TRAINER SOLES

I stumbled across this poster in Sneaker Freaker and it sprung an idea to mind. The New Balance Sole is quite boring and there is nothing special on it. If you look the ones below it is clear the brand is plastered all over in different colours. If consumers wear these fancy soled trainers then they are effectively printing the logo into where they walk. New balance could maximise on this...It's free marketing after all..

SNEAKER FREAKER POSTER OF DIFFERENT BRANDED SOLES

A pattern across the whole sole with arrows and the name very clearly!

Nike across the middle of the trainer with different textures at the top and the bottom...

A very large brand name and logo with different colors to stand out.

Even this sole, though more understated, has a more intricute pattern and the brand name in the middle.

Just a simple pattern surrounding and complimenting the brand logo can work!

These images have given me inspiration four our campaign. Perhaps tagging on from the Conviviality Culutre (personalisation) trend, a suggestion for New Balance could be to create a more intricute branded sole. A lot could be done with this campaign wise and they could even bring out Limited Edition soles for the Tier 1 consumer?!

Abbie xxx

STICKER TREND

Thecoolhunter.net has launched a guerilla marketing campaign which will be used to create a buzz. The campaign involves slapping these stickers on cars, magazines and people. The stickers say things like "You've been Cool Huntered" and "The contents of this magazine have already been blogged about 3 months ago, save your money and read thecoolhunter.net".

 

At a time when magazines are seen to be struggling to win against digital media, magazine publishers are now joining together for a comeback campaign stating that "people aren't giving up swimming just because they also enjoy surfing". Even though I love blogs, magazines are in my mind, irreplaceable. 

What I like about this sticker campaign however is how intrusive the labels are: anything can literally be branded with the cool hunter as little or as much as possible, and the public are likely to notice these sticker high jacks, and even take part if provided with the stickers.

I love how the campaign has also translated into clothes- the label can be printed on tops to make a fashion statement, spreading the cool hunter awareness even further. I think that branding every day objects, and claiming them as your own is an interesting way to communicate brand identity, especially if great thought is to put into the exact locations so that these branded objects are part of the brand itself.

Caroline

THE URBAN PLAYGROUND TREND

Brands today are expected to be innovative and creative as consumers become accustomed to surreal ideas. This has resulted in it becoming increasingly important for brands to “remain experimental and original, in contrast to more conventional or established ideas.” (Melius, L. in WGSN 2011: Online)

With a new trend in urban and outdoor entertainment brands are jumping on the band-wagon to “convert the unexpected into urban playgrounds” (Marshall-Johnson, R. in WGSN 2010: Online). In 2010 artist duo, FriendsWithYou turned the city of Toronto into a magical world of colour and fun with a series of interactive art installations for the Wish Come True Festival to create, what was called, the Rainbow City. (SEE BELOW)

Consumers love the simple but “innovative ideas that come from creating a personal space in the city” (Marshall-Johnson, R. in WGSN 2010: Online) and with an increase in aspects such as rooftop entertainment and events this is set to take off into the marketing world to give brands the opportunity to develop a relationship with their consumers in their own, personal space away from other competitors.

HANNAH

FUTURE LABORATORY - CONVIVIALITY CULTURE TREND

‘As mindful consumption starts to unfold, and technology broadens expectations, far more personalised consumer desires emerge. With such an abundance of choice, consumers will continue to be drawn towards options that demonstrate a true sense of understanding such needs, while also still searching for value.’ (Cultural Shifts A-Z 2011, WGSN)

Drawing on the quote above, I have managed to locate a pdf/jpeg format of the Conviviality Culture trend from when I went to a lecture from Chris Sanderson at the Future Laboratory last year. It is about personalisation and could really fit in with our New Balance Campaign...

‘LIVE AGE’: The most exciting thing today is being offline and engaging with people and brands in the real world.

In ‘Brand Sense’, Martin Lindstrom says that we’re experiencing emptiness – we lack the physical contact which we are hard-wired to desire.

Consumers are moving ‘beyond consumption’ – they are looking for happiness elsewhere.

VR Urban and their SMS Slingshot which can be used to ‘catapult’ texts onto the walls to reclaim the streets/their culture.

CONNOISSEUR TASTES: Consumers are increasingly interested in becoming experts in once-forgotten rituals, behaviours and products. We want to use our choices and expertise to show who we are and to tell someone about our personality. For example, there are 33,000 combinations of drink at Starbucks (e.g. different shots) – what we have says something about us.

‘We want to mark ourselves out. If we become an expert in something it becomes a facet of our personality and our brand identity.’ (Mark Tungate, trends expert + consultant)

We could use these quotes and trends for our campaign. Perhaps personlisation and making the New Balance trainers something unique to the consumer is a good way to take things?

Abbie xxx

80's TRENDS

‘Retro is in with a passion, and the 1980’s and 1990’s are back.’ (Associated Content 2011: Online). Spring/Summer 2011 is seeing a return to the 80’s and 90’s retro trend for sneakers, and from bloggers images it is clear that the bolder the better. Hightops have been predicted to be hot this season, with Jimmy Choo and Christian Louboutin reintroducing this style on their Spring/Summer Fashion Week catwalks. Natalie Hartley, senior editor at InStyle says that ‘with so much street style influences around, high tops give a nod to that [nineties grunge era] without feeling too try hard.’ (Telegraph.co.uk 2011: Online) Shoeblogger’s ‘Shorty Loves Shoes’ predicts that ‘sneakers in Spring are celebrating colourful funky 80’s and 90’s fashion- for better or for worse.’ (Shoeblogger 2011: Online)











‘Tier Two’ consumers are also beginning to recognize this as an appealing trend; ‘I get my inspiration from films. I have recently seen ‘The Firm’ which is set in the eighties. It reminded me how cool the chunky eighties look is.’ (Si Mason, Focus Group participant: 2011) This initial awareness of the trend marks the beginning of the ‘Trickle Down Theory’ from the ‘Tier One’ early adopter to the ‘Tier Two’ high street shopper.

