Lady Emily [00:00] Here’s a story about a small, odd car and a headline that broke every rule in advertising at the time.
Doug Downs [00:11] It’s 1959, and Detroit owns the American road. Chevrolet ads show chrome catching the sunset. Ford promises the future arriving today. Every car in every ad is bigger than the one before it. Bigger engines, bigger fins, bigger dreams.
Into that world comes a small, odd looking German car. It’s called the Beetle. It has the engine in the back. It seats four, barely. It looks nothing like a Cadillac, and it carries a harder problem than its size.
The car was developed under the Nazi regime at Hitler’s direction less than 15 years earlier. World War II is still living memory for the people Volkswagen needs to buy this car. Small, plain, foreign, German. By every rule of 1959 advertising, this launch fails before it starts.
So Volkswagen hires an ad agency called Doyle Dane Birnbach. The agency has a choice to make: hide where the car came from or lean into it being different and hope honesty beats size.
Doug Downs [01:21] Well, they chose honesty. The newspaper ad they run is almost empty, a small black and white photo of the Beetle tucked in the corner of the page. The rest is white space. Two words for a headline: Think Small.
No chrome, no sunset, no family smiling in a driveway, just a small, odd car admitting out loud that it’s small and odd. American drivers had never seen a foreign brand talk about itself that plainly.
Here are the numbers that matter.
Doug Downs [01:57] In 1959, Volkswagen sold around 120,000 cars in the United States. Within a decade, that number passed half a million. The Beetle became the best selling imported car in America, full stop.
And just to close out the success story, they don’t still make the Beetle today. They’ve moved on. But Volkswagen sold 330,000 vehicles last year in the US.
Volkswagen didn’t hide being German. They didn’t wave the flag either. They told the plain truth about the product, and it turned into maybe the best selling advertising campaign of the century.
Today on Stories and Strategies, how do you know whether to wave your flag or leave it at home?
My name is Doug Downs. My guest this week, Daisy Pack, joining from London. Hey, Daisy.
Daisy Pack [03:01] Hi, Doug. Thank you so much for having me on the show.
Doug Downs [03:04] It’s so good to connect. We connected briefly, not in your office, but at your offices, so to speak. How are things in your area of London today?
Daisy Pack [03:14] Yeah, very good, thank you. I mean, it’s a little overcast, but I’m still in my summer wardrobe, so that’s the main thing.
Doug Downs [03:21] Yeah, and London had such a heat wave this summer, so I’m sure in some sense the cooler temps are a slight relief. There’s just no turning back now. It’s going where it’s going.
Daisy, you spent more than 20 years building brand reputations for some of the world’s most recognized food and drink names, from Waitrose and Mars to PepsiCo and Premier Foods. You lead Hunter’s London office as managing director, where American brands often come to you when they’re ready to cross the Atlantic.
So you’ve helped several different American brands land in the UK. When a company asks you, should we lean into it like Volkswagen did, or should we downplay it like others have successfully, how do you even start to answer that? It’s got to be a translation of who the brand is and what they want to do.
Daisy Pack [04:09] Absolutely. It’s a great question to ask, Doug, and actually there are a few different factors that I consider.
First of all, I think you really need to think about your difference and what about that difference can help you earn attention as a brand. Successfully standing out in a sea of sameness does often mean embracing what makes you distinctive rather than trying to blend in.
Well, I think Volkswagen did that brilliantly with Think Small. What I really love about that campaign is actually how self aware it was. It resisted that temptation to conform and actually transformed what could have been seen as a disadvantage into the reason to pay attention.
And that’s actually an important lesson for any brand entering a new market. But earning attention and actually earning affection are two very different things. To really build a lasting connection, you really need to understand the local audience and what will genuinely strike a chord with them.
Daisy Pack [05:18] And actually, I do think that Volkswagen is an interesting example here too. I don’t know if you remember those brilliant films, the Herbie films, Doug, The Love Bug and...
Doug Downs [05:29] Herbie Rides Again. We used to go to drive in theaters to watch those. You’re sparking a childhood memory there.
Daisy Pack [05:35] Oh, I know. I used to love them too. But actually, what’s interesting is that these came years after Think Small introduced Americans to that very different kind of car.
It was actually the Herbie film franchise that transformed the Beetle into that lovable, cheeky character that is so embedded in American popular culture.
And you know what? I think it really made the brand feel familiar and emotionally resonant without stripping away what made it distinctive in the first place.
So that’s really the balance that I’d encourage brands to find. It’s not about downplaying who you are, but also don’t assume that who you are will automatically matter to a new audience because difference can earn you attention, but it’s cultural relevance that really helps turn that attention into connection.
And I think that’s particularly important for American brands coming over here to the UK as well. As Brits, we’ve long held this sort of fascination with American brands and culture.
