It’s common knowledge that nicknames are for the most part, terms of endearment. They also help to make people or brands seem less formal and maybe just a little more cool. For instance, the Kennedy clan -John F., Jacqueline, Robert F. and Edward Moore were most often referred to as Jack, Jackie, Bobby and Ted making them not less regal, but certainly gave them a more human element in relating to the general public. The slang expression for McDonald’s, “Mickey D’s” is embraced by McDonald’s Corp. because it promotes its street cred to a core market, and growing up in the Midwest, we affectingly referred to those little square White Castle hamburgers as “slyders” which is now a WC trademark (my cousin Ken called them “gut busters” for apparently the same reasons but I doubt that one is officially sanctioned by White Castle’s suits). In lieu of corporations adapting consumer’s nicknames for their brands, they love to create catchy nicknames or abbreviations because it’s easier for the public to wrap their brains around them and can promote a certain corporate message. Until the recent disaster in the Gulf, the lower case “bp” next to a happy little green and yellow daisy presented a more, well, environmentally “friendly” face to the world than the staid uber-corporate British Petroleum.
That’s why is was downright odd when GM’s vice president Alan Batey and marketing vice president Jim Campbell recently sent a memo to employees asking that they talk about the brand as Chevrolet, not its age-old shortened nickname “Chevy.” Apparently, they wanted the “brand to be consistent,” especially since General Motors is trying to push Chevrolet in global markets where some people may not know it as Chevy. Sounds like typical corporate-speak that happens when marketing and sales execs have to come up with something (when they have nothing) to prove that they’re hard at work.
The problem is, to the general public, Chevy will always be a cool sounding moniker for Chevrolet. The classic “Chevy Nova” and “Chevy Malibu” just roll off the tongue so naturally. Now substitute, “Chevrolet” for Chevy on those models and see how clunky and uncool that sounds. Better yet, do the same substitution for these lyrics “Drove my Chevy to the levy” or “I get off on fifty-seven Chevy’s” and you’ll wonder what type of Korporate Kool-Aid this guys were drinking when they concocted that memo. It should be said that Chevrolet tried this once before in the 1950’s with their sponsorship of the Dinah Shore Show by having Shore sing the theme song, “See the U.S.A. in Your Chevrolet.” Interesting enough, the popular show was renamed the Dinah Shore Chevy Show the following year. If it ain’t broke, don’t try to fix it.
The GM execs also broke the #1 rule of “positioning” – once your brand is positioned in a consumers mind, a very arduous, yet desirable result of a long term marketing campaign, it’s even more difficult to undue – and why would you want to negate all that and maybe even rile your brand loyalists? Coca-Cola messed with the original 100 year old recipe and their beloved nickname “Coke” with some marketing brainiac’s vision of “New Coke.” The public outcry from their loyal consumers was so relentless that they were forced to reintroduce the original as “Classic Coke.” Not too many years ago, with little fanfare, they dropped the “Classic” from the label and of course everyone still refers to it as “Coke.” Wait a minute; maybe these GM execs aren’t so clueless after all.
Coda: No, these guys are clueless - as I was writing this blog, because of all the commotion the original email caused throughout the blogosphere and terrestrial media, GM VP Batey put out a press release stating that they “Love the nickname Chevy” and never intended to blah, blah, blah…which is corporate spin for “Wow, what we thinking?”
