Hairy Diamonds

New Age Diamonds is a Russian St-Petersburg company that offers hand-made diamonds from your own hair – Your Personal Diamond ™. NAD uses production facilities of a former space-lab for high-pressure high-temperature artificial diamonds forming. This technology is not new and artificial diamonds are sold all over the world. The marketing trick is the offer to make diamonds personal – from human or animal hair. What’s the point? Hair contains DNA that makes every diamond unique. NAD needs only app. 1 gram of hair to produce a stone.

Oh! I almost forgot – ashes left after the body is cremated are also accepted as raw material.

The price starts from $1000 a carat.

Related Tags: Russia, St.Petersburg, jewelry, man-made diamonds

Ruski

Krasniy Vostok Brewery is sold to Efes Breweries International (Turkey). The price of the deal was only $360 mln. Nobody expected that Krasniy Vostok could be so cheap. It should’ve been at least $730-780 mln. But alas! Krasniy Vostok marketing failures in the last five years were so numerous and so disastrous that in 2005 it had only 3% share of Russian beer market (5,7% in 2002). Its productive capacity is 130 mln. dL but it sold only 19,9 mln. dL of beer last year.

Take for example its Ruski brand project. For those who don’t know Russian – (1) The word should be written with double ‘s’ russki, (2) The word is only used in an idiom “po-russki” meaning “in a way Russians do”. When I saw Ruski beer billboard for the first time I thought, “Hey! Spelling mistakes!” Later I learnt that the brand creators meant it – they thought this would boost the brand recognition. Next came satirical TV commercials picturing dull ways of drinking beer (Finnish or Japanese) and a jolly way to drink beer (po-russki). The jolly way – balalaikas, nesting dolls, dancing bears - are usually associated with vodka. No matter how kvass-patriotic Russians could be they know that the best beer is German or Czech but not Russian. And drinking beer po-russki is outright silly. Krasniy Vostok spent $2 mln on advertising and many times more on distribution with zero result. In 2003 it disappeared completely from store shelves.

Related Tags: Russia, beer, brand, Ruski, failure, Krasniy Vostok, Efes

To trax or not to trax?

RMB mourns over the death of yet another brand of so-called alcohol cocktails: highly carbonated sodas with 6-8% of pure alcohol. We are talking about Trax by Lebedyanskiy juice tycoon. Ad men called the brand of the year but investors insist that they lost $10 mln. Competitors are sure that reasons of the failure are sexually explicit and rude commercials. The name of the brand is also free and easy. It’s a pun – Cyrillic x in Russian is pronounced as “kh” thus making the name sound a dirty slang word.

Trax name was “invented” at Samolet Design Studio. It was tested on numerous focus groups with teenagers and they liked it very much. It means they said they liked the idea. They didn’t lie. Teenagers enjoyed making fun at Trax cans at stores but refused to buy it.

Via Sostav

Related Tags: Russia, Trax, alcohol cocktail, branding, naming, advertisement

Crust wars

Some time ago I wrote about one of the most popular snacks in Russia – sukhariki (rusks). Today there are two major players on the market (should I say rusk giants?) who are constantly warring with each other. One brand is ‘3 Korochki’ (3 Crusts) and the other one is ‘Kiriyeshki’ produced by Sibirskiy Bereg (Novosibirsk). Although an archetypal Siberian is a slow and non-aggressive person, Sibirskiy Bereg launched an aggressive advertising campaign. The anti ‘3 Crusts’ ad pictured three banana skins, three orange skins and three mouldy bread crusts with the slogan: “Real sukhariki are not called crusts”. In Russia comparative advertising is illegal. It didn’t take a lot of time to calculate that Sibirskiy Bereg was behind this attack and 3 Crusts didn’t hesitate to sue it. Two years later after all appeals and counter-appeals the court pronounced the judgment – Sibirskiy Bereg should place the exact number of billboards it used for slandering its competitor with the words of apology.

Calling names

This brand of convenience food was called ‘Lentiay’ – a lazy man. I wonder who stood behind this creative naming? The person definitely believes that reason I buy convenience food is my laziness. What if the reason’s exactly the opposite? I’m too hard-working and don’t have time to cook.

