[Music] Hello everyone and welcome back to On

the Offense where we dissect all things marketing and communications and have a

ball doing it. Uh I am John. This is I am Jeff

and our executive producer is Gellman. Gellman, say hello. Hello everyone.

Okay, that sounded a little unhinged, didn't it? John

Gellman needs to be the one on camera, not us. All right, just fair warning everybody. We have uh talked in advance

of this and we've decided we feel like being a little bit unhinged here. I don't know what that's going to mean. we

may get too into the topic or we forget but we're going to we apologize in

advance for any poor behavior. So oftentimes we take something in the news

as a launching pad uh into a discussion and that is exactly what we are going to

do today. So yes rebrands rebrands is the topic for the day and to say this

has been in the news is an understatement. Uh, and I'll tell you

what, sure. Right. I mean, with the semester just having started and and I'm teaching advertising and brand strategy classes

at the great and grand Jeff University of North Texas. Go Mean Green. Um, what

a great case study Cracker Barrel has been in these classes about brands and

marketing and advertising and and so forth. Um, so yes, I am referring to

Cracker then that this what I'm about to do, Jeff, is going to lead you down a primrose path. Okay.

Okay, I'm ready to Cracker Barrel Gate. Cracker Barrel Gate Cracker Gate, Barrel Gate,

Restaurant Gate, Rebrand Gate. By the way, now you're going to see the

connection here. Speaking of gate, meaning Watergate,

I have to do it. A shout out to the single biggest stud in the history of

the human race. That would be Robert Redford. Robert Redford.

Yes. Who just passed away at 89 yesterday when we're recording this. And it was

Redford in the brown. Oh man, I wish I still had it. I haven't had it for a

long time now. In the brown corduroy sport coat in All the President's Men.

Can you picture him in that ugly 70s brown? Oh yeah. Yeah.

As Bob Woodward that made me fall in love with journalism, which is how I started my career for those of you who

know my story. So Jeff, I So that's my all-time favorite Redford role. I'm

going to put you on the spot. your favorite could be your favorite Redford movie, your favorite Redford role, which

could be different. Everyone I I think of all the President's Men was great. I I actually thought Butch

Cassidy and Sundance Kid was one of my favorites. Classic. Classic. And you like that

better than The Sting? Yeah. Yeah. I don't know why. Yeah. I just read last night that

Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid came out five years before The Sting. And when The Sting came out, everyone was so

into Redford and Paul Newman as this duo that they reintroduced

Gassley and Sun. So, it was in theaters at the same time as The Sting. Anyway, rest in peace,

Robert Redford. Um, you left your mark both, you know, frankly, in front of the camera, but also behind it. what a what

an amazing directorial uh career he also had as an environmentalist and of course

having started the Sundance Film Festival which will live on which will live on and the and

ironically it is now in the process of moving from Park City near where he

lived to Boulder Colorado where I went to college

and so going forward yeah it'll be in in Boulder. So there you have it. Okay.

All right. Cracker Barrel. All right. Um, do you think Robert Redford ate at

Cracker Bear Island? I I kind of doubt it, but you know what? I I used to live up in the Northeast,

and we would drive down to Florida on occasion to see my in-laws, and we drive all the way down I 95. And when a

Cracker Barrel came up, we were thinking, okay, this would be a nice place to stop for breakfast or lunch.

You know, it was comforting. You felt the comforts of home. You saw the rocking chairs. You had that little game

with the golf tees to play. That tradition kind of led me in the warmth of it. Well, what are they doing?

They're getting rid of that. You know, you don't know what you've got until it's gone. And it was going to be gone.

