Going into 2012, I’d like to bring some attention to a worrying pattern that has been occurring.

The recent release of the Jordan Concord sneakers sparked scenes that were reminiscent of the Black Friday madness a few months earlier (see here).

Hype, and unsubstantiated hype, have reached new levels in retail marketing. It almost appears to be from the school of thinking that any publicity is good publicity….but if it goes too bad you employ some crisis PR experts to make it all go away!

Yes – The Jordan Concord is one of the most iconixc designs and shoes in modern history.

Yes – It has always remained a wildly popular shoe.

Yes – Retailers, authorities and Nike probably underestimated the huge amount of demand for the shoe upon release.

Yes – the mainstream media took the opportunity to also hype the situation at a time of slow news.

But, as with Black Friday, the hype and the results leaves a nasty aftertaste.

Let’s look at another example that we have discussed before.
The Lebron James series of shoes;

We’ve talked about the Nike/LeBron marketing hype (over substance) before, and the slew of colorways and releases have continued at a fast pace. New colours and design adaptations appear on blogs every month.

None of the LeBron shoes even come close to hype at the release of the Concord – that’s over 10 years old!

Why?

The Jordan series of shoes from when he still played basketball have an enduring quality linked to the athlete’s success and mystique as a player.

Since then, Nike have tried unsuccessfully to create that elixir of athlete, design and results. That’s why subsequent releases have lacked that popularity.
Nike know this – why do you think they’re re-releasing so many of his iconic shoes?

High Snobiety published a very interesting commentary on the mayhem that ensued when the Concord was released;

“..the only solution we see is to move away entirely from in-store releases for such products and exclusively releasing them online. For the retailer that is of course a very unsatisfying solution, but that is the only thing we could come up with.”

This is what had us baffled – the recent release of the Jordan 3 “Cement” (admittedly a connoisseur’s shoe compared to the mainstream Concord – but certainly an iconic and popular shoe), was not met with the same disasterous results to people’s safety and property.

Was it a different audience buying the “Cements”? Quite possibly.
But it was still voted one of the top shoes in 2011.

The “Concord” release was definitely created to achieve footfall with retailers, who got a whole lot more than they bargained for.
Maybe because they didn’t know their audience very well!

Instore releases have been mastered by Apple with a carefully choreographed strategy, combining instore sales (an PR to go with it) and online sales.

They have stayed just the right side of the ‘hype’ line (did anyone say iPhone 4GS/iPhone 5?) and maintain that crucial step ahead of their rivals.

They continue to use hype in way that works and no one gets hurt.
The good thing about the aftermath of the Concord release is that everyone involved will be forced to rethink their hype strategy…or maybe they just hope it doesn’t happen next time.

Our advice? Understand the new 2012 audience and use hype sparingly – if at all!

R