Blog

The Year of the Penguin

From the Brand Historian’s Timeline: 1998 It was a dull, overcast, and humid start to the trip. Normal for the time of year, I learned. As the ferry left its moorings with sky-scraping sentinels looking on and Star Ferries bobbing Read More

The Famously French Brand That Was Built by Brits

From the Brand Historian’s Timeline: 1906 The British have had a long love affair with the South of France. What began with the traveller’s tales of writers like Tobias Smollett in the 1760s was followed by a veritable Brit invasion, Read More

My Life in Yellow Fats

From the Brand Historian’s Timeline: 1886 It’s often said that the secret of a successful career in brand consulting lies in amassing deep knowledge of a category for which constantly job-hopping clients are prepared to pay a premium. And that’s Read More

By Royal Appointment to Queen Victoria and Bridget Jones

From the Brand Historian’s Timeline: 1922 Heading north on the A38 from Lichfield towards Burton on Trent, you will find several small villages that nestle on the border between Staffordshire and Derbyshire, but which more than a thousand years ago Read More

The Brand Historian’s Holiday Cracker

Bored with all the usual festive challenges? Then try the Brand Historian’s Yuletide Brands Quiz which celebrates the founders and the inspiration for 16 iconic brands. All you have to to do is to identify the ‘brand managers’ featured below, Read More

A Short History of the USA in 50 Brands

(and Happy Thanksgiving to all my chums) 1795 Jim Beam 1806 Colgate 1818 Brooks Brothers 1830 Macy’s 1850 American Express 1869 Heinz Ketchup 1876 Budweiser 1879 Ivory Soap 1880 Kodak 1886 Coca Cola 1892 Philadelphia 1894 Kellogg’s Cornflakes 1900 Hershey Read More

Keep Calm and Eat Your Sausage Roll

From the Brand Historian’s Timeline: 1939 There was not much to smile about in Britain in 1939. With the possibility of war with Germany becoming ever more likely, in London, the nation’s art treasures were being packed up and transported Read More

Concentrate! Here comes the science bit

From the Brand Historian’s Timeline: 1989 The Daily Candy is a popular trend website that introduced us to its own wryly observed lexicon of words that don’t exist but should. Bluetoothsome is a word they coined to describe someone “so attractive that his/her Read More

An Odd Solution to the Schleswig-Holstein Question?

From the Brand Historian’s Timeline: 1978 Donald Pleasance was surely one of the most characterful of all British character actors. In a long career, he created a veritable gallery of movie villains including Ernst Stavro Blofeld, Doctor Crippen, Heinrich Himmler Read More

Bringing Out The Best

A Proustian Moment for an Englishman in New York From the Brand Historian’s Timeline: 1913 One of the many clouds of sadness which the pandemic has brought with it are those wretched feelings that come from missing the places you Read More