It was going to be gone, but no longer. So, I mean, this has just been a crazy case

study in rebranding. So, yeah. So, Cracker Baron, this is in the last few weeks, announced two main things that I

can recall. I think I have this right. One was a rebrand of the logo, a redo of the logo

that proved the older man and and the and the rocking chair and I believe the

barrel as well. And was there a dog in the logo? I don't recall a dog, but there could

have been. I think that would have been a bit too busy, but the whole idea that old man with the

butter churn or whatever it was. Yeah, exactly. Um, and they were going to get rid of all of

that, keep the name of the restaurant in the same font,

and maintain the colors, the the corporate colors of brown and yellow, which Mhm.

sounds like an ugly combination, but it actually wasn't. Um, so, um, that was

the first thing they announced. The second thing they announced, and I think these were announced concurrently, I

think uh was a complete redo of the inside of their restaurants, uh right

to focus much more on a, if you will, a uh oh, I just lost my light here. A a

more sleek, more modern experience. It's a matter of um

which and not sure if they were going to keep the country store part but it would be

I think they were they were I think they were a complete renew uh renewal if you will

inside. Now let me ask you a little quiz. Like I said I I'm a professor on the side here.

Quiz time Jeff. Oh Mr. Fancy. Mr. F it's that's Mr. Fancy to you. What

is the number one reason people go to restaurants?

H I know. I like to go for great food. It's a bit of a question.

Entertainment. You know, just to get out of the house. I like to go to a restaurant. What is the real number one reason?

Well, I mean, what I was hoping you would do was say food, which you kind of sort of said. I did. I like I like food.

That's the product, right? I mean, that going to eat it. That's actually not the number one

reason. The number one reason is a combination of the ambiance of the

particular restaurant. But one thing that's common regardless of the ambiance is you're being served

to go and be waited upon to be served. You don't have to do it yourself. Um

it's just to be served and just kind of do something nice, right? Um, but if you're going to redo the

entire environment and ambiance, you're you're messing with that mojo. You're

messing with the number one reason why people go out to eat. I mean, unless

you're a chef, you're not you're probably not producing restaurant quality food at home, but you can get a decent meal at home, right?

Sure. Sure. Yeah. Yes. Food is I'm sure is part of it, but more importantly it's that

people just want to be served and they want to enjoy a familiar experience. Right? So what happened? The customers

lost it. The investors lost it. The president of the United States lost it.

He lost it. Okay. And the result was that they caved on the logo pretty quickly. like semi

immediately, which was to me as a marketer was a real red flag. Um you're

you're either you've either done your research and you're doing the right thing or you haven't and you're not. And

um so they they caved on that. But in the background, they kept pursuing the

remodel of the restaurants. Apparently now they've stopped that as well. Yeah, I heard they only did about four

so far. So limits the damage. That sounds about right. So, they've now

um stopped the whole thing dead in its tracks. Now, it's easy it's easy to you

know when you you know what have they done right, what have they done wrong, right? It's easy to throw them under the

bus, right? It ended badly. It is easy. I mean, it's very easy. And you know, we

should, you know, these things are far more complicated than they seem. I'm willing to bet it's easy to say, "Oh,

they didn't do the research. They didn't talk to the customers." If they didn't, shame on them. Um, and and and if I had

to say, "What did they do wrong?" It doesn't sound like they talked to enough customers, right? Or maybe they didn't

do enough to preview things to a certain select audience. I don't know, but they

seem to have been caught off guard by the by the reaction. people have emotional connections to brands and if

you mess with that emotional connection, um you you've got a problem, right? They

didn't completely blow the thing up. I mean, the same colors, the same logo. The logo looks different because the

environment around it is different, but the logo is actually the same. The colors are right without a few embellishments.

That's all. Well, yeah, they still have the country store. Now, I have an article in front

of me, an AP News story on a rebrand. How often does that happen? Probably not

often. Here's one of the things they did. Uh they they did some things in advance as

part of this overall transformation. They didn't just go from 0 to 60 overnight with this stuff that we just

talked about. They tried to update the menu, right?

Trying to get younger. They had had I want to say four or five consecutive

quarters not years I think it was quarters of same of declines in sales

same store sales restaurant business so they had good reasons for doing this

but they did try to update the menu items to increase their dinnertime

traffic and I'm telling you if this thing is still on the menu I'm going to

Cracker Barrel today. Hash brown casserole shephardd's pie.

Are you kidding? Oh, I've had that. I like that. But they make it sound like it was a new

um a new item. That seems very kind of a traditional Cracker Barrel item.

