Intel
You Bought “Brand Strategy” and Got a Junk Logo
The word “brand” files the work under decoration, so decoration is what gets bought. What a strategy would have to cover to deserve the name, and the three-person test that tells you which one you paid for.
Sony Kept the Tariff Money and Said the Quiet Part Out Loud
A tariff refund landed on every importer this year. What each company did with it exposed what it had told customers the price was for, and the companies that had explained themselves were the ones who had to pay it back.
AI Took the Cheap Half of Creative
Everyone at the wedding has a better camera than the photographer, and the couple still pays the photographer. Creative work is the same purchase now: the pixels went free, and the judgment about what to ship became the whole price.
Brand Audits: The Best “Bad News” Money Can Buy
Tropicana cleared every internal review, shipped the new carton, and lost $30 million in six weeks. A brand audit is the inspection you order before you spend, and the report is mostly bad news. That is the report working.
The Discount You Didn’t Know You Were Giving
Duracell makes Kirkland’s batteries. The 17 cents between the two boxes is what packaging is worth, and what a plain box quietly costs you on every unit you sell.