Word: brandings
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...wrenching stop, leave behind the garish consumerism of Moscow and drive 220 miles (354 km) southwest to the small Russian town of Lyudinovo. For the first part of the five-hour trip the road is a smooth four-lane highway that whisks you past gleaming gas stations and a brand new Samsung TV factory. Then everything slows down. The highway turns single-track and becomes progressively rougher. For the last 20 miles, you bump along the ruts, distracted only by the swaying rows of silver-birch trees that flank the road...
...eBay's for the first time last summer. "eBay used to own all the on and off ramps, and now it's just another highway," says Scot Wingo, chief executive of ChannelAdvisor, a consultancy that works with online retailers. "They have to figure out how to reorient the eBay brand to mean more than auctions and learn to become a leader again...
That's where Donahoe's tough love comes in. First, he's acquiring companies like Bill Me Later, a payment system, and Danish classified-ad sites that have synergy with eBay's brand. He's also re-evaluating whether to spin off Skype, the voice-over-IP phone-system acquisition that was Whitman's biggest mistake, not to mention a $1.4 billion write-off. eBay overpaid for a company that doesn't directly benefit the core business. Donahoe also launched a new search platform to better catalog the 120 million live listings...
...products. "They don't fall off like regular socks, which are usually manufactured with a 120-degree angle," explains Yasui, lifting one cuff of his black jeans to reveal a pair. Yasui--who has been with Muji since the Seiyu supermarket chain created it as a private brand in 1980--says that sometimes the original, rather than the evolved product, is best. "Many products are buried in traditions and culture, and when you rediscover them, they are universal, anonymous...
Anonymity is an odd thing for a brand to strive for, but not if you are a "no brand" brand. The goal of Yasui's team is to define Muji by design: to create and refine products toward ultimate simplicity and functionality. Muji is characterized by neutral tones and a bare-bones chic infused into everything from food to beds to bicycles--even a house. Muji ("no mark" in Japanese) screams minimalism to anyone who has entered one of its 433 locations in 16 countries...