One more brand bites the dust

One more brand bites the dust

The Hindu Business Line

Bengaluru? Globalisation, better lifestyle, greater opportunity and the mindset of the villager in the Hoysala period?


Traffic snarls and bad roads reflect the transition the Garden City is going through.

BANGALORE, the garden city, the software capital of India, the city with several credits to its name - not least of them the weather and additions to the lexicon with terms like `bangalored' - is going through the horrors over the last few months in terms of bad press, roads full of potholes, phenomenal rain, traffic jams that have assumed frightening proportions and increasing government apathy that has only been exceeded by people's impatience at the declining quality of life.

In fact, anyone who reads the charts will tell you that the city is "having a bad time," as Tamilians are fond of repeating. And that applies not only to the city but to its inhabitants as well. It is not only Mr N. R. Narayana Murthy who is upset about the state of the roads; recently, I heard an eminent person saying, on stage, at a management convention, "In most parts of the world people drive on the left side of the road, in Bangalore we drive on what is left of the road!"

While it is possible to look at the lighter side of life, the latest decision to rename Bangalore as `Bengaluru' seems particularly inopportune. I know that enough reasons can be found to support such a name change; yet, the point I would like to make is simple: Each city possesses the potential of being a brand. The cities we live in and work in are an integral part of our lives. We are passionate about them. We believe that these cities belong to us. And yet we find that time and again, a politician who is supposed to be the custodian of the brand decides to get his own 15 seconds of fame and changes the name that is part of our childhood and every living moment. And I suppose one can't even say, "How can they?" with the procedure couched as it is in the garb of protecting our own culture and throwing out our colonial legacy. Nor can we take out processions and burn effigies of Kiran More and Greg Chappell as some of the citizens of Kolkata (I got that right I hope) have done.

Precedents galore

Bangalore is not the first city to be bitten by this bug. The Turkish city of Istanbul has had its own trysts with changes. The Greek city of Byzantium became Constantinople under the Romans and was reborn as Istanbul once it was conquered by the Ottomans. Cities such as Beijing and St. Petersburg have had their brushes with a name change. And Pretoria, named after a settler and folk hero, is expected to take the name Tshwane after a black tribal leader. Closer home, Calcutta has been renamed Kolkata, Bombay Mumbai and my own city of Madras has been renamed Chennai. In Africa, and closer home in India, all these name changes have their rationale in statements like, "We are independent. Who needs the legacy of a colonial name?" The more things change, the more they are the same Let's take a look at the world of brands. At the risk of repeating myself, let me quote:

"Buildings age and become dilapidated.

Machines wear out.

People die.

But what live on are the brands." (Sir Hector Laing, Group CEO, United Biscuits Plc)

Yes, brands are timeless. But not as timeless as some of the cities in which these brands are sold. Yet, there is a difference. A corporate/product/service brand is someone's baby. Virgin belongs to Richard Branson, Kingfisher to Vijay Mallya, Wal-Mart to Sam Walton and so on. There is a finer distinction to this ownership. These barons of industry know deep down that while they are custodians and at times physical owners, ultimately the brand belongs to its consumers. Coke realised this when it came out with `New Coke'. "How can you have a new, presumably better, Coke? How could the real thing have been bad? Why on earth would you ever change?" asked the offended consumer. In Seattle, retired real estate investor Gay Mullins set up a hotline for angry customers. A Beverly Hills merchant bought 500 cases of Coke and sold it at a premium. Thousands of angry customers called in. The company listened, for its own good. And even if you have to change, you must plan and execute the change to make a difference. What has changed about these cities other than their name?

I remember what the novelist Shashi Tharoor wrote in a column about the name change at Madras, "The weather will be just as sultry in Chennai as it used to be in Madras. But are we Indians so insecure in our independence that we still need to prove to ourselves that we are free?" Of course, a few die-hard and self-declared champions of culture can celebrate the fact that Bangalore's name change highlights the city's origins - Bendakalooru means `boiled beans' in Kannada. Never mind the fact that the roads might have been slightly better six centuries ago when the name was first coined.

The road ahead

It is common knowledge that every brand needs a champion, whether it is someone as senior as the CEO or someone as junior as the product manager. Whilst older need not necessarily mean wiser, it can mean greater authority and resources. The brand champion protects the brand's properties - its identity, its packaging, its positioning, its personality and its market share. The trouble with cities is that they have no champions. Would a father allow his child's name to be changed after years? Preposterous, isn't it? Should the constituents of the city not be asked about such an operation? I am told in Pretoria they have voted on it at City Council level and agreed to do this on the basis of the vote. I don't remember anyone asking anybody about Bangalore's proposed name change. After all, we live in a democracy. Think of the confusion, the expense and the time lag in any change. I know that we don't have to worry unduly about the ability of foreigners to pronounce our names but today Bangalore is a global entity. It is the cynosure of the world and a brand that is instantly recognised not only for its skills in software but also for its skills to have global customers. It has an image. It's just not another Indian city. Our far-sighted politicians through this far-reaching name change have done just that - made it another city.

Baby or bath water

As custodians of brands our role is to preserve a brand's properties. These are built carefully over time. And yet at times, in our desire to modernise and contemporise, we change. Sometimes just for the sake of change. We then throw the baby out with the bath water. We can't continue to benefit from globalisation, a better life style, greater opportunity and yet have the mindset of the villager in the Hoysala period. The sad reality is that building a brand is a slow, arduous process. Diluting its equity is a simple step for a few. Retrieval is a task of mammoth proportions. And yet, there is very little that an individual and a brand lover like me can do other than start calling myself `Sridharu'.