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Is Ferrari all about snazzy design or superb engineering? Try this. Say 'Ferrari', and ask people what comes to mind. After megabytes of "Formula 1", "Schumacher", "race car", "Marlboro" and even "Shell" from random people, you might get to hear "engineering" and "design". Stop there. That's a good point at which to start an amateur brand analysis. The not-so-obvious thing to note is the power of TV-screen imagery. Most citations have to do with the instantaneous visual association, the visual inscribed in the memory by TV. It is the rare analytical mind (and print media loyalist, as print professionals would like to think), that actually thinks of this brand in terms of its edge over its rivals----on and off the race track. To Ferrari itself, of course, this is what being competitive is all about to begin with---differentiation. Ferrari differentiates its cars---by way of what's under the hood. The engineering part. And it also differentiates its engagement of the consumer---by way of its uniquely Italian sense of design, for starters, and even the odd little things it does to vivify the brand, such as muzzling the new cars with its logo in reverse for the recent Bahrain race, in honour of Pope John Paul II. Few brands in the world command equity in both hardwired engineering and aesthetic design-and that too, amongst the most knowledgeable in the respective fields. There's almost poetic justice in Ferrari being a Formula 1 champ. But is it still the champ? Its track performance in Bahrain was so poor that Toyota got away with scoffing that Ferrari is no longer a contender for Formula 1 championship. Brands, though, tend to be enduring. Brands that create diversified equity, even more so. Maybe engineering can be matched. But design? No sir, not that simple. So Ferrari, and its prancing horse, is not as badly hit as you might imagine. Like the cricketer who sees the scoreboard as an art canvas as much as a number-maximising chart, the race car brand with the equine logo could be up to something interesting from a different sort of perspective (why, that sonava...!). So if Ferrari, the dreamer, dreams of itself as some sort of flying machine, the brand's fans should worry, but only a little. Remember, the only way to Formula 1 championship, it knows, is to keep the brand's actual wheel-turners grounded in scientific no-nonsense reality. Get wishy-washy on this? No way.
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