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April 1, 2005
Screwing up a perfectly good thing...
(Posted by francois to: branding | random brainsqualls | worst practices )Ok...so this may not be totally new anymore, but it got me ticked off enough that I wanted to write about it.
I have been a long time user (and champion) of Ofoto. The other day all Ofoto users received an email from the Kodak Chairman informing us that they were renaming the service to Kodak EasyShare Gallery. Kodak easwhatwasthatnameagain??? Here is another perfect example of how a big company can kill something so innovative...
Ofoto was not only catchy, easy to remember and above all easy to recommend to others. It also occupied a piece of "real estate" in my mind that was (mostly) associated with possitive attributes. Some corporate suit felt that this service would benefit from being renamed to the supremely bland "Kodak Easyshare Gallery"...I must be missing something...not only will I never remember the name of the service when I am at a party and want to recommend the service, but even if I did...the person I would recommend it to would never remember it (and I am not even talking about the fact that url is different from the name...a problem Ofoto did not have!) And that problem is of course exacerbated when I will try to recommend the service to my international friends (what the heck does EasyShare mean in French, Dutch or Urdu anyway?).
I am sure Kodak will spend a fortune trying to rebuild a brand around the new name. The problem with that is twofold...with a name like that it will not work (and in the process they killed a good brand)...and it is a total waste of shareholder money.
I was sufficiently offended by the stupidity of this move that I replied to the email (I thought I was responding to the Chairman of Kodak of course - since he wrote to me) and voiced my opinion on the subject...only to get an automated response saying:
"Greetings from KODAK EASYSHARE Gallery Customer Service. This is an automated reply to your response to our recent email; so a customer service representative will not be replying to your message.
1. To quickly find answers to your questions ..."
Sell your stock if you have any...some companies will never get it!
[Categories: kodak ofoto brand]
Posted by francois at April 1, 2005 6:25 PM | Bookmark This
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