Take It Face To Face

The examples are mind-boggling: celebrities that take advantage of their fame to launch a product line. Restaurants. Perfume. Clothing. Handbags. Salad dressing. No industry has gone untouched.

The late Paul Newman (the sole food-unaffiliated celebrity I can recall to ever venture into the condiment market) turned it into an art with Newman’s Own. The company’s motto “shameless exploitation in pursuit of the common good” speaks for itself.  His company didn’t take itself too seriously. If only more celebrities took a page out of Newman’s book…

Shameless exploitation is what these stars bank on. Whether simply to turn more profit, or to fulfill an alleged lifelong dream (Dear Monica Lewinsky, I’m skeptical), fans can be relied upon to pounce on whatever product their idol might choose to send their way.

It seems like a foolproof formula, but on the whole these brands don’t seem to stick around that long. They fizzle out rather quickly into relative oblivion. Remember Mariah Carey’s signature perfume? Yeah, neither do I.

The kink in the plan comes in when the products are just, well, bad. When their success hinges solely upon the popularity of the spokesperson, consumers will quickly figure out it’s not worth their money.

The onslaught of celebrities pimping out their image to sell stuff has become so intense lately that an endorsement now has the exact opposite effect of what’s intended. Oh, a celebrity developed it? It must be garbage.

A recent New York Daily News article about Justin Timberlake’s new tequila shines light on the fact. Three aficionados who pre-tasted the product were stunned, read STUNNED, that it was not only drinkable, but rather good. Said one, “it’s actually a nice product,” and another, “I gotta admit, I’m a little surprised.”

The small number of other celebrity ventures who have gotten their hooks squarely into the consumer market did so simply by proving their product was quality. Sean John, for example, doesn’t look to be going anywhere anytime soon.  Perhaps it’s becuase the company distanced itself enough from its creator image-wise that I often forget where it came from. Good work Puffy/Diddy/whatever your name is.

Moral of the story: quality product first, PR and marketing later. We can only do so much.

What’s your favorite celebrity product? Which do you think is the worst? Tell us your thoughts.

I was lucky enough to have a father that loved movies. I grew up watching films like Ben-Hur, The Bicycle Thief, and Cool Hand Luke. My father’s love of movies has been passed onto me and I currently own over 950 DVDs. Much to my sadness I saw on TV this week end that Paul Newman lost his battle with cancer.

Paul Newman was a great actor, he came from the school of thought known as Character Acting, where an actor truly becomes the person they are trying to emulate. Your onscreen persona hasn’t showered in two weeks, you don’t shower for two weeks, it’s that simple.

I could talk for hours about Mr. Newman’s acting but I am here to talk about his brand. Anyone who followed his career knew one thing about him, he was honest. He wasn’t one of those actors in Hollywood that pandered his image or even cared about it, if you like Paul you liked Paul, really wasn’t much of a concern to him.

If you asked him about something Mr. Newman would tell you what he thought, but he never preached; he never came out and said you were wrong simply because you didn’t share his beliefs. When Mr. Newman’s son died of a drug overdose he dedicated millions to starting a charity to help people with substance abuse problems.

As the story goes one summer night Paul and a friend of his were joshing around saying that Paul should market his oil and vinegar mix; as a joke he did. His salad dressing was soon flying off the shelves and his salad dressing was now making money, the he certainly didn’t need, so what did Mr. Newman do? He gave all the profits from his branded products to charity.

Every cent of profit that Newman’s Own branded products went to support charities. Mr. Newman began expanding his brand to a host of other products. As a consumer I was certain of two things when I saw the Newman’s Own brand: Quality and helping a good cause.

That was the power of Mr. Newman’s brand, at some point he could have been selling me tires and I would have believed that they were good tires for a good cause. Can you think of anyone else out there that has that kind of brand equity? Any other celebrity that could simply add his or her name to something and have it sail? Let me know.