It does. You're mixing some traditional items together. But, you know, John, we were talking, how would you characterize

Cracker Barrel food? I I characterize it as comfort food. Comfort food. Something you count on. Hey, it's there.

This is familiar. I like it. And they they were going to chuck that.

Do you think it's possible, Gman? Is it okay if we spend the next 30 seconds just chanting

hash brown casserole shephardd's pie like over and over? Okay. Are you ready?

Yeah. I'm ready. We're not going to do that. But it did say one time. One time.

I I just want to hear it out loud one more time. Hash brown. Hash brown. Casserole. Casserole.

Shephardd's pie. Are you kidding me? So, I'm here to tell you in the next week I'm going to

Cracker Barrel and I'm ordering that. And And but that's I I to me and and then I'll stop and I'll we'll turn it

over to you and talk about some other rebrands maybe. But to me, that's the the best thing that's come out of this

for for the company. We're sitting here talking about it. Oh, yeah. where we

or we weren't. No, I drive by those restaurants every day. Don't pay them any heat. Uh now I want

to go. I want to see it for myself. What's all the fuss about? Right. Right.

Regardless of the I quote brown casserole, shepherd's pie.

Shepherd's pie. My new my new favorite dish in my head. Um but yeah, I mean word of mouth. Um,

and the value of earned media, which Jeff and I know so well, you cannot buy

the earned media that they have somehow ended up with, right? Whether

they meant it, right? They stumbled into it. Stumbled into it. Um,

I'm willing to bet. Let's make a bet right now. You bet. I'll bet you five bucks. I'll bet you I'll bet you a hash

brown casserole. Shephardd's pie. Shephardd's pie. that their same store

sales go up in whatever quarter we're in now, probably Q3 if they're on a fiscal

calendar. But you want The problem I have with that bet, John, is I would bet the same thing.

Yeah. Yeah. All right. We'll have to think. They will. They will. How about if we both I told you all

we're going to be a little unhinged here. How about if we both buy the hash casserole shephardd's bike?

I'm in. I'm in on that. No, that's just one part. The second part is then we have a food fight.

I like that too. You like that? I like that too. Yeah. Everybody kind of wins at that point.

Well, and the hash hash brown casserole shephardd's pie. There's a lot of good

smooshy stuff, right? That's a handful of that. That is really good food fight material.

So, all right. I mean, you know, it it's this one of those things. This has become a thing, taken on a life of its

own, but the earn media, I don't I'm willing to bet that they're going to end up uh doing okay here. So, um

I believe so as well. So, in preparing for this, Jeff and I both stumbled on many an example of a

rebrand. In recent times, in 2024 alone, there were

so many brands that it was actually shocking. You don't realize when they maybe come out one at a time when when

you see a rollup like that, some really big brands. One of them was Jaguar, and

I know you wanted to talk about that. Yeah. Yeah. And that's that's an amazing one to me. And so when I think of

Jaguars, I think of growing up. I thought the ultimate car was that Jaguar XKE from the late 1960s.

Oh, yeah. What a beautiful machine. And Jaguar was kind of viewed as an aristocratic

vehicle that if you had made it, you know, you could drive a Jag. But it also had a reputation of not being the most

reliable type of car. a lot of breakdowns, all that stuff. So, they wanted to revamp their image. Well, you

know, if you're going to do that, how would you do it? You you'd want to keep your current base of customers. You want

to expand it, but you want to do it in a way where you don't alienate people who are already loyal to your brand. So,

they decided, okay, we're going to ditch that growler, you know, the mouth of the Jaguar

and uh and ditch the logo altogether for its advertising. change the fonts how

Jaguar looks and appeal to a young hipster audience.

And I saw that I was thinking, why on earth do they doing this? And it's kind of interesting because the first

reaction to it was from 2024 to 2025,

their sales dropped over 98%. That is hard to hard to believe. Now,

they were overstocked in 2024, so that might have something to do with it, but you still don't drop 98%. So, not only

did they drop 98%, they got rid of their CEO, they started a fresh, but you know,

by all measurements, that's a disaster. That sounds like a disaster. Now, let's

let's not point counterpoint, but I read an article that that uh has a has

some different information that made me wonder about why they did it, right? Because I

mean, the single, let's face it, the single hardest that you're you're you're going after a new

target, a new demographic. That's what Cracker Barrel was trying to do. It's

really hard. It's really, right? What is a CMO to do? It's hard,

right? You want to go in this direction, but you don't want to lose your core base, right? So, listen to this. Tell me

if this makes any sense. It says Jaguar, this is a Wall Street Journal story from

recently. is attempting to move into a more exclusive market where executives say

the opinions of the vast majority meaning vast majority of customers don't really matter.

