I recently posted a link to marketing guru Garland Pollard’s list of  “brands to bring back.”
Now, the local angle on missing brands.
Pollard’s blog has praised Seattle’s Major League Soccer franchise for wisely keeping the beloved Sounders name.
He’s scolded the retailer formerly known as Federated Department Stores for trashing its beloved regional store names, including The Bon Marche. He’s suggested bringing those back at least in some capacity.
And when the Post-Intelligencer folded as a print daily, Pollard suggested things Hearst bigwigs could do to keep the P-I brand active, beyond a mere Web presence, such as a weekly print paper or magazine. I think that’s still a good idea.
I, of course, have my own faves I’d like brought back:
- If it can ever be determined who (if anyone) owns the trademark rights to Frederick & Nelson, I’d love to see a new store with that storied name. It needn’t be a full line department store. It could just be a quality family clothing store plus a cosmetics counter and a tea room.
- The Rainier and Olympia beer brands currently live in vestigial form, owned by the Pabst marketing company and made by Miller in LA. It’s time they were brought home, perhaps contract-brewed by one or more local microbrewers.
- With Sound Northwest merged out of existence, the region could use a print music mag again. Why not resurrect The Rocket? I can just see gleefully overdesigned cover portraits of today’s Seattle “beard bands.”
- Someone, somewhere, has the bulk of the exhibits from the Jones Fantastic Museum, the beloved carny attraction that used to reside in what’s now the Seattle Center House.
- Heck, for that matter let’s find a place somewhere in town to put up a new Fun Forest. I suggest the former Frederick Cadillac/Teatro ZinZanni block in Belltown, where two humungous condo towers were supposed to rise up before the housing market fell down.
- Speaking of Belltown, this town still needs a restaurant/lounge as fun, as welcoming, and as classlessly classy as the Dog House.
- Compared to most of these fantasized revivals, there’s actually some practical hope for a new Sonics franchise. The money and the management are in place. I’m certain a re-enlarged arena can be conceived with a minimal govt. investment. This leaves only two obstacles—David Stern and the current team owners at whose bidding he serves.
