Which came first–our mission or the brand?
Brand Autopsy is launching a series of posts that’s taking an inside look at Starbucks. Mr. Brand Autopsy, John Moore, used to be the Retail Marketing Manager at Starbucks, so he’s going to offer a unique perspective on a rapidly growing company.
In today’s first post, he makes a fantastic point about brands. He said, "you cannot create a brand before you create a business. Your business creates your brand. Your brand should never create your business." For Starbucks, that means they were more focused on roasting the highest-quality beans and creating welcoming places for people to enjoy coffee. John suggests "the by-product was the creation of a strong brand."
The same certainly holds true at Granger. From the very beginning of the church, Granger has been focused on it’s mission of helping people take their next step toward Christ…together. Out of that mission came the commitment to relevant teaching, quality experiences for adults and kids, innovative approaches to worship and the arts, etc. With that focus on Christ and fulfillment of our mission has come a very strong "brand" within our community. People have perceptions of what they’re going to experience at Granger before they ever step foot on our campus.
The point here is that we didn’t begin with those "desired perceptions" and then decide we were going to commit to relevant teaching, excellence in first impressions and innovative worship experiences. We began with our passion for Jesus and our commitment to the mission God has placed on our church to help people become fully-devoted followers of Christ. Out of that came the teaching, the worship, and ultimately the brand–the intangibles including the perceptions of the experience people associate with our ministry.
I’m still not sure if the chicken or the egg came first, but I do know you can’t begin with the brand.
In the age of denominations the claim was made (implicitly or explicitly) that Brand – denominational label – was all one needed. This approach has helped kill United Methodism. By settling for Brand alone, we’ve marginalized doctrine, cut out passion and settled for a simulacrum of unity.
Keep up the good work!
“Simulacrum.” I love it when someone forces me to visit Dictionary.com and learn a new word. On top of that, this is “a good word” from Richard.
tony
Starbucks and Granger you can compare, since they both began at least with clear and passionate ideals and then developed branding. This is why a startup business or a church plant is so much easier than what we are trying to do. After 30+ years, after the peak days, an organization has to reinvent its branding or die. Our church had a great branding and effectiveness but then rested in that after it was not relevant anymore. Now, I am part of a new leadership team that has to forge a new branding and identity. Ghosts are hard to kill. So, in many ways, we have to preserve the core and stimulate progress like Jim Collins shares. We will see if we can make it through this! Bless you.
Great post, Tony! Also check out the article in October’s Fast Company. http://www.fastcompany.com/magazine/99/open_essay.html Same line of thinking. Good insights.
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