Critical Debate Of The

Brand ReleaseOf

From a first glance at the brands logo I have noticed it has a modern twist on the name, it can be perceived in two different ways. The ‘Classified’ section is written in calligraphy, which looks smart and sophisticated as the script writing is seen as a professional way to write and then the section labeled ‘LDN’ which assuming means London as that is where the company is based has a very urban feel to it which is often related with London it is seen to have a very urban and graphical scene for youths with such locations as the Banksy tunnel underneath waterloo bridge where it is legal for people to do graffiti underneath. For a brand in London I feel that it will fit quite well into the 16-25 age range as the brands logo still has an appeal to people of an older age as it is not too in your face. The one thing I do feel the brand is missing is an image logo that would give the buyers something extra to look at and

appeal to them also opening up the opportunity to do bigger spread images across the t-shirt. I would like to see a wider range of products coming from the band but it is expected to see the first release small just in case all doesn’t go well on product turnover.The genre for the brand I believe is as I mentioned before very urban so looking into that subject there comes a lot of underlying sub genres from different sports, the music listened to, events that the people attend and of course the clothes that they wear, so this gives the brand an opportunity to appeal to a wide range of people but could also deter some people as they may believe the product is to set to one genre and is not open others if all the advertising is in that form. A brand who’s advertising is on point and is an extremely renound brand is Carhartt recently all of there poster designs have given the effect that they have been drawn, in particularly one which stands out is a group of images drawn by the illustrator SHOHEI. The thing which gives the brand the upper hand is the money they can put in too there campaigns and it proves, it catches the eye of the consumer. Carhartt’s target audience is a lot wider than what Classified have aimed at as the brands logo is so simple that it cannot be defined to one particular demographic, the only thing which it isn’t is sportswear like football as but more towards extreme sports but the brands product range is wide from work wear to ski wear which gives the brand a wide variety to aim at.

As I have said previously I believe that the company need to have a wider selection of clothes so that the consumer has a variety to choose from and different tastes can caught then again that will lead to the widening of the market. I personally like the fact there is little content on the t-shirt and believe that subtle is a suave

image to take but some people prefer t-shirt designs which are extremely out there with pictures and colours this may want to be considered for different designs as the brand grows.

The brand is shown how it matches the genre by its advertising, the poster comes across scruffy but still looks well edited, especially with the tape in the corners which I think adds a great effect to it. The model gives it a rugged look and matches the genre of urban and he looks the age of the demographic I believe is set at with the 16-25 year olds. The environment of the photo shoot matches the graffiti style text that has been used for parts of the branding of the product. Once again I do feel that a character or brand image is needed to top off the brands image, it could make an

appearance in the corner of the poster and could lead to other branding, advertising and market opportunities for the brand if they did so.

As the brand is extremely new on the market I was not expecting it to blow up straight away and be the next top selling brand but the brand helped themselves along the way by promoting it in magazines which built up the hype before the release and made it clear to people who may not have noticed it before. I read a figure that “for every £1 spent on advertising you get £5 back” makes it clear that advertising is key to getting the product out there, Carhartt are who I took my inspiration from, as well as magazine posters they release free look books into there stockist’s before they come out so that the shops can give these to the customers in their shop and have a look through the products and then go back to buy them if they are interested. The advertising campaign in particular I looked at was the Spring/Summer, Fall/Winter 2011/12 collection where they added a promotional video a long with some of the drawings which they hired the artist to do them SHOHEI. This meant that followers of the artist himself would become interested as he posted the video on his blogs, the artist is extremely well known in Tokyo that is where he is from. The audience expect a lot more from what carhartt would be releasing in comparison because they are so renound and have a worldwide status.

By the looks of the advertisement it is only aimed at the male sex which means they may have lost out on money by not opening up there options by creating products for females. As I said before the brand are still in their beginning stages so as the brand expands so may there range of products. The fact that they don’t advertise to women does not mean that they could not buy the products as it seems to be a craze at the moment for women to wear men’s baggy t-shirts and jeans so if they are interested in the product and it appeals to the demographic which they class themselves in its possible they may buy it. Carhartt do make women’s products and advertise to them but in comparison to the amount on money they put into the male sections it is miniscule. For the release of the collections I previously spoke about there were 8 videos made of the artists drawing process but 7 of the 8 images are of males wearing the product and one of a female.

Any product is open to be bought by anyone of any age it just depends whether they are interested in the product but by the age of the model in the advertisement it makes it clear that it is more focused on the younger generation it can be made clear that he is younger but not below 16 because he has a beard and if they were trying to aim it at a

younger age group it would have smaller person who looked a lot younger. Sometimes age can be mistaken but for males if you pick someone aged 20-30 years old they are going to look much the same so it can be used as an advantage of the age group that it is aimed at. Carhartt’s advertising campaigns seem to be aimed at a higher age group than classifieds but still appeal to the younger generations as well, but carhartt cover clothing from children’s all the way through.

I feel that this product appeals to people as it carrys both an urban appeal and still has the brand name which can appeal to a wider variety. I think the brand has found a niche in the market that will be taken in well by a lot of people in the 16-25 generation. The brand logo is simple but in my opinion you do not want something which is to in your face as I have learnt from looking at the Carhartt brand a lot of there branding is subtle but still looks sophisticated and smart.