All Boats Rise – a Wholesaler’s Consumer Branding Lessons

Peter Friedmann is a thought leader on product-, brand-, and marketing challenges. His experience, coming from many years at Hallmark and DEMDACO shines a strong light in our conversation about branding, strategic planning, and how to remain open for new information after having built a robust strategy. I commend his organization’s commitment to sharing information with industry peers/competitors – “a rising tide lifts all boats.”

1:59 – “not all (consumer product) companies are wired for consumer branding… it depends on the culture of the organization.”

8:20 – “2020 in hindsight would tell you that mitigating risk from one channel is something everyone has to do…if you were all-in on wholesale, you were hammered. If you had a direct-to-consumer strategy you survived just fine.”

8:58 – “…it needs to start with the consumer. Who the heck are we talking to?”

13:38 – “What does it look like to be a brand for the consumer? We started mapping out a product strategy – to do more cross-selling – then an aesthetic-, editorial-, pricing-, packaging-, merchandising strategy… if you want to be a brand, everything needs to look like it comes from the same DNA.”

14:40 – “Defining what you’re not going to do is as important as what you do.”

28:24 – “…if you can’t say what you need to say in the room… if you have broccoli in your teeth you want somebody to tell you… to get your vision to move forward, you have to be radically canderous.” (Hint: Peter highly recommends Kim Scott’s book “Radical Candor”)