Jet that's I mean how does that happen? How does that happen exactly? Jaguar

expects only 155% of its current customers to buy its cars

once its rebrand is complete. That is mind-boggling to me.

It it is totally mindboggling, right? You know, you make your money off your existing clients, you grow that base,

you add some more on because that's great, but you need that big existing customer base.

I I I I agree. Now, and the other thing is what if this I mean that's a luxury item. Okay,

it is compared to a consumer packaged good, a roll of paper towels, a bag

that are bought every 10 days, a Jaguar or a an upscale vehicle is bought every

10 years. I'm making these numbers up, but yeah. Okay, fine. Let's say

85% of people who buy the cars are new. But what if they don't buy one for

another five to 10 years? Then it's not like you're it's not like paper towels where you have it. Do you have to have a

Jaguar? I I don't think so. You have to have a car. I don't know if you have to have a Jaguar, right? And so

you don't have to have a Jaguar. And the the headline of the story, which is

mind-boggling, says one of the subheads, the CEO, and I

don't mean, you know, again, this stuff is so much more complicated than people understand. There's so much going on

here, but the CEO of Jaguar is basically saying that the fact that everyone's so

upset shows him the plan is working. I I get that either. I don't get it. Do

you want people paying attention to you? Yes. Want them pissed? I mean, I don't know.

Maybe I'm talking out of my mouth because here I am saying I'm going to go to Cracker Barrel, but I'm not one of

the core customers. I'm not pissed. I'm just curious. I I I I would look at myself the same

way. John, can I can I throw in another example? And and here's a brand you'd never want

to rebrand. And I don't even know if they're still along there, but I've talked again about my trips, you know,

from New Jersey to Florida on I 95. And once you get south of the Mason Dixon

line, you see a lot of Stuckies. And you stop at Stuckies. Well, why do you stop at Stuckies? To get a pecan roll. That

is what you get at Stuckies. What if they were to discontinue pecan rolls?

What would that do to their brand? You know, brands are what people say about you when you're not in the room. And

again, just like Cracker Barrel, what's more traditional than stopping at Stuckies and getting a PCON roll?

Okay, this is actually a serious comment. Brands would say, that may be the

greatest quote of all time. Brands are what people say about you when you're not in the room. Mhm.

What a great way to look at it. I think so. I think so because that's true.

I retract my threat of the food fight. I cannot huck hash brown casserole

shephardd's pie at someone as learned as you. Can't

I can't do it. So, um All right. So, you're saying they were going to get rid of them?

No, no, no, no. I'm saying what a travesty if they thought I'm going to rebrand, get rid of pecan, you know, um

the the rolls. Why why would you do that? And that is the same question for

Cracker Barrel that I'd see. Why do I want to get rid of something was viewed as a comfort item where I would stop

because it's it's just a great thing to do. Why would you go to BIES along the

highway and not go and get some beaver nuggets and all the delicious things they have at BIES and take in the

spectacle? Those are places where it becomes more than a road trip. It becomes a tradition. And so I think we

need to preserve stuff like that, not only as a part of marketing and branding, but it's a part of our

culture. You know what what what is the country if you get rid of these things that you've always counted on? We are

nothing without pecan rolls. Yes. Yeah. My learned statement of the day. Um no

but point the point is valid. Yeah. Is stuckies often along the highway

about it. So is Cracker Barrel, right? If you think about it, Bies, great example. Um, I wonder if those to the

extent that the business of the the revenue from those businesses is

dependent upon people saying, "Oh, look, let's get off." Maybe there's not a lot

of pre-planning. Even more reason

it people better have people better be able to get what they

expect to get, right? because then they're out of there, right?

