Stupid Stupid Rebranding

[LadyG]

39 minutes ago, pete.i said:

Whinge whinge whinge whine whine whine. It's no wonder C&RT,    yup I don't do it the official way either, what the hell has that got to do with anything? are fed up of boaters if in fact they are. I think if I was in a place of influence with C&RT I would be thinking about getting rid of boaters if they are like you lot. Thankfully they are not.

Are you sure about that?

[LadyG]

14 minutes ago, Athy said:

You think some members are boring old FRTs, then?

Obviously, being a cross section of the boating population, some are bound to be cross.

Edited May 24, 2018 by LadyG

[LadyG]

17 hours ago, adam1uk said:

It got them coverage every 20 minutes on BBC Breakfast tv this morning -- every time Carol did the weather.  How much do you think that was worth?

I'm not sure how much it is worth, I mean, who watches BBC Breakfast? Perhaps some clever bod on here can tell us, then by reverse extrapolation [intrapolation] we can determine how many folks living close [7 arbitrary miles] to the canals saw this broadcast, and how many of these felt better for it, or imagined they might feel better if they visited a canal. You don't have to visit Venice to feel uplifted by paintings by Canaletto.

Edited May 24, 2018 by LadyG

[Tanglewood]

Its taken me a few weeks to remember the old adage - 'any publicity is good publicity'.  So given that there are very very few positive comments about the new logo on any of the 4 or 5 threads so far started on here, then perhaps the marketing bods had this conversation - 

 

'Flipping Ada, its just hit me'

'I'm listening'

'All we need do is upset as many people who actually know who CRT are as possible, then they'll tell all their friends how rubbish we are, and they'll pass this on.....  PRETTY SOON EVERYONE IN THE COUNTRY WILL KNOW WHO WE ARE'

 

'Didn't we try that when we bought that massive consignment of spikes and red netting from China?'

'Nah, that was location specific - we need something that's really gonna rile them all the time'

'Like a new Logo?'

'Brilliant!  Any ideas?

' well something based on ying and yang so definitely needs to be black and white'  

'OK print off a black circle with a thick line'

'Done - oh crikey my weekly b/w printing allowance has run out - I'll go for blue..... oh S***, blues running out too, halfway through'

Sometime later....  important head office guy reaches for a scrap of paper .......

 

'HEY GUYS - LOVING YOUR WORK!!!!'

 

[MtB]

I'm tyred of you lot moaning about CRT.

 

(See what I did there? ) 

[Jennifer McM]

6 minutes ago, LadyG said:

Obviously, being a cross section of the boating population, some are bound to be cross.

That's true, rather like 'chalk 'n' cheese' - boaters tend to be practical (I wanted to say 'grounded' but thought this might get misconstrued ?) while marketing bods (aka 'flower arrangers') tend to live in a world that can seemingly be surreal. 

 

I wish CRT success with their rebranding for all our sake, just wish within their 'marketing hype' they'd have mentioned boaters more, not least because boaters are over 20% of their revenue (can't remember the exact percentage). Boats are an attraction for walkers, we get waved at, photographed, and pointed at. Perhaps it would have been better (somehow) to have involved boaters more, getting boaters on the side of CRT.   

 

 

[matty40s]

13 minutes ago, LadyG said:

I'm not sure how much it is worth, I mean, who watches BBC Breakfast? Perhaps some clever bod on here can tell us, then by reverse extrapolation [intrapolation] we can determine how many folks living close [7 arbitrary miles] to the canals saw this broadcast, and how many of these felt better for it, or imagined they might feel better if they visited a canal. You don't have to visit Venice to feel uplifted by paintings by Canaletto.

Or any other pasta dishes. ..

[dmr]

Oh dear, just been approached by a CaRT chugger. Even before he had got his intro speech going I told him that I was boater and so feeling rather negative towards CaRT at present.  He did not try to persuade me otherwise ?

 

............Dave

[Mac of Cygnet]

I have a much better idea for a new logo.  Simple and attractive.  They wouldn't even have to replace all the signs.

