Starbucks Fans

Starbucks fans may be as close to KISS fans as you can get in the world of corporate branding. They parade down the street sipping from their Starbucks cups. They spew out orders the way KISS fans shout the words to “Rock and Roll All Night,” sharing a special language that includes such words as venti, nonfat cap, skinny, grande, and Frappucino. And although attending your first Starbucks concert-er, ordering at a Starbucks for the first time-can be intimidating, new fans quickly become part of the community of other Starbucks zealots, often while surfing on their Wi Fi enabled laptops.

How do Starbucks and KISS do it? With the right combination of product, atmospherics, and cast interaction. In addition to selling a functionally excellent product, Starbucks makes people feel part of a community or culture with an in store experience providing individualized attention, service, options, and recognition.

Maintain and Adapt Great Brands It’s More Profitable than Inventing New Ones One critically important truth rises from analyzing legendary rock bands-maintaining, adapting, and improving a band’s existing “product” is usually more rewarding than inventing a completely new one. Many recording labels have forgotten this lesson. In the early days they invested time and patience in the brands of their new stars, accepting a gradual rise to stardom. Today, if success isn’t meteoric and if that success level isn’t maintained, bands move to their label’s second class citizen list or are dropped altogether. The label then looks for and markets the next new thing, forgoing a long term view of the impact of the brand on the market. Individual artists have learned this lesson, however. Just as KISS’s success diminished after it abandoned its full makeup product, Prince lost a substantial portion of his following when he strayed too far from his core sound.