I mean, um, Stuckies and what's the other one? Oh, um, what's Do Do they

have Stuckies in Texas? I haven't seen a Stuckies in Texas, but I might be wrong on that.

Rudy's Barbecue. Oh, yeah. Rudy's Barbecue. That's a good one. Now, those that's the type of place that

probably never changes. No. And that's the beauty of it, right?

And maybe they should, but they they won't, right? Um, by the way, for those

of you who've never traveled through Texas and seen a Rudy's barbecue, please get off get off the highway, have some

Rudy's barbecue. Um, okay. Other examples? I've got a couple.

Can I throw in one more before you get to yours, please? again on that I 95 trip. Um once

you get into the Carolas, once you get to North Carolina, maybe southern Virginia, you start to see these big

billboards for South of the border in Dylan, South Carolina. And they're all

very kind of tongue andcheek. You know, visit south of the border is famous Sunover

Beach and all these different things. And as you get closer and closer, the signs get more frequent. So if I'm a

traveler going south, I'm going say, I want to stop at south the border and see what all this is about. And um so I

finally convinced, let's stop at south of the border, see what it's all about. And it ended up being kind of a cold

night. You were you just cross right over the border and there it is with a big sombrero.

And honestly, it was like a creepy place. Like um you know when they have

those murders at the at the carnivals, that was kind of the feel of it. It was

dark. Oh, excuse me. Have those murders at the carnivals. Well, you know, at a state fair,

whatever that that's a setting for a murder and all those people. But there were no people.

It it was it was empty. and you went in and you had the schllocky store where they had a lot of, you know, velvet

pictures of dogs playing poker and uh and things like that and you're thinking, "What is this?"

So, I I guess that's a wonderful advertising campaign for a place you go

one time and then flee. I mean, and then flee. Flee

and then flee. Nothing. And if you're affiliated with South of the Border and watching this, that is not mean I don't

mean to denigrate you. I mean to praise you because that's a that's a fantastic marketing idea.

Yes, that is a fantastic marketing idea. I suppose we should ask them to ensure that no one is murdered there

like are at carnivals that you go to. But Right. Right. It's like the Rockford Files. If you

remember the Rockford files, you know, Jim Rockford would have to chase people through carnivals.

Yes, he would. And everywhere else. Yeah. So, I I I saw another list of rebrands

in the last year or so, but I I don't I don't look at these as re there.

Stracker Barrel was a brand, right? A lot of these things on the list though were just repositioning a brand, right?

To me different, right? Uh,

Kleenex added a touch of crown.

Well, okay. That that sounds like it's packaging, right? Right. Brand. I don't know about I don't that's

not rebranding. That's that's adding something around the edges in my view.

Um, uh, Decathlon's rebrand emphasized the joy of that's just brand positioning.

That's not rebrand. Um, and Switzerland tourism,

which centered its new brand on the country's natural beauty. That's just brand positioning, right? And by the

way, uh, if you're a CMO out there, we live and breathe this stuff. We love

brand positioning probably more than anything else or repositioning me. It's fun stuff, but like I said earlier,

it's hard. This stuff is hard. Even just repositioning is hard, let alone an entire rebrand. Now, here, let's take a

different type of rebrand, if you will. You actually change the name of the

company. And I'm thinking of Dunkin Donuts, right? Which is Duncan, right?

Duncan. So I did some research into this and I found some things out that surprised me. They changed that name in

20 it was either 2018 or 2019. What which since it was before CO seems like

another lifetime. Oh co changed everything. Yeah. I mean it's unbelievable. Um,

so but as early, believe it or not, as 2006,

they released their first motto that did not include donuts. America runs on

Duncan. So they were out there for 12 or 13 years just saying Duncan before they

took the formal step of taking donuts out of the name. Right. Yeah. Yeah. That is now that's a plan.

