Who's Jumping on Wal-Mart's Brand Wagon?

According to Yahoo! News, Vogue, Garth Brooks and Destiny's Child.

"The world's largest retailer just launched a major fall ad campaign in the fashion bible Vogue, signed a multiyear music deal with country crooner Garth Brooks that might include exclusive products and linked with pop music's Destiny's Child for a holiday promotion.

"The ties with A-list brands and personalities come as Wal-Mart puts an increased emphasis on its clothing and music offerings. Marketing experts say that by tying in with popular, credible brand names, the retailer should be able to spruce up its image. Wal-Mart also will host a fashion show next month during New York's Fashion Week, the apparel industry's biannual big trade event."

Don’t laugh. Consider Target. It almost single-handedly made designer fashions affordable. Wal-Mart is trying to expand its customer base and include happy Target customers. To me, this is the funny part since the top 10 retailers reported $488 billion in 2004 sales. Wal-Mart sales made up more than half of this number with $285 billion. Target weighs in at number five behind Home Depot, Kroger and Costco.

So the giant blinks. This is proof that Target’s marketing blitz is working. They’ve already taken over an entire issue of the New Yorker and created several buzz worthy events including a vertical fashion show held on the side of a building and temporary, pop-up retail concepts in New York and the Hamptons.

But at what cost? “Target outspends far larger Wal-Mart on marketing: $904 million in 2004 vs. Wal-Mart's $841 million, as tallied by Advertising Age.”

The whole point of this post is: Some might tout this as a marketing case study of David and Goliath. But the numbers above show that the spend helped create Target’s marketing gravitas. Target is one of the most creative marketers in retail as far as I am concerned. If their marketing was not creative, it would not be as successful. But it also costs money to create this level of impact.

It will be interesting to watch Wal-Mart's brand wagon race with Target. Who do YOU think will win?

tags: public relations, media relations, PR, advertising, marketing, branding, brand, retail, wal-mart, target

Comments

[robin ferebee]

We're doing a reserach marketing on any information that directly relates to Walmart and Target competetiveness purpose (e.g., evidence, examples, causes-effects, general principles of business, analogies [similar situations], definitions, as well as statistics). Providing any inforamtion you have regarding these two retail stores is appreciated.
Thanks,
Robin Purcell
robin_dp@hotmail.com

[Kevin Dugan]

Who's we? You're sending this from a hotmail account with one name (purcell) and another name in the from field (ferebee). As a result, I'm not sure of whom I'd be sending to and not very comfortable sending it. Sorry!

[Sharon Beckham]

I worked at Target for 17 years. For the last 7 years I have been a team lead on the front lanes. We have 40 registers to shut down when the store closes at 10pm. We have 50 minutes to collect everything from all registers because the cash office has to be verified and the locks set by 11pm. We are always short handed and incredibly rushed. If we don’t have it done on time we receive a final warning. On Feb. 20,2007 I accidentally left the money in one of the registers which was found in the morning by the opening team lead. This was a bad mistake, however no money was missing. Also, every other team lead has made this mistake at one time or another but it was not reported. We have some new team leads who do feel the need to report. { One of them is also on a final warning having been reported by the other one.} The registers are locked with a store lock as well as a register lock [only overnight executives can open a register.} Anyway, my point is the money was secured but it is supposed to be in the cash office in the safe. I was put on a final warning at that time, which is for one year not to make the same mistake. On Feb. 2 of this year I stupidly left money in a drawer again and was fired the next day.
I had been a stay at home mom until I got that job in 1991. It was basically the only job I had ever had and I gave it my all. I wish they would have given me the opportunity to go to another position but my feeling is they can get someone else to do my job at half the price, due to my seniority. This is no fault of theirs and not their problem but I am 51 years old and now will have to start over somewhere else because I support myself. I have to move out of my apt asap because I cannot afford it. They didn’t care one bit about any of this.
I do take responsibility for my mistake, but still am devastated and scared.
Thanks for listening.