Do I have a Dream or a Brand?
Like most things, a brand or a business starts with an idea or a dream. For us it grew from a simple note along the spine of our journal: “Why not build a brand on something you know…. Explorers and Coffee”.
In most cases, these ideas become all-consuming – you find yourself doodling concepts, taking down notes about your thoughts while sitting with friends, planning around the dinner table, and flicking through Pinterest boards while drinking way too many cups of coffee as your vision and dream takes shape.
I always find myself distracted by the photographs, notes, tokens, and quotes across my office wall and one of my favorite and possibly best-suited quotes is owed to T.E. Lawrence:
“All men dream: but not equally. Those who dream by night in the dusty recesses of their minds wake up in the day to find it was vanity, but the dreamers of the day are dangerous men, for they may act their dreams with open eyes, to make it possible.”
Over the years I have become fascinated by how others have built their dreams into brands and successful businesses. Trying to learn from their legacies, how they marketed themselves, built their customer base and present themselves in an everchanging (and now often digital) market. One of my favorite brands was built by Hans Wilsdorf. His company Rolex is, in my opinion, one of the greatest examples of brand building to date, with some of their most recent campaigns – such as the “Perpetual Planet” series – taking them bounding into the digital era.
My fascination does not come from wanting to own a luxury watch, but instead how they, as a company, positioned themselves alongside some of the greatest achievements in history to market their brand and products.
Deepest Dive Lt. Welsh
Swimming the English Channel
Sir Edmund Hillary
Sylvia Earl
As a brand, they were decades before their time in using what we refer to today as “influencer marketing” to build trust among the people, a reputation for their brand and a legacy which they proudly refer to as “The Rolex Way”.
Of course, having a dream and being fascinated with one of the world’s most successful brands does not ensure the success of your own ideas. I learned early on that success is never guaranteed, but in order to work towards it you need to seek the guidance and advise of friends, loved ones, and mentors. This is possibly the most difficult part of building a brand: taking criticism constructively and allowing your dreams to be shaped by the collective wisdom of others.
I am not referring to a “product testing” or “product tasting” session with clients, I am referring to taking the opportunity to assess and reshape the viability, systems, vision, and values of the business or brand in question.
For me, this part of the process was the most enlightening and challenged us on the following points:
- Why start a business in the first place, what problem or need are you trying to solve or meet respectively.
- Why “exploration”, what makes that theme unique and why will it draw customers.
- Why coffee at all, it’s a product that’s sold everywhere so what makes yours different.
- How will you build community around the coffee.
- What is your unique selling point.
- How will you source your inputs, how will you roast the beans, and how will you ship your product.
- What is your wider contribution and how do you maintain social responsibility.
All of these and many more were topics of discussion on our planning weekends in the dunes of the Kalahari, team getaways along the wild coast, and fireside chats snuggled deep in the Scottish Highlands.
Over the next few blogs, we hope to answer some of these questions and open your eyes to the various components of our brand image, business model, and 10% donation of the retail price of our coffee on your behalf to the Curiosity Fund.
Sending you off on your next adventure, coffee in hand.
John & Team
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