That's a plan. That is a longterm transformation plan that probably

said, "Let's do this first. See how that goes. Let's do this. Let's do this." I'll bet you there tons of consumer

research um stuff like that, right? And then it probably all worked well enough that

they were actually able to change the name at one point, which if you think about it is a pretty drastic thing to

do, but very it was very easy for them to do. Now there is another side of the

coin. Um, I've seen that I've seen talk that, and actually we talked about this

in one of my classes on Monday, that um, if you are a younger consumer, let's say

you're 25 or younger, you only know it as Duncan for the most part, do you even

know that they have donuts? That's still one of I mean, you still go

in there and they have the whole thing of donuts in there, right? Mhm. The other thing that I saw which is

really interesting which is if you look at it globally and we haven't talked about globality here

yet. We we haven't not we've just maybe it's been implied

but let's say you are taking Duncan the franchise into another country

and so it's an entirely new franchise or a new brand for people in that country. Those people would have know what what

what is Duncan? What does that even mean? Dun, right? Is that coffee? Is it donuts? Is

it breakfast food? It's it's all of that. But how are you supposed to know without a thing? In this case, a donut

being part of the brand, right? So, I suppose everything is a is a double-edged sword, right? What do you

think? Yeah. And you can regionalize your marketing. You could regionalize your product introductions. Absolutely.

I know when I worked way way way way way way long ago at Ward of Amard, we own ship razors. And when we would introduce

the ship razor to a new country, we wouldn't go in with our top-of-the-line Tracer. We'd go in with their uh bottom

of the barrel, you know, first razor they ever introduced, get a

following for that, and then move up the line. And that's right. I forget there's a there's

a term for this, but that's basically how you introduce a brand. And in mostly

in in countries that aren't quite as resourceful resourceful or as wealthy as the US, but that's how you do it. You

grow it from the ground up. I make sense. Yeah. Are you a Duncan person?

Am I a Duncan person? You know, I can tell you at one point in my life I was when I was a little kid. We'd moved down

to Florida again and they had just started Dunkin Donuts and I remember my

dad saying, "Oh, they started this place Dunkin Donuts. They've got like every kind of donut you could ever want." So,

it was very exciting to go to Dunkin Donuts. So, we would go to Dunkin Donuts. I liked it very much. I loved

cake donuts versus the raised. Then, much later in my life, I

discovered a thing called crispy cream. Oh, yeah. And the taste of a crispy

cream hot out of the oven where it melts in your mouth.

You You just can't beat that. I'm sorry. And it can't be the fancy ones they've introduced. It has to be the original

crispy cream. I could eat a dozen. And And what do they have? What are the

two words at Crispy Creams that they have flashing in neon lights in the window?

Oh god, I never even looked at the window. What does it say? Hot now.

Oh yeah. And words. I mean, they might as well just be, you know, funneling this the

the donut smell into the air at that point. It is wonderful. Wonderful. Um, so okay. So you had an early

experience as Duncan. It was known as Dunkin Donuts. Did the change mean anything to you go

just going to Duncan? No. I mean, I haven't really frequented Dunkin Donuts for years. Um, I guess if

I were going there all the time, maybe. And And here again, I Hey, if you're

from Dunkin, you're watching this, cover your ears. Um, we got a little

disillusioned with Dunkin Donuts because they've got good coffee. But if you go

in to get a cup of coffee, they don't let you put in the creamer yourself.

They do it for you. That is wrong. That is wrong. That drives me bananas.

Yep. Have you seen what Starbucks has done? Um I I don't think so. I know that you

can put in the cream yourself, but Well, you've always been able to do that at the little station, right? Right.

I love that station. Although, I will say this, my pet peeve, my Starbucks pet

peeve is when people stand in front of the station when they're waiting for their coffee. Oh, yes. Yes.

Get out of the way. They're going to call your name, right? They call your name.

I need the napkin. Get out of So the the station, they took that away. They

stopped doing that. Huh. At any Starbucks that I've been to over

the last couple of years where you they would do it themselves. They've just brought the station back. So, a lot of

people must have complained. Now that but that made me think why did they change?

And you know what I thought of? I hate to say it. Here we are in a latigious society. I wonder if somebody you know

did it themselves and spilled hot coffee on them in their hand and sued them. Could be. Could be.

I mean that's what happened to McDonald's. Uhhuh. Oh yeah. Very famous example.