I bet they would’ve never introduced the brand ‘Lentiayka’ – a lazy woman. Russian women are more sensitive about such things.

Smashed by Adertisement

Yesterday thousands of Muscovites swarmed the square at the Belorusskiy railway station trying to find a cab (in vain) or get on a bus in the direction of Leningradskoye Shosse (dangerous). The Metro “Green” line was closed from Belorusskaya station to Rechnoy Vokzal.
Nabi Abdullaev from Moscow Times writes:

Workers erecting a new billboard above a metro tunnel in northern Moscow drove a
concrete post onto a speeding train carrying about 500 passengers on Sunday
afternoon. A car burst into flames, but no one was injured. Police detained
five men as they tried to flee in a minibus from the billboard site between the
Sokol and Voikovskaya metro stations on Leningradskoye Shosse, news reports
said.

Advertising can be really dangerous. If it doesn’t kill it inflames! You can hide from it even underground.

Related Tags: Russia, Moscow, billboard, advertisement, Metro

I want that cap

Super offer! Buy an apartment and get a free baseball cap! Prices start from 1600 US$ per sq.meter. What guys and Barkli meant to be a joke its potential customers met as rude mockery. Prices are from summer 2005 and are totally outdated already. An average price today is more than $3000 per sq.m. Apartments that Barkli sells go for $4500-5000 per sq.m. A dilapidated ‘kruschevka’ apartment close to MKAD could be bought for as low as $1700 per sq.m.

I’m not kidding – my former classmate sold his Moscow apartment (a good one in the center) and bought a family hotel (est. 1781) in Germany on the Rhein on a popular tourist route. His family lives and works there.

Related Tags: Russia, Moscow, billboard, advertising, humor, real estate

Machismo Chocolate

Nestle Russia launches a new chocolate sub-brand “Nestle Classic for Men”. Its main difference with “Nestle Classic Unisex” lies in its square form and extra calories. With the help of this macho product Nestle plans to fight German chocolate producer Alfred Ritter. The German brand Ritter Sport came to Russia only in 2001. That’s not surprising. German paratroopers, for example, are known for their ability to hover over the landing point for three days without water and food. Anyway Ritter Sport had 2,5% of Russian chocolate market at the start of 2004 and 4,6% in 2005. “Nestle Classic” (irrespective of sex) has only 4,3% market share.

What’s the secret behind Ritter Sport success? This chocolate was designed for German sportsmen who have square pockets on their sportswear. Square chocolate bars fit nicely in such pockets, thus fully satisfying the Teutonic need for order. Ritter Sport also has nice and convenient package that prevents sportspockets from being stained. Germans like tidiness. But hold on! Russians are not known for orderliness and neatness! That’s the point. Ritter Sport attracted Russian men because it looks so much like Lada Car Model 5 – square, practical and good. Nestle Russia hopes with the help of its For Men appeal to boost the share of Nestle Classic to 8% in 2008. Good luck!

The Russian caption on the package goes, “Keep away from women”. High content of Swiss testosterone, you know.

Via AdMe

Related Tags: Russia, chocolate, Nestle, machismo, Ritter Sport, Lada

Russian Billiards

In the Soviet Union twenty years ago people played only Russian billiards. Even very small towns had special “billiardnaya” where for symbolic price you could play this wonderful game. Billiard tables were almost everywhere: at office buildings, at ‘palaces of culture’, at all resorts and sometimes even at theatres and cinemas.

Today everything is different – everywhere Russians play pool. In a very short period of time pool almost killed the old noble Russian game. Old style Russian billiard tables one can find only at some elite clubs or at famous “billiardnaya” like the one at Olimpiyaskiy in Moscow where professionals play for money.

The reason behind this phenomenon is two-fold: greed and laziness. By greed I mean cupidity of clubs and bars owners. First, people pay for a game of pool but games themselves are very short in comparison with Russian billiards where a single game could last for ages. Second, pool tables are much smaller and cheaper than Russian billiards tables.

By laziness I mean the ease of playing pool. In Russian billiards balls barely fit in the pockets, so it’s almost always very, very difficult to pot a ball. But on the other hand the rules of Russian billiards are more simple and straightforward.

