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Quote of the Week:

Radio Shack rolling out new brand identity in August

Following the Tour de France today, I came across Lance Armstrong's message that he will be partnering with Radio Shack next year to form an American pro cycling team. That was enough news for one day, it seemed. Until I noticed in Radio Shack's related presser that the company will be rolling out a new brand identity in a few weeks. As Their Chief Marketing Officer, Lee Applebaum said in the release:

"We are re-launching our brand with a new creative platform in early August, and now having Lance on our team - an American icon who embodies the spirit of mobility, connectivity and philanthropy - really allows us to accelerate our brand's evolution."

"re-launching our brand" I guess could mean they're keeping the same identity, but I don't think so. "new creative platform"....that's nice and vague. Skywriting? Perhaps some sort of chalk-bot-inspired piece of MAKE-kraft? THAT would be truly DYI-inspired, and be a hit with the MAKE-rs of the world.

I'll be interested to see how they position themselves. For years, Radio Shack was the go-to place for hobbyists and do-it-yourselfers interested more in making things work than the brand name on the package. Lately Radio Shack has positioned itself as not only a place you can go for capacitors and AC adapters, but also to buy cell phones, sattellite radio receivers, televisions, and more "finished" consumer electronics goods.

With the recession making everyone look towards fixing what they have rather than throwing it out and replacing it with something new, Radio Shack's fortunes have actually improved, as people once again turn to it for replacement power cords, battery chargers, and resistors.

So which way will Radio Shack go with the new brand? More towards consumer goods? Or back to its roots as the neighborhood electronics parts supplier? I kinda hope it's the latter--we already have too many consumer goods stores, and look where CompUSA and Circuit City have gone. I'm not the only one who thinks this is a good idea, either.

Radio Shack Armatron (I had one of these!) from unlovablesteve on Flickr.

Labels: advice, branding, cycling, DIY

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