey D's in 1981. Campaigns were created using the nickname in black publications like Jet and Ebony. As the Mickey D's nickname got more popular as time went on,

McDonald's used it in its advertising, but sparingly. In 1986, the fast food company ran a television campaign where people would ask McDonald's various questions. Each ad began with, Dear Mickey D's. Dear Mickey D's, I'm confused. You have this tasty wonder burger with cheese, onions, pickles, mustard, ketchup, mayo, the works. And you give it a teeny weeny name like McDLT. For a totally equipped burger,

this does not compute. Pam. Okay, Pam. Yo, Pam, just for you, call it the hot side hot, cool side cool, every delicious thing you could want on a hamburger, hamburger. Or just call it McDLT.

In 2017, McDonald's used the nickname in a campaign to promote its breakfast menu. The theme line was, make it a Mickey D's morning. But Mickey D's is not the only nickname McDonald's has. As a matter of fact, it has a different nickname in just about every country. In France, it's McDo. In Mexico, it's McDonas. In Japan, it's Macu. In the UK it's McDonus. In Japan, it's Macu. In the UK, it's Maccy D's or Mackers.

In Australia, it's Maccus. That nickname was so popular there, a survey showed that over 50% of Australians preferred the word Maccus. So, in 2013, to celebrate Australia Day, a national holiday, McDonald's locations officially changed their signage to say Maccas for one full month. Which raises an important aspect of brand nicknames. Locality. Slang is not global.

Each culture will have its own version of nicknames, which means most nicknames don't travel well. Back in June of 2010, General Motors Management sent out an unusual memo to its Chevrolet employees. It was about the importance of consistency in marketing and pointed to powerful brands like Coke and Apple to make the point. It explained that one way to achieve this kind of brand consistency

was in the use of the word Chevrolet versus Chevy. The memo requested that when staff was talking to a dealer, reviewing dealer advertising or speaking with friends and family, they were to refer to the brand as Chevrolet moving forward, not Chevy. It was a strange ask, considering how embedded the word Chevy was in its brand history. I took my Chevy to the levee, if you know what I mean.

The memo contained two other interesting details. First, the reference to Coke was odd, because that is a nickname. And second, the memo contained a PS that said management had put a plastic can in the hallway, and every time staff said Chevy, they would have to put a quarter in the can. Like a swear jar.

That memo leaked to the press. While journalists could not understand the logic, the memo also provoked a very strong negative reaction from the public. Eleven days later, GM backtracked. Hard. It said the memo was poorly worded and that it was not trying to discourage customers from using the word Chevy. The vice president of sales and co-author of the memo even made a video saying Chevy

was the brand's nickname and the company loves it when people call them Chevy. He also said the memo was just a rough draft and was only meant to be a bit of fun. It was a revealing insight into the concept of brand nicknames. Maybe best summed up by a blogger who said the reason the public reacted so strongly was because the nickname was not Chevrolet's to take. Even though Chevrolet had trademarked the word Chevy back in 1963, the word was, in fact, coined and owned by Chevrolet's customers. That truism would come to haunt another brand called Fiat. And we'll be right back. Why not dip into our archives? Available wherever you download your pods.

Go to terryoreilly.ca for a master episode list. Of course, not all brand nicknames are affectionate terms of endearment. The word Fiat stands for Fabrica Italiana Automobili Torino. Fiat established a plant in Poughkeepsie, New York in 1908, three years before Chevrolet opened for business in 1911. For the next 60 years, with a couple of pauses for world wars, it continued to manufacture automobiles. Its Fiat Spider sports car was its best seller. Then, in the 70s and 80s, Fiat started to have quality issues.

Their cars were constantly breaking down, and Russ seemed to devour the cars with a side order of relish. It led to a nickname that crippled the brand. Fiat. Fix it again, Tony. While other car brands have managed to survive negative nicknames, like BMW standing for Broke My Wallet and Ford becoming an acronym for Fixed or Repaired Daily, Fiat's brand image was so damaged by the Fix-It-Again Tony nickname, it eventually had to exit the North American market in 1983

without managing to fix its reputation. Then in 2011, Fiat announced a return to North America. Even though it had been 27 years, the press couldn't resist the punchline saying, welcome back, fix it again, Tony.

The leader of Fiat's global branding, Olivier Francois, was not afraid of the past. As a matter of fact, he called the old nickname the elephant in the room and he rolled up his sleeves to wrestle that pachyderm. To do that

the company released a 90 second video to promote its new Fiat 500X model. It opens with a man standing outside a garage called Tony's Fix-It Shop. He needs to have

a broken mirror fixed on what looks like a Honda Civic. This is very bad. Don't worry, we fix it. Oh, Salvatore, Paolo! The garage owner calls out his two mechanics. They take one look at the car. No, no, no, no, no, no, no, no.