Related Tags: Russia, Moscow, billiards, Russian billiards, pool

Free Salt with Every Purchase

Some rumors in a town of Voronezh about possible shortages caused some old people to stock salt. This caused some shortage in Voronezh. Local TV channel made a headline out of this event. When nothing happens any news will do. This story was picked up by a national network. Almost next day all Russian TV channels and newspapers were packed with reports from different towns and cities about shortage of ordinary salt. “Just in case” people began buying an extra package or two of salt at groceries and supermarkets. Prices went up. In a chain reaction manner more people bought salt - in case prices would be even higher. More shortage – higher prices – more TV news.

At the peak of the salt panic Evroset – the leading Russian retailer of mobile phones – started a new promotion: “With any purchase you get a free package of salt!” Supermarkets and grocery stores started ordering triple amounts of salt from wholesalers. Then one day the panic stopped abruptly. In the last two weeks Russians bought zero amount of salt – their private stocks would probably last for the next couple of years. But stores are overstocked! What to do with thousands of salt packages that occupy so much of precious warehouse space?

Related Tags: Russia, salt, panic, promotion, Evroset

RMB Recommends

Adventures in Russian advertising from digenis.org concentrates mostly on cases of plagiarism in signage and advertising in Russia and Ukraine. Entertaining.

Snowsquare is another very interesting source of mysterious and/or weird Russian advertising. Don’t miss it!

Bloggers about IWD

A comprehensive review of bloggers' post on the topic of the International Women's Day could be found at Global Voices Online. Highly recommended for everyone interested in what became of post-communist holidays in Russia, FSU states and Eastern Europe.

Some marketing facts about the 8the of March in Moscow:

1. Prices on flowers rose on average 170%.
2. L'Oreal Paris made 40% of its planned sales of perfume on one day only.
3. Tables at Moscow restaurants were all booked 2 weeks before the day.

Happy the 8th of March!

Down with kitchen slavery! Give us new family life!


Ironically the 8th of March - that was thought to be the holiday of feminism and equality - undergone weird metamorphosis and became in Russia today a holiday of machism in a way. Russian men give gifts to their wifes, daughters and female collegues. They are supposed to bring breakfast to bed in the morning and cook for their women a gorgeous dinner. Not everyone survives.

Matryoshka

Russian marketing and advertising community on sostav.ru is discussing an interesting topic – stereotypes about Russia. In this country things like balalaikas, matryoshkas or samovars one can find only at tourists traps like Arbat in Moscow. Most of Russians view them as silly but anytime in any country when something Russian is advertised one can’t get away from them.
When Scholz & Friends (Berlin) decided to make a poster promoting Russian opera festival in Baden Baden they picked the most obvious symbol. This opera singer is wonderful! And she also hints there are a lot of minor singers inside.



It’s great that Russia has a symbol that is immediately recognized everywhere. I can’t think about such “living” symbols of other countries – they are usually architectural landmarks. Ok, kangaroo for Australia, kiwi for New Zealand, bulldog for England. Cowboy? No, it’s Marlboro. Panda? It’s WWF. What else?

Via kak.ru

Related Tags: Russia, advertising, matryoshka, opera

Diamond Vodka

Strange New Products found an interesting sort of vodka from Poland:

Diaka Vodka is being billed as the world's most expensive vodka, maily because of its unique diamond filtration process.It's made in Poland where they use nearly one hundred diamonds of up to one carat in size, to filter the spirit resulting in a Vodka
with unsurpassed clarity and smoothness. The bottle itself is made with
crystals, though not of the diamond variety.It's now being distributed to
the USA by TransBorder Spirits USA, a division of TransBorder Marketing,
Inc.

I doubt it strongly. Actually I don’t believe it at all. You can filter vodka through diamonds or rubies or sapphires – its quality wouldn’t change a grain. Vodka could be filtered through carbon and this is the most popular method because carbon is an active element. It could also be filtered through quartz but this method is very expensive as one needs immense pressure for the active process. Filtering vodka through egg yolks was very wide spread in Russia in the 19th century but it was actually the process of coagulating not filtering per se. A bucket of yolks was needed to “filter” just one bottle of vodka that was certainly expensive and time consuming.

Related Tags: Poland, vodka, filtering, diamond