Romanian Brandient expresses company’s point of view about Romanian tourism brand

Brandient, Romanian company specialized in strategy consultancy, design and brand value and creator of some of the most known Romanian brands, published, on its own site, a point of view regarding the new Romanian tourism brand.

Brandient was one of the companies that were involved in the pitch for Romanian tourism brand and was part in an association with Wally Olins that reached in the final stage of the pitch.

After avoiding to be involved in the scandal that started around the new Romanian tourism brand and especially of the leaf from the visual identity and because Romanian journalists kept on asking for a reaction, Brandient decided to publish a reaction on its own website.

In the document, Brandient representatives say that “we will hold ourselves back from emitting «valuable» judgements regarding the positioning or the logo, because this kind of affirmations can be considered subjective as Brandient participated (in a consortium led by Wally Olins) at the pitch to chose the company to make Romania’s tourism logo.

“The pitch’s brief was saying, in an express way, that «we will disqualify from the start any company that isn’t specialized in brand consultancy». In this sense, we must say that THR, Asesores en Turismo, Hoteleria y Recreacion SA, the winner of the pitch, isn’t a company specialized in brand consultancy. During the pitch, Tourism Ministry reffered to the absence of a legal criteria to evaluate this specialization. Even if such a legal criteria was missing, Tourism Ministry could have asked its specialized consultants (IAA, UAPR) to give their opinion and they could have the site of THR (www.thr.es), on Services sections, where there are 18 types of services but no mention of the branding word. Also, the drawings of different country logos vehiculated in the official presentations create, by omitting other information, the wrong impression that THR created, for example, Spain’s of Greece’s logos, which is not real, THR being, in many of these projects, the one that realized the touristic marketing plan or offered other services according to its specializations”, it is mentioned in the document posted on Brandient’s site.

Brandient’s representatives also mention that, contradicting the word and the spirit of the pitch documents, branding companies with high reputation and decays of experience such as Landor, Future Brands or Siegel & Gale were disqualified from the pitch, while the consortium led by Wally Olins was rejected using as a reason the price, considered too high by the Ministry.

Brandient also considers regrettable the fact that, in the entire debate launched after the brand was unveiled, there are too many comments regarding the political side and too many uninspired opinions such as “we don’t need something like that” or “anyone can make a brand in 5 minutes on computer”.

“I think that the worst thing to do now is to judge blinded by political passions and egos. The Tourism Ministry must act professionally and take responsibility for the future of the Romanian Tourism. The remaining 73 million euro, destined for the brand’s communication campaign in the following years, can be invested profitably, generating value for the country, or can be spent wastefully. Positioning doesn’t mean differentiation for the sake of it, but it means finding that sustainable and relevant differentiation, capable of delivering growth for a business — in this case, the Romanian tourism. It’s not a tragedy for a client (notice to the Tourism Ministry) to return to the designated consultant and to request other differentiation alternatives. It is a tragedy however, to carelessly carry on, especially when large amounts of public money are at stake. We must stop the national bickering and do what is best for us, the Romanian people, not for some foreign company or some politician.”,Aneta Bogdan, Chartered Marketer, Managing Partner Brandient, said.

Brandient is the Romanian consultancy on brand strategy, design and value dedicated to creation and development of brands as signs of value™. Brandient offers integrated consulting services in marketing and branding, verbal and visual identity creative services, packaging, brand communication, brand engagement services, etc.

Brandient is reputed to have a unique local specialists team, with remarkable experience in management, marketing, design and communication. Among Brandient’s most prominent projects are the rebranding of CEC Bank, of the retail chain Domo, the pharmaceutical group Europharm, TVR, the National Radio-Communication Society – Radiocom, the retail chain Flanco, the retail chain Dedeman, of the companies Astral, Albalact, Novensys, Smartree, Fabryo, TBI Romania, Ventrust, Ceramica Iasi, etc, and also creating brands as Fulga, Credisson, Estima, Domenia, Fonomat, Tuca si Asociatii, Qualians, Zuzu, Qfort, etc.

Brandient has also developed for BusinessWeek the first ranking of The Most 50 Valuable Romanian Brands.