This is embarrassing, eh? No, no all-wheel drive, no horsepower, no. The garage owner tells the man No, this is embarrassing, eh? No, no all-wheel drive, no horsepower, no. There's no security, no technology. The garage owner tells the man his mechanics are assessing the car. Where is the sexy? No sexy. No sexy. No sexy.

Do you have any other mechanics? We fix it, we fix it. You like espresso? Yeah, I guess. I'm on it. Then the mechanics finally drive the repaired car back out of the garage. Ah, bravo! Well, she's ready. Then the mechanics finally drive the repaired car back out of the garage. But the car has been completely transformed into a Fiat 500X.

So is that your car? We fixed it. We fixed it. I just drive it? This is your car. We fixed it. The driver gets into the Fiat and loves it. I really like what you guys did. As he pulls away, we see a big banner hanging from Tony's garage saying,

We fixed it. We fixed the sedan. With the all-new Fiat 500X crossover. The video is very funny and well done. When Olivier Francois unveiled the car and the video at the Los Angeles Auto Show, he said it was time to retire the perception that Fiat has poor quality. He said the commercial featured a skeleton in the closet, the elephant in the room. His name was Tony, and he had to go.

It was a very clever way to reference the negative nickname without actually having to say, fix it again, Tony. Sales peaked in 2014. But once the economy pulled itself out of the Great Recession, small cars fell out of favor, sales slipped, and Fiat found itself in yet another fix. Ever shopped at Crappy Tire? If you live in Canada, you know instantly which store I'm talking about. It's hard to know when the long-time nickname of Canadian Tire started. I can remember it as far back as the 70s. That nickname led to an interesting legal case back in 2001. A London, Ontario resident named Mick McFadden created a website called CrappyTire.com.

He intended to use this site as a place to voice complaints about Canadian Tire. When Canadian Tire threatened legal action in early 2000, McFadden took the site down but retained ownership of the domain name. Canadian Tire tried to buy the website from McFadden, but he apparently declined to sell. That's when the company filed a complaint to gain ownership of the domain name. It was a strange case because Canadian Tire's claim stated that the company was, quote, colloquially referred to or known as Crappy Tire. The retailer went on to say the nickname Crappy Tire was confusingly similar to its brand name. McFadden countered by saying since when is the word Canadian interchangeable or similar to the word crappy?

It was an interesting standoff. Canadian Tire wanted to extend its trademarks to include crappy tire because the company felt it was a slang expression that, generally, did not have a negative connotation. It was just a slightly derogatory form of affection. Well, an arbitrator associated with the World International Property Organization in Geneva, Switzerland, was brought in to render a decision. In May of 2001, Canadian Tire's claim to the Crappy Tire domain name was rejected. A Canadian Tire spokeswoman said the company was disappointed with the decision,

maintaining they were just trying to protect its trademarks. While waiting for the decision, Mick McFadden tried to trademark his domain name, but abandoned the claim in 2003. And when I tried to search CrappyTire.com, no results were found. But when I searched the search CrappyTire.com, no results were found. But when I searched the words Crappy Tire, over 5 million results popped up. The top result was Canadian Tire.

It certainly was a nickname case for the history books. As the Globe and Mail said in a headline at the time, Canadian Tire loses the right to call itself crap. There is a lot of value in a brand nickname. There is social media value. In the Twitter era of 280 character limitations and bite-sized social media posts, a short nickname comes in mighty handy. Then there's the emotional value.

If the nickname is a term of endearment, like Chevy or Coke, it implies customers have an affinity for the brand. Of course, the ultimate value of a nickname all comes down to how complimentary it is. Target has fun with Tarjay, and Blackberry seemed okay with Crackberry. But Taco Bell can't be crazy about Taco Hell, and Whole Foods can't love Whole Paycheck.

The thing is, brands don't really have control over their nicknames. When Radio Shack tried to grant itself the nickname The Shack, it didn't go over well. As with people, nicknames work best when they are given. And that's why it's not something a brand can take back from its customers. Because while a nickname may be trademarked, it doesn't truly belong to the brand. It belongs to the public.

And the smartest brands know it. Just ask Rocket Richard when you're under the influence. I'm Terry O'Reilly. This episode was recorded in the Airstream Terrestrial Mobile Recording Studio. Producer Debbie the Devster O'Reilly. Sound Engineer Keith the Sonic Sweet Omen. Theme music by Ari NoPosePosner. And Ian...

I've got a fever. LaFever. Research Abby Abs Forsythe. Nice work, Abs. If you liked this episode, you might also enjoy To Bleep or Not to Bleep? Vulgar Trademarks. Season 8, Episode 20. You'll find it in our archives wherever you download your podcasts.

Follow me on Twitter and Instagram at Terry O. Influence. See you next time. New year, new me. Season is here, and honestly, we're already over it. Enter Felix, the healthcare company helping canadians take a different approach to weight loss this year weight loss is more than just diet and exercise it can be about tackling genetics hormones metabolism felix gets it they connect you with licensed health care practitioners online who'll create a personalized treatment plan that pairs

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