[Rob-M]

3 minutes ago, Mac of Cygnet said:

I have a much better idea for a new logo.  Simple and attractive.  They wouldn't even have to replace all the signs.

Having come up the Wolverhampton 21 recently I've seen that logo quite a bit, nearly every lock I think still had one.

[MtB]

20 minutes ago, dmr said:

Oh dear, just been approached by a CaRT chugger. Even before he had got his intro speech going I told him that I was boater and so feeling rather negative towards CaRT at present.  He did not try to persuade me otherwise ?

 

............Dave

 

They always give up the instant you mention you are a boater in my experience. I think this is because if they persist, they get the "I already pay CRT £x,xxx k a year and I think that's enough, don't you?" lecture.

[dmr]

8 minutes ago, Rob-M said:

Having come up the Wolverhampton 21 recently I've seen that logo quite a bit, nearly every lock I think still had one.

 

That was a very very good logo in lots of ways, I never liked the swan as it was just a "degradation" of that rushes logo. Sadly the nature of management and "corporate man" is that they are not able to go back to a previous image no matter how perfect it is, or at least not until about 20 years have elapsed.

 

The use of black and white would be hailed as a stroke of genius if it was thought of now by CaRTs branding consultants, not only does it "resonate" with waterways infrastructure (Locks) but it can be rendered perfectly with a black and white printer thus saving costs.

 

..............Dave

[MtB]

3 minutes ago, dmr said:

 

 

The use of black and white would be hailed as a stroke of genius if it was thought of now by CaRTs branding consultants, not only does it "resonate" with waterways infrastructure (Locks) but it can be rendered perfectly with a black and white printer thus saving costs.

 

..............Dave

 

No doubt in ten years some marketing genius will be paid another £60,000 of our money to think of this original idea.

 

[dmr]

3 minutes ago, Mike the Boilerman said:

 

They always give up the instant you mention you are a boater in my experience. I think this is because if they persist, they get the "I already pay CRT £x,xxx k a year and I think that's enough, don't you?" lecture.

I was going to be "humorous" by saying that I did not recognise which organisation he represented as his sweatshirt and gazebo were both decorated with a black and white swan, but I thought that would be too cruel.

 

Right, just waiting till the lock-keepers (old logo) are back on duty then i'm going boating.

 

................Dave

[LadyG]

Who was this chugger, are they multiplying?

[dmr]

Just now, Mike the Boilerman said:

 

No doubt in ten years some marketing genius will be paid another £60,000 of our money to think of this original idea.

 

 

Next time we meet for a beer I will tell you the sad story of the rebranding disaster at the university where I used to work, very very similar to what CaRT are doing now. I do suspect that we will now see more rebrandings every few years whilst they try to "correct" the current brand but without obviously going back to the previous brand.

 

...............Dave

 

2 minutes ago, LadyG said:

Who was this chugger, are they multiplying?

 

He has been accosting the girls from the local college as they cross the lock but I don't think he was breeding with them ?

 

(sorry couldn't resist that one)     ..... Dave

[Tumshie]

Is blue a fashionable colour just now? I know that seems a silly question but is Facebook and Twitter not blue so also being blue might make them more appealing on the social media sites.

 

That might be completely daft or obvious to others but I'm not on social media. 

[Athy]

1 minute ago, Tumshie said:

Is blue a fashionable colour just now?

Well, the Government seems to like it.

[adam1uk]

8 hours ago, LadyG said:

Am I the only person that thinks that we can do without some of these Directors of spin: any first year marketing student can come up wth these words in a focus session in the Uni bar. They don't need to visit a canal.

I have to confess, I switched off after the first paragraph, and I am an "interested party" So who is it writtten for: if the Chairperson and the CEO can't find any ideas themselves, thus requiring employment of persons in rubbish jobs, they should fall on their swords.

I've worked for several unsuccessful companies,  CRT, exhibits all the characteristics of drowning men clutching at straws particularly in their Wellness Department.

If HM Govt want to make this country a pleasant place to live by laying down good quality towpaths while ignoring litter, graffitti, foul language, knife carrying, drugs , inner city crime, stalking, noise pollution, air pollution, countryside despoilation, THEY NEED THEIR HEADS EXAMINED. 

