Trends that shape the manufacturing

Are trends healthy for the established brands to follow? Do they re-shape or re-vitalize the interest of the customers? If at the current moment, the coronavirus hits hard many big clothing brands like Adidas, Versace and on, the others try to re-capitalize on the plague, introducing the new, 'fashionable masks' and merchandise. Having a respiratory unit with your favourite brand logo at the corner of it is a last gasp before your lungs turn into a dead pulp. Alas, but the recent ideas on the trend-based merchandise factors may sound the way they are.

For most business people, the coronavirus is just another trend, and we can understand them, because the progress does not move alone. In crisis times the factories lose jobs and people get owned. Some of those, who can re-shape or recoup the production, try to fiddle in with the trends in order to meet the demand.

In the more developed countries it is noticeable less, but our planet is mostly comprised of the developing and under-developed regions.

Is it long-lived?

Trend - is something revolving at the moment, and we believe there is no certain forecast for it. Once something caught up in the tendency, may be stifled or severed in demand afterwards. In some cases, it could re-establish the brand and create a separate sub-niche. But we understand that blindly following it in most cases, damages the brand.

Especially in such negative trends as COVID-19, AIDS, terrorist attacks - you name it. These events and disasters are based on people's death and grief, and therefore, at the end of it, we look back at the cynical side of the marketing.

Certainly, if you make your production line in order to help people, let's say Adidas makes affordable masks instead of new sneakers and therefore, sustains the demand balance and helps people who really need it - then this is a good trend-based action.

Creating more masks would significantly drop the prices, therefore helping people to acquire more units for less. Some celebrities donate money, but again, these are the singular examples of charities that work in certain cases only.

Re-shaping the brand manufacturing

As it was offered at the end of the March, to re-tune the Ford and GM factories in order to produce respiratory equipment for the COVID-19 epidemy, proves the more efficient way in solving the problem. Laboratory testing, volunteers and one-time charities - they all work well together against the common problem.

It is always the hard moments that define the true values of a human being, brand or corporation, and what we are witnessing today during the pandemia, is the eager to rehabilitate people, reset the factories, normalize the supply. We see that many companies are helpless by themselves, lenient to react properly, some of them go bankrupt, others are getting neglected.

The law enforcement, political decisions made in haste and in leeward to the financial disaster, deteriorate or destroy lives of ordinary people. The 'greedy' brands, trying to snatch out the trend hysteria, would suffer eventually. The loyalty does not come back too often - if it's lost once, it's gone for long.

Brand building

If somebody builds a brand based on the trending situation only, then it is most likely to fail due to the lack of focus and identity. Some of the common mistakes of the brand launch explained here. We have also discovered the main reasons of the brand decline, including the outsourcing and online competition.

However, the trend-based decisions must be scaled out by the marketing professionals, because you're embarking your own money on someone's fame or disaster. An artificially created fuss could later on burst out like a bubble with your of decisions and changes, because of insubstantial grounds. Using 'something in the air' approach is a tactical marketing move to re-vitalize your brand, reclaim your top positions in the niche and risky too.

But doing it too often would probably damage the reputation of your name. Nobody likes sharks, money-chasers, spineless pretenders and other goosies that tarnish your brand.

Selling reputation

Sometimes it is not always the profit that drives the brand to make certain decisions. It could be a daring event, a shocker, a 'charity' or publicity speech for the 'common benefits' that change the perception of the brand. Perhaps, the hardest thing for the big brand is to control the opinion about itself. Especially if a big name had clashed with the media and dove into a plunge crescendo, way below the clouds.

Reputation, interest and hype, later on could be capitalized in a bounce back of the customers to the forgotten brand, or acclaim for your new product. Re-evaluating old brands is harder than just striving for the customer return. Rebuilding the identity and the spirit of your company, establishing own trends and public reaction, handling troubles in an original way - it all takes time. Not forgetting to catch up with the new technology updates, trends, etc - is the way to stay afloat.

Happy plague reading

According to many consumer stats, due to the quarantine the retail shopping dropped, while the online goods such as: books and music soared. It means, the more people stay at home, the more they read. It is still questionable why people didn't do much reading before or while on the go? Tablets and pocket-readers have been accessible for a long time.

In the current situation we understand the following: the manufacturing companies will stay solid, it is the retail and the brick-n-mortar places that will suffer the most. In simple words - the most vulnerable places to where people will need to get their buttocks to. Online delivery and places such as Amazon will only thrive.

Nevertheless, you can't build a whole economy on a disaster, many chains will fall out from favour, creating job loss and therefore decline of the middle class, rise of the crime, etc.

We see the trends come and go, unfortunately some of them come from natural diseases and plagues. Not so many care - pain of others is cheap. Many people re-adapt and so shall us. In times of despair, most of the people begin to think differently. They look at the brands differently. They simplify their expenses and move towards the Gen Z approach - the minimalist survival.