When talking to Si our Opinion Former and his flat mates about their purchasing decisions, 19 year old Tobias came up with a very interesting answer. Tobias is our BIG Adidas fan. He said that he did not read magazines and did not feel that TV adverts made him go and buy something, although he would remember a cool advert for years.

Tobias said Adidas have started to focus more on their Trimm Trab style, and he currently loves the 80's chunky, colourful trainer vibe. Below are images of Adidas' Trimm Trabs, the soles are thicker, the colours more old school than fluroescent and have a definite nostalgia of when we were young.

"I love them because they are retro without being predictably retro. They are old but not old enough that everyone is wearing them as 'retro' is in. I don't like to be the same as everyone else with my shoes, I like to stand out. I get bored of things when everyone starts to get them, and I think that 80's retro is something that could really hit off."

Caroline

NEW BALANCE NUTTER INTERVIEW

The website below is dedicated to trainers of all styles including the new arrivals of certain brands and then consumers testimonials on their favorite brands...it is also a website where you can purchase their magazine with content in:

http://www.sneakerfreaker.com/

On this website, I found a particular article of interest...the New Balance Collector who goes crazy for the NB Brand:

NEKTARIOS LIOLIOS - NEW BALANCE NUTTER

"On our quest to find vintage sneaker collectors the world over, our in boxes have been inundated with crates of Jordan, Nike and Adidas kicks... no big surprises there. Recently however, we met Nektarious Liolios, a fella with a full-on fetish for New Balance. A relative rookie on the sneaker scene, Nektarious is a late bloomer – a few short years ago he was stung hard by the sneaker bug, and thus began a love affair with NB. We caught up with him to find out just why he has a jones in his bones for the NB brand and why his room looks like a jewelery store!"






When did you start getting into sneakers?

This was in 2000! Before that, I did not own a single pair of sneakers! Not even for exercise. But I needed something comfortable and I saw this one pair in a shop window that looked kinda nice. It was the only pair of sneakers in that shoe store, by the way. They were grey New Balance 574s... quite plain. I tried them on and they fit like a glove. I only knew NB as a geeky sneaker brand that lonely computer programmers wore. But then I noticed other people around me wearing NBs in some pretty impressive colours and shapes and little by little I started buying more, mainly to match my clothes. I guess it got more serious in 2003 when I bought my first pair that I liked the look of but didn't wear because I didn't want to spoil them. That's when I really started to ‘collect'.

You're in a full-blown crush with these NBs - what is it about them that makes you gaga?

I love the colours and materials, I love the different styles, I love the fact that NB are not ubiquitous, I love the ‘Made in England' concept, I love that NB are not as commercial as other brands. Although I am ‘sold' on NB, sometimes, when I think I have overdone it a bit I try to slow myself down and not spend some money for a while. Ironically, I compensate for that by buying sneakers for my partner. He likes his Adidas ZXs and little by little I managed to ‘grow' his collection to 30+.


You've said you have collected and copped kicks from all over the world... any interesting stories along the way?

In my previous job I used to travel a lot around Europe so I ended up checking out the sneaker stores in every city I visited. So my collection has come from the UK, Holland, Denmark, Sweden, Greece, Germany, Poland, Estonia, Italy and Luxembourg. Sometimes I would buy a pair that wasn't that special but I made it a souvenir from that particular visit. It's amazing how sometimes you'd walk into a store and they'd have only ONE pair of NB and they'd be something I had never seen before. Since I moved to Australia I travel a lot in the region, so I managed to add some pairs from Hong Kong, Singapore and Japan. I don't have a particular story but what I found amazing is that it's normally the really GOOD shops that stock NB. And there might be only one store in the city or even the country. But luckily there's the web and eBay and I get to travel a bit. When I went to Japan, I thought I'd end up in sneaker heaven but most stores that have an amazing range online did not have that much in the actual store (i.e. Atmos). I do travel to the UK occasionally and I pop into Size? or Offspring for a fix. Crooked Tongues and Hanon are great online stores.

What style of New Balance do you prefer? Most heads go bananas over the 1500...

I only have a couple of 1500s but they ARE fantastic! Maybe I am a little traditional but I kinda like the 576s a lot. Seems to be the one made for me. And I do have an awful lot of 574s because that's what I started with. I like the look of the 4XXs but my feet don't seem to be made for them. I recently got my first 910s and I am still undecided. The bulkiness of the 580s is great but most of them seem a bit tame. Let's hope there will be something more titillating soon (like the Mad Hectic-x-Mita).

What's your grail when it comes to NB?

There are so many great kicks that I don't know where to start. And with so many obscure collabs I don't even think I know them all. Some that come to mind are:
- the eYe Junya Watanabe Comme des Garcons 1500
- the Staple design Pigeon 575
- anything by United Arrows
- the La-MJC collette 1500

What shoe are you looking forward to dropping in the future...we hear there are some dope colabos dropping soon!

I wouldn't mind seeing some musicians or artists giving their versions. And of course I wouldn't mind designing my own pair. It would be pretty erm...bling. I like sparkles, he he!

This directly relates to or New Balance brief...glad I came across this!!!

Abbie xxx