I am excited to announce the official call for presenters for The Private Brand Movement 2010 Conference, Building Brands at Retail. Strategy. Design. Innovation. I will chair the conference, which will be presented by IIR’s FUSE Conference. The unique event will focus on building brands at retail to drive customer loyalty, differentiation and overall profitability. Priority will be given to retail practitioners who wish to present. We also encourage you to submit team presentations, where two members of cross-functional teams co-present.

This event will take place September 27-29, 2010 in Chicago, IL and will include three days of case studies, panel discussions and interactive sessions. We are currently recruiting corporate practitioners from the RETAIL and BRAND world who can share best practices in the form of real-world case studies, stories of what’s worked and what hasn’t.

We invite you to submit a speaking proposal directly to Amanda Powers, Senior Conference Producer, by Wednesday, March 24, 2010. Send to apowers@iirusa.com.

Who will attend this premier cross-industry conference?
Attendees will be senior-level professionals including Presidents, Vice Presidents, Sr. Directors, Directors, Sr. Managers and Managers of Brand Development, Brand Strategy, Design, Category Management, Innovation, Market Research, Advertising, Shopper/Consumer Insights/Research, Merchandising and more.

Preliminary Topic Areas for 2010:

• From Merchandisers to Brand Managers: How Today’s Retailers are Stepping Up
• Brand Architecture for Today’s Consumers
• Brand Sensory Equity to Strike Emotional Connections
• Developing a Strategy to Lead the Process
• Stepping Out of Name Brand Shadows
• Brand, Price and Packaging Architecture: The Right Mix for Your Customer
• Principles in Designing Across Categories
• Brand Equity Survival: Developing Packaging that Can’t Be Replicated
• Distinction through Green Packaging: Less is More
• Consumer-Centric SUQ Rationalization & Category Optimization
• Savvy Retailing Amidst Organizational Challenges
• Advancing Equity and Value by Strengthening Your Brand Loyalty
• A Line Extension is Not Innovation
• Changing the Conversation from Competitor to Ally: Leveraging National Brands to Create Unique Opportunities for Retailers
• Manu-Tailing: A New Approach to Manufacturer & Retail Partnerships
• Reinventing Innovation: The Strategy Conundrum

** Please feel free to submit additional topics of your choice.

Added Bonus: Each speaker will receive free admission to the conference (a $2000+ value) including admission to all conference sessions, networking breaks, lunches, exhibit halls, etc.

Due to the high volume of response, we are unable to respond to each submission. All those selected to participate, as speakers will be notified shortly after the deadline.

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English supermarket Tesco is leaping onto the catwalk with its first ever Private Brand couture collection, F&F Couture. The brand will include sixteen items – which will range in price from £40 ($60.17) to £140 ($210.60) and include a sheer printed racer-back vest and a heavily embellished sequin jacket.

According to F Terry Green, chief executive of Tesco clothing in the United Kingdom, said: “This signifies a new era for supermarket fashion. It’s a high fashion-led range which will enable us to meet the increased desire for affordable yet high quality clothing, and we’re so confident that the range will be a success that work has already begun on the autumn/winter range.”

You can get a look at the new Private Brand collection in this video direct from the On Off show at London Fashion Week.

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Take a look at this written by Jamey Boiter of the BOLTgroup’s  He has worked with numerous national and regional brands including: IZOD, G.H. Bass, Marc Ecko, , Ryobi, Coca-Cola, Kraft and Phillips-Van Heusen. This is an interesting take on the homogenization of brands and perhaps more importantly the impact of the Walmart mega Private Brand, Great Value. I have also included a clip from the academy award-winning animated short Logorama, which was used in the article. If you haven’t seen the clip it is very cool.

Logos Get Lost in the Supermarket, Here’s Why

Have you seen Logorama, the movie comprised entirely of animated logos, that just won the Oscar for best-animated short film? It’s an excellent representation of the technicolor tapestry of branding that our world has become. Whether that’s a good or bad thing depends on your point of view.

But what would the world be like if there were no more brands to differentiate products, inspire us, or give us a good feeling about a company or product we’ve never tried before? I’m one who thinks it would be bad for brands to meld together into a homogenized mess, and I see that starting to happen in places. At the rate things are going, someday soon all brands will look like Walmart ’s Great Value label.

Why is this happening? It’s partly because value is in great demand now, with unemployment still in double digits throughout parts of the country. It’s also because retailers are putting pressure on manufacturers to differentiate their brands inside their stores, so that a brand doesn’t look and act the same in one store chain as it does in another. If brands fold to this pressure, they become diluted and change what they really stand for. This erodes brand equity with consumers and eventually, retailers decide they don’t need certain brands anymore and can easily outsource the product cheaper themselves to increase their margins. So now those manufacturers are out, and jobs are lost. And so is the brand.

Read the entire story.

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This intriguing report on Private Brands comes from Medill Reports – Medill Reports is written and produced by graduate journalism students at Northwestern University’s Medill school. Each day, students uncover, report, write, file and produce news stories for both Web and print for use by various media outlets in Chicago and the surrounding suburbs. This story by graduate student Alice Truong presents an insightful look at the growth of Private Brand.

As generic brands gain market share, retailers capitalize on trend

by Alice Truong

Alicia Peiffer used to go to the store and pick up packs of Huggies diapers for her two children. But things changed when her fiance lost one of his jobs in January. On a routine shopping trip, she noticed the Target-brand diapers—Up & Up—on sale.

“I thought, ‘Oh I’ll try it,’” the Orland Park mother said, and learned she could barely tell the difference, except for the price—$13 for the Target brand versus $19 for Huggies. “Obviously, the baby doesn’t have a clue.”

Used to be there was a certain stigma attached to picking up the store-brand product versus purchasing national-brand products, but that has faded along with sky-high housing prices. Instead, the shift in consumer mindset has helped generics gain market share and propped up retailers’ margins.

Generic brands currently make up $88 billion in sales, according to the Private Label Manufacturers Association. While stores are capitalizing on the generic-buying trend by investing more in marketing their private-label lines, many are asking if this is a trend that will continue.

“Longer term, private labels are here to stay,” said Michelle Chang, an analyst at Morningstar Inc. who follows Supervalu Inc., Kroger Co. and Safeway Inc.—companies with portfolios boosted by their private-label lines.

Meanwhile Timothy Calkins, a professor at Northwestern University’s Kellogg School of Management, whose specialty lies in marketing and branding, said the recession has only sped up a trend that has been developing for years.

Read the entire report.

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