Very famous example. So they took action. This this restaurant stuff is not for the faint of

heart, Jeff. No. No. You've got to have some special hutzah.

That's right. Restaurant. So, all right. I mean, that's I think

that's all we had for rebrands, but we did want to offer our listeners some friendly advice. Uh, if you are a chief

marketing officer, um, so we're we're kind of winding into the conclusion. Is there were there any

other points or examples you wanted to site, Jeff? No, I I I think to give a couple of

learnings from all of this, you know, what are the five things you look at if you're developing a brand or preserving

a brand or enhancing a brand? Yeah. So, I Well, I've got three I'll

and you can please chime in as we go. I mean, what's the number one rule of

real estate? Location, location, location. re research research.

Like I said earlier, people have an emotional attachment to brands. Um, you

know, and we talked about, you know, why people go to restaurants. It's personal to them. It's not just about having

great food. And it's one thing I joke about the uh my new favorite dish, which

by the way, Jeff, is called hash brown casserole shephardd's pie. Um, did I

repeat that? Did you get that? Should I repeat it? Hash brown casserole shephardd's pie.

Exactly. That's that's what it is. Um, uh, it's one They also serve one hell of a meatloaf

there, just so you know. Oh, that's very comfort foody. See, now I want to go to Cracker Barrel,

right? I think they did this on purpose, those sobbs. You know, we should do another road show

where we go to Cracker Barrel, you know.

We could go to Cracker Barrel, Bies, all those things along 35 going south.

If we do our, and this is a little bit of inside baseball, folks, but hey, this is live television. What the hell? If we

do the Texas A&M thing, we're going to be on highway and that we should do a

vlog all based on stopping for food. We're going to be food critics. Mhm.

Well, on that trip, you're going to go past an area that serves all peach ice cream, this whole area.

So, you stop for a peach ice cream. And then you get down a little bit further. You stop at a Cracker Barrel.

And I think there's a BIES along there. So, I'm sure I'm sure there is. Yeah. So,

research, research, research. You What's It's one thing to update the menu, right? Right. It's even another thing to change the

actual name, right? And every situation is unique, but boy, if you're a

restaurant, it's an entirely different thing if you're changing the entire

customer experience. That better be based on research. And if

this was uh maybe they did the wrong research,

shame on you. They didn't or maybe the sample size was too small. I don't know. But it didn't

work. Clearly didn't work. So you got to do the research. Okay. The second thing

is go out and you know maybe Cracker Barrel did this. I don't know. Go out to

different publiclix to different groups to different stakeholder groups

under NDA of course before you go public with this stuff. The industry analyst. Jeff and I have

spent a lot of time in IT services where the industry analysts are the kinks.

They're the king. Oh yeah. They can make or break you. What's that? They can make or break you. Particularly

if you're a technology, you're you're a CIO and you want to pony you want to pony up a billion dollars

for an IT package. First thing you do, you go to the industry analyst who's bought the

technology before, right? What's your rating on them? G 800 pound gorilla, but

there are lots of others. We're getting a little sidetracked, but industry analysts, investors,

and and others. Um maybe even employee. I you know, you'd have to do this very

carefully over time, but

a they can steer you in the right direction, but b they can come to your

defense if and when the hits the fan. for sure.

Seen some of these stories out there with third-party endorsement quotes from

outsiders who said, "Here's why they did it, and it makes sense to me." If you're

pre-briefing people before you go public and bringing them in and hopefully

turning them into an evangelist, they're much more likely to come to your aid if

you run into a problem. Uh, that's that's one thing. And then the third thing I thought of was um prepare some

marketing assets in advance to support your announcement. Um it could be videos of customers

talking up the new rebrand, the new experience, you know, oh you I'm

Stuckies does a rebrand. They interview some customers in advance when they put

out the press release that day. Maybe they have a social campaign that's filled with videos of customers

talking up not only the pecan rolls, but oh, look at this new store. Oh, this is

great. You know, blah blah blah. Right. Um, I didn't really want to go and visit relatives. I wanted a peon roll.

That's right. Exactly. And so

that can all easily be done if you build out a road map in advance.

