Twitter chum Luke Scheybeler and I have been discussing the phenomenon of brand collaborations over the last couple of weeks. The debate was kicked off by Luke’s observation of the bizarreness of the Vitra / Jean Prouvé x GStar RAW collaboration. Not the only slightly weird furniture / fashion collab either, as Moroso and Diesel recently got together too.
However, yesterday Luke declared,
“Brand “collabs” have become so fucking boring and predictable. Most of them are just a way of boosting PR for a couple of weeks. Lazy marketing.”
I had to disagree. As I see it, the majority of brand collaborations are indeed lazy, senseless PR exercises dreamed up by imbeciles with lofty job titles in bullshit management. But despite this, there are plenty of marvellous potential collaborators just waiting for someone like me to pluck them out of obscurity and drop them together into a mutually-beneficial metaphorical double eggcup.
Such a pair are Atco and Gucci.
Atco is a British heritage brand. They have been making the finest lawnmowers since 1921. They have two Royal warrants, and are well-steeped in mowing history. They are a strong international brand, but need to diversify their image if they are going to appeal to a younger generation of gardeners, who might currently identify with funkier, Japanese lawnmowers produced by manufacturers such as Honda.
Gucci is an Italian producer of clothing, leather goods, watches and jewellery. They were also founded in 1921 (see, I told you.) Gucci’s product range is aimed at wealthy arrivistes, footballers, self-made nail salon millionaires, and men who drive Mercedes convertibles. Gucci desperately want to direct their brand away from those particular demographics and instead focus on heritage-appreciative rugged old-money types. As such, a collaboration with Atco could truly be a match made in heaven.
As you can see above, Gucci’s signature red and green stripe almost exactly mirrors Atco’s red cutting blade and green body paint. This really is just too easy…
Below, you can see a previous collaboration Gucci undertook with Fiat. Alas, no self-respecting gardener would ever been seen dead in a car like that.
So, here we have the first set of images produced by the Salted Mackerel Brand Collaboration Consultancy.
I give you Atco x Gucci.
And here is another project that I’m currently developing for another pair of clients…