Daisy Pack [06:46] And there was a time back in the day when a trip to New York, a New York weekend shopping trip, meant coming home with the coolest things that you couldn’t get on this side of the pond.
But those days are gone, Doug. Now we live in this sort of access all areas kind of global culture thanks to the internet and social media. And of course, British consumers today are exposed to American brands and trends and culture constantly.
So really, simply arriving from the US is no longer enough to make a brand interesting.
And I hate to say it, but against a more complex geopolitical backdrop, leaning heavily on American identity may not necessarily always resonate in the way that it once did.
So really, I’d start by asking, should we play up or play down being American? That’s not so much the question.
Really, it’s about what’s genuinely distinctive about this particular brand and how do we make that distinction meaningful to a British audience right now?
Doug Downs [07:57] You have an example. Premier Protein was a campaign that you led, an example of downplaying the obvious American angle entirely. Walk us through that campaign, what the thinking was and what the outcomes were.
Daisy Pack [08:13] Yeah, sure. Absolutely. I’d love to. I’m sure that your US listeners will know Premier Protein very well. I’m sure you do, Doug.
It’s North America’s number one ready to drink protein brand, but awareness and relevance don’t automatically travel, and simply placing the product in front of a London landmark isn’t necessarily going to give British consumers a reason to care about it.
What’s interesting about this category, the protein category, is that it’s absolutely crowded with heaps of brands that are all pushing that kind of functional messaging, whether it’s reps and macros to performance and optimization.
But actually, the audience that we wanted to reach was health conscious but not health obsessed.
So rather than competing within that same territory, instead we looked at what was happening in British culture and really asked where Premier Protein could credibly play a different role.
And what we found, Doug, was that actually young Brits these days are increasingly swapping boozy nights out for wellness led ways to socialize.
Daisy Pack [09:35] They’re not necessarily chasing this sort of hardcore fitness culture. Instead, they’re looking for connection and community and healthier ways to spend time together.
What was brilliant was at that point, British Vogue came out with their latest issue and declared in a headline that we should all forget the pub because saunas are the new place to socialize.
So that was absolutely our kind of cue and inspiration, if you like.
And we actually created Premier Protein’s Fueling Friendships Social Sauna, which was a pop up that kind of turned post workout recovery from that sort of typically functional, individual, solo moment into something that was more shared and social and culturally relevant.
And we very much purposefully opened it up. We opened the doors on the day of the London Marathon, when wellness and recovery were very much part of the cultural conversation at the time.
And we gave participants and spectators an opportunity, or a place, to come and refuel.
Daisy Pack [10:48] We opened it up in London Bridge. They could come and refuel with Premier Protein, but also connect with others as well.
And what we did was we kind of surrounded that whole experience with original research and expert commentary and influencer storytelling, as well as media, to really give the idea some legs and life beyond the sauna itself.
And yeah, happy to say that it was a success. All 150 tickets sold out, and the product also saw a significant uplift in sales, which was fantastic.
But I think what that taught me, what the lesson was, is that we didn’t downplay Premier Protein’s American roots, but instead we found a role for the brand that was rooted in what British consumers cared about at that particular moment.
And really that allowed us to move Premier Protein beyond a functional protein drink and really give it that distinctive, culturally relevant role in the UK.
Doug Downs [11:53] So I think what I’m hearing there is find the shared values, which in this case was health awareness, not health obsessed, because you’re right, it’s a more narrow...
Daisy Pack [12:04] Absolutely.
Doug Downs [12:05] Cool. Health awareness, as well as this tendency for the younger generation, I think globally, to live a healthier life than even you and I did.
It’s not that you and I smoked and hung out in the smoking area, but some of our friends did. We certainly went to the pub, or in my case the bar. Yes. That’s how we met one another quite often.
But the younger generation, wine sales are down since 2022, down dramatically. I was stunned when I saw that number.
So you found those shared values, and it wasn’t that you denied the flag. The Stars and Stripes were still in the background. We didn’t lean into it. That was not the value because to some, rightly or wrongly, American may carry other messaging behind it always, but particularly maybe right now.
Daisy Pack [12:57] True. Yeah, that is absolutely the case right now, Doug. Yes.
And I think it was about tapping into what was happening in the UK in current culture amongst the audiences that we wanted to reach.
And as you rightly put it, gone are the days where we were sort of drinking pints and going to parties. It’s more about shooting darts.
Doug Downs [13:20] Yeah.
Daisy Pack [13:21] Yeah, shooting darts. It’s now about 5K run clubs and morning yoga. Very different.
Doug Downs [13:34] So now I know when we chatted before the episode to get ready for the episode, one of the lines that you said, I loved it, was that we speak the same language and sometimes we don’t speak the same language.
