Contact:
Judy Kalvin
(718) 520-1660
jkalvin@kalvinpr.com
CharacterTM Launches to Breathe Life into Brand Characters
Writers, actors and marketers combine talents to lend new depth to brand
icons
Portland, OR – October 29, 2002 – CharacterTM, the first marketing service firm
devoted to creating and revitalizing characters for brands begins its journey as an
independent company. Its mission: to develop characters as strategic brand
assets.
Character has worked with marketers and their agencies to revitalize venerable
characters, including Tony the Tiger for Kellogg’s Frosties in the UK. The firm is
also currently working on a project for Cadbury. In the US, the firm has worked
with icons such as The Maytag Repairman, and Popeye, and is currently
developing a new brand character for Pepsi-Cola North America.
“Our devotion to characters stems from our love of storytelling,” explains Jim
Hardison, creative director of Character. “Great marketing is about telling a
compelling story, and storytelling is about characters. Done well, characters can
evoke what’s truly human in a brand and put a face on it.”
The Character team includes experts in animation, filmmaking, screenwriting,
improvisational theatre, marketing, and new product development. “Our diverse
backgrounds help us see the character and the brand more fully,” says Brian
Lanahan, director of strategy at Character. “The result is characters that are both
engaging to the audience and effective at embodying what’s true in the brand.”
Character begins projects by convening Character CampTM, a two-day immersion
in the fundamentals of characterization and storytelling through film clips, group
exercises and improvised scenarios. At Camp, attendees use these storytelling
fundamentals to crystallize a clear vision of the brand and character. (See
separate page for more details).
“People often have an intuitive sense of what makes a character engaging, but
they don’t know how to talk about it or how to apply it to their brand,” explains
Stacey Hallal, who runs the camp process at Character. “The experiences at
Character Camp give them the language and tools to understand how characters
work, and how they fit into a brand’s strategy.”
After Camp, the Character team writes a Character SourcebookTM on the
character, a richly illustrated “ bible” that explains who the character is and
presents a road map for bringing him to life throughout the marketing mix. (See
separate page for more details)
Character was incubated at Will Vinton Studios as The Character Development
Lab. Vinton has been creating compelling characters for 25 years in both
entertainment and advertising, winning an Academy award and eleven Emmys.
Commercial characters Vinton helped bring to life include the California Raisins
and the M&M’s.
Character founder David Altschul led the Vinton Studios commercial production
business for twenty years, and began tinkering with the ideas behind Character
in 1998. “ I kept seeing that many of the difficulties advertisers were facing in
creating strong relationships with consumers could be helped by a deeper
understanding of how stories work and how characters work.” He spent several
years developing the practice and attracting an eclectic mix of talented people
drawn to the idea of serving brand characters around the world. The global
approach appears to be working; Character has been hired to revitalize icons in
Australia and the UK in the past year.
“Our intention is to develop characters that can anchor an authentic emotional
connection between a brand and its audience,” says Altschul. “At the end of the
day, it’s about re-establishing trust and value in brands, one character at a time.”
*
CharacterTM (www.characterweb.com), based in Portland, OR, creates new brand
characters and revitalizes existing ones in the U.S. and around the world. The
multi-dimensional team combines backgrounds in animation, filmmaking,
screenwriting, improvisational theatre, marketing and new product development
to develop characters that build trust in brands and create strong emotional
connections with consumers. The firm has done character development work for
such clients as the Kellogg Company (Snap, Crackle & Pop for Rice Krispies and
Tony the Tiger for Frosties, UK), Dr. Pepper/Seven-up (Punchy for Hawaiian
Punch), Hearst Entertainment (Popeye), M&M/Mars (The Three Musketeers for
3Musketeers Bars), Maytag Corporation (The Maytag Repairman), and ConAgra
Foods (Orville for Orville Redenbacher Popcorn), to name a few.