Lacoste Revamped Their Iconic Polo Shirts… Here’s Our Take.
Have you heard? In partnering with the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN), Lacoste recently revamped their iconic polo shirts.
With the new limited-edition polos they’re launching, the brand is swapping out their signature crocodile logo in favour of a series of endangered species.
Within 24 hours of Lacoste breaking the news, the story was picked up by several media outlets. To date, many notable publications have covered Lacoste’s campaign, including Harper’s Bazaar, CNN, Hypebeast, Fox News, Yahoo, and more.
Wondering why Lacoste struck gold with this particular campaign? Here’s our take…
#1: Lacoste’s brand name
Call us cynical, but here’s what we believe:
Lacoste’s brand name played an integral part in the dissemination of this story.
No, we’re not saying that all these publications picked up the story solely because of Lacoste’s name. What we’re saying is that when you’re an internationally-renowned brand, any information you release (be it about a partnership, product launch, or company milestone) naturally carries more weight.
Think about it…
If an unknown fashion label collaborated with the same organization, and pitched the story to press outlets, would the press have responded the same way? Nope, probably not.
A bit of tough love here:
If your company is relatively new to the market, and you’re considering doing press pitching, our advice would be to skip it (unless you really have a great story to share).
The odds are stacked against you, so a better strategy would be to focus on other forms of marketing first. Once you’ve built up your brand, and people recognize your name, then focus on media pitching.
#2: This marks Lacoste’s first-ever logo change
Of course, the fact that it’s Lacoste doesn’t make the story newsworthy, all on its own.
But here’s where the story gets interesting:
The iconic crocodile logo has graced Lacoste’s polo tees for an impressive 85 years, and this partnership with IUCN marks the first time Lacoste has ever initiated a logo change.
There you have it, those magical three words: the first time.
If you didn’t already know, reporters love superlatives. If you can promote your product as the first of its kind, the newest, the oldest, the biggest, or the fastest, this automatically bumps up its newsworthiness. Keep that in mind!
#3: The partnership is relevant to Lacoste
Simply put, the campaign makes a ton of sense.
We all know the purpose of replacing Lacoste’s crocodile with these other species of animals is to draw attention to the fact that these animals are endangered. Lacoste also cleverly corresponds the number of shirts available to the number of animals (of each species!) which remain in the wild. For example, there are 450 surviving Anegada Rock Iguanas across the entire glove, and 450 polo tees featuring iguana logos have been produced.
As opposed to this, imagine if Lacoste partnered with a random children’s charity and simply pledged to donate 10% of its limited-edition polo tee sales to said charity. This would result in a much less impactful campaign, don’t you think?
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