The people CRT are really talking to with all this are the government.  When CRT was established, the funding settlement was for ten years.  The most important thing on CRT’s agenda, in my view, is getting that extended.  Without the £50million a year grant, things will look very bleak.

 

If you’re trying to convince the government to continue to put £50million a year into the canals, you could make the argument that it’s needed to subsidise the 30,000 or so people who have boats.  Or you could say that x million people make use of the canals, and that the ‘well-being’ that results is worth x million (or billion, even).  The first argument has no chance; the second argument has some chance.

 

I really think that people who want the sole focus of CRT to be on boaters, and who don’t want more people using the towpaths, are being very shortsighted and are shooting themselves in the foot.  Without that grant, we’ll either have to pay several times more or there will be huge cuts in maintenance.

4 hours ago, Mike the Boilerman said:

 

They always give up the instant you mention you are a boater in my experience. I think this is because if they persist, they get the "I already pay CRT £x,xxx k a year and I think that's enough, don't you?" lecture.

The one who was at Foxton this morning came over to chat — and in the course of conversation said that most boaters he encounters are just rude.  He was a pleasant guy, just doing his job, who said he’d signed up 360 friends — and yet boaters are rude to him.  

[Athy]

8 minutes ago, adam1uk said:

 

The one who was at Foxton this morning came over to chat — and in the course of conversation said that most boaters he encounters are just rude.  He was a pleasant guy, just doing his job, who said he’d signed up 360 friends — and yet boaters are rude to him.  

People do not generally take too well to being approached by strangers who ask them for money. Much depends, I think, on whether the approacher is a volunteer, as many charity collectors are - but I have heard that some of CART's collector are paid for their services (they may even be on commission, I don't know).

[adam1uk]

Just now, Athy said:

People do not generally take too well to being approached by strangers who ask them for money. Much depends, I think, on whether the approacher is a volunteer, as many charity collectors are - but I have heard that some of CART's collector are paid for their services (they may even be on commission, I don't know).

So it’s ok to be rude to them?

[Athy]

1 minute ago, adam1uk said:

So it’s ok to be rude to them?

If that's what you want to do, yes. 

[john6767]

5 hours ago, dmr said:

 

That was a very very good logo in lots of ways, I never liked the swan as it was just a "degradation" of that rushes logo. Sadly the nature of management and "corporate man" is that they are not able to go back to a previous image no matter how perfect it is, or at least not until about 20 years have elapsed.

 

The use of black and white would be hailed as a stroke of genius if it was thought of now by CaRTs branding consultants, not only does it "resonate" with waterways infrastructure (Locks) but it can be rendered perfectly with a black and white printer thus saving costs.

 

..............Dave

But they could Change to that logo even if they wanted, as it is the logo of British Waterways a separate organisation.  Remember BW still exists, it did not go away when CRT was formed.

[dmr]

5 minutes ago, john6767 said:

But they could Change to that logo even if they wanted, as it is the logo of British Waterways a separate organisation.  Remember BW still exists, it did not go away when CRT was formed.

With modern mergers, take overs and demergers there are several examples of an entire brand ending up owned by one company but licensed to another, there is one very well known automotive examples but I just can't think of it right now!!!. I think if CaRT wanted that logo they could buy it or rent it quite easily and cheaply. They could even make a legitimate case that they own it. Surely if its current owners wanted and valued it then they would already have taken legal action against CaRT for the Swan Logo, a blatant case of "passing off".

 

...............Dave

[john6767]

1 hour ago, dmr said:

With modern mergers, take overs and demergers there are several examples of an entire brand ending up owned by one company but licensed to another, there is one very well known automotive examples but I just can't think of it right now!!!. I think if CaRT wanted that logo they could buy it or rent it quite easily and cheaply. They could even make a legitimate case that they own it. Surely if its current owners wanted and valued it then they would already have taken legal action against CaRT for the Swan Logo, a blatant case of "passing off".

 

...............Dave

The owners are of course the government, no doubt they approved the swan logo when CRT was formed.