And that road map is doesn't go on forever, but it has enough runway that

you can build and build and build these things in advance. So when you are ready to press that button, you've got all the

backup in the world. Even if the president of the United States

about it, right? Those are my pieces of advice. Jeff, anything from your end? Yeah, I got three things here. So,

first, if you're giving a speech or whatever, you got to know who's in the audience. You got to know your audience.

You got to know who loves your product. You you got to know why your brand has

equity and if it has equity or is it something that's just this fantastic tradition? And if you break the

tradition, you break the brand. I think that's one of the first things you have to know. And that's certainly the case with Cracker Barrel. And you know, you

go back to the New Coke example, New Coke. You know, do you want to be like Pepsi or do people love that Coca-Cola

classic brand? And that was a great marketing lesson there. But so you have that. Then you got to listen to your

audience. You got to ask them, you know, what do you think about this? You do a little focus group. And then finally,

you know, what is your purpose? Do you do you want to grow your sales? Do you want to latch on to ones that are

leaving? You know, what is the purpose around this? Because there are lots of brands that have cache and equity around

them that they don't even realize. So, those would be the three things I would look at.

That That's exactly right. And yeah, I mean, and and all of that stuff

you just said can easily be put together into a presentation that you can float

ahead of time with certain audiences under NDA and get some get some third-party feedback. I've been

in involved in rebranding efforts myself where that was done where we went out

and I'm talking about company changes, logo changes, things like that um that I can't

probably shouldn't talk about in terms of who it was with but uh we learned

invaluable lessons from some of these people including and this was in the IT world customers

customer under an NDA with a consumer of a restaurant,

but a high level tech buyer, you could do that. You could do that under NDA. You don't need to get to a ton of them

bit of money, but it's worth it in the end. Just do the research, folks. That's all we're saying.

I I agree. You can save yourself a lot of money. You can save your shareholders a lot of money.

That's right. Um All right. I think that's all we have. Um why don't I turn

it over to you to close us out. Well, first, yes, thank you, John. This 21st

broadcast is kind of special to me because that number 21, I know a lot of you out there probably

don't remember this or don't care, but I grew up in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, and my fi favorite Pittsburgh Pirates player

of all time was Roberto Clemeni, who wore number 21. So, that number has

always been sacrosan to me. I love the number 21. So, special broadcast 21. Um,

all these things we've covered I I I I think are really interesting. You know, you just take a look at it. This is in

the news today. Would a lot of these brands be in the news at all? No. And

did some of them make mistakes that vaulted them into the news that may ultimately be good for them? Yeah. But

others have made mistakes that have sunk them. So, I I just think it's a really good topic. It's worthy of discussion.

You know why 21 is important to me? Was that Reggie Bush's number? That No. No. That's how old you have to

be to have a hash brown casserole shepherd's pie,

right? It's that strong. It's that strong. You have to be 21. And I remember No. Okay. Um I'm not kidding.

I'm going to Cracker Barrel. Um I I think it's you know one of the

things I think is important to point why have all these rebrands occurred why are we talking why did Cracker Barrel do

this I strongly suspect it is a sign of increased competition

he's struggling in a middling economy true causes business problems

which results in the CMO and the board sometimes looking at the CMO

What are you going to do to help us out? What are you going to do to help us drive growth? Let's rebrand. Right? I

get it. But if environmental, I should say maybe external performance pressures

are driving a lot of these rebrands and repositionings, uh, that's probably going to keep

happening. So the stuff we're talking about probably becoming increasingly common uh

which makes it even more critical to get it right when you do it. So yeah, this

is this is really important stuff. Hey, let me do an ad for Clients First Marketing and Communications LLC. Um

please please look at our website. Go to all of our social channels. We're on every one of them. And uh and watch

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but you'll always be entertained. John, you want to take it from here? We wish you all a great day. Yes, please, please follow us. Uh, we have

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Um, this will be out the week of uh something something in in September. Uh,

and um, we're excited and frankly a little bit hungry. So, one last

right now. What? One last time. Hash brown. Hash brown casserole.

Shephardd's shephardd's pie pie. See y'all later.