And that can be quite literal, the boot and the bonnet, or that could be metaphorical. But expand on that and how it ties into this if I’m coming across the Atlantic.
I suppose, theoretically, either way. I also want to think about British brands that want to sell in the US.
Daisy Pack [14:05] For sure. Yeah. I mean, it’s funny, isn’t it? It’s so true.
I think, you know what, Doug, something that I love about Americans is their unfettered enthusiasm and energy and joy. I think we Brits, we’re not cheerleaders in quite the same way.
Doug Downs [14:25] So we need to footnote that because there are a lot of Americans listening right now going, “What are you talking about? Joy?”
I do agree. There’s an enthusiasm and an optimism.
Daisy Pack [14:37] To American life. Yes, definitely. Yes. Always cheerleading. It’s wonderful.
But I think on the flip side, you think of us Brits, think of us more like teenagers. I’ve got two teenage sons, and they can greet their friends with an almost sort of imperceptible raise of the eyebrow, and somehow an entire conversation has taken place.
And actually, British audiences tend to respond to that same kind of subtlety in storytelling.
It’s all about the understatement, a lot of wit, and maybe a slightly left field approach.
Funnily enough, I sometimes joke with our clients that a wry smile should be a KPI for American brands trying to resonate with Brits.
But you know what? To your question, I don’t think there’s any hard and fast rule there.
Actually, the signal that I kind of tend to look for is really whether a brand’s American identity adds something meaningful to the story, or is it simply being used as a badge of origin?
Doug Downs [15:48] Well said.
Daisy Pack [15:49] If it kind of gives people a world that they want to step into and become part of, that could be incredibly powerful.
But if it’s just Stars and Stripes and bigger is better, it can quickly feel a bit clichéd or tone deaf.
Sometimes, for example, it could be that leaning into a more nostalgic version of Americana can work beautifully.
Just thinking about those Herbie films again, actually, or diners and road trips, family recipes passed down through the generations, small towns, craftsmanship, that kind of thing.
And actually, those are cultural cues that British audiences already understand, and they can evoke a sense of familiarity and discovery without pretending, of course, that the past was perfect. Far from it.
And interestingly, that’s something that we’re leaning into with one of our clients, Tripadvisor and Visit the USA, right now to inspire British travelers to explore more of America.
Daisy Pack [16:58] So I guess the point isn’t to make America less American. It’s to identify which parts of America are most compelling to the audience that you’re trying to reach and to tell those stories in a way that feels right for them.
Doug Downs [17:13] Yeah, and find the shared values because that’s how we create community in the end.
For sure.
How important is it for a brand to already have some awareness or some presence? Because in the case of Premier Protein, it was not an unfamiliar brand in the UK previously. Most folks had some level of awareness of Premier Protein.
And I’m asking that because we live in an age of worldwide digital media, social media, digital advertising, podcasts, for heaven’s sake, YouTube channels, that kind of thing.
Daisy Pack [17:46] Yeah, absolutely. And as I said, I think the fact that Premier Protein had been in the UK for a couple of years before we started working with them, but they were quietly here, if you see what I mean.
Doug Downs [18:04] I get it.
Daisy Pack [18:06] And the fact that, as I said earlier, we now live in this global world of social media, as you say, and the internet, means that we are much more aware of brands that perhaps might not be on our doorstep.
But if it’s something that an influencer that we follow is talking about, then that makes it desirable and cool, and we might have heard of it even if we haven’t got hold of it just yet.
But yeah, I think the thing with Premier Protein was that it was sort of sitting there, but it really needed an opportunity to enter the UK cultural conversation and to appeal to the audiences that it wanted to reach.
And it wasn’t going to do that by placing itself in front of Big Ben, for example.
Doug Downs [18:59] Let’s say an American brand comes to you tomorrow, because it’s late in your day here as we’re talking.
So tomorrow morning they come to you and say, Applebee’s, classic American brand, we want to expand or we want to start in the UK. I’m just picking Applebee’s out of the thin blue air.
Tell me about the initial process. What are the questions you ask? What are the things that they could prep ahead of time for this kind of transfer?
Daisy Pack [19:28] Well, do you know what? My one piece of advice to any US brand launching or expanding in the UK, and actually we do have a lot of US fast food brands coming over here and expanding right now. There seems to have been a sort of real burst of them, which is exciting.
But the key piece of advice I would give to any US brand is to have a Brit on the team.
Don’t try and kind of walk in their shoes because otherwise you might end up with content that doesn’t quite resonate.
For example, Applebee’s or the team at Applebee’s, they might think, oh, British food is bland, but we don’t think that.
Daisy Pack [20:17] Or if it’s an all American team, their head
