Branding: My new favorite blogger

Continuing a conversation from the transfer thread:

From Fan: "udmperry, maybe your correct on all points, but the UD or U of D was a brand and had a great a tradition as a school and in sports, likely as good or better as other Jesuits schools around the country. As appreciated as the Sisters of Mercy's commitment to the school was, I find to hard to believe that one of the stipulations for them to write the check was to put their name on the door. I think somebody just made a bad call.
As for the kids that came here recently, they came because of Coach Davis, it's the ones we miss because some kid doesn't open a letter or e mail from Detroit Mercy because of the name, or other factors.
It was a bad call, and the school, fans and alum have had to live with it. I guess the issue is the school's hard ball way of dealing with it. Even Coke admitted and changed a branding mistake."

Good points, Fan. Also, if someone is saying that guys like Waterman, Johnson, Fraser, Kuol, etc., weren't impacted by the Mercy thing, they should at least acknowledge that none of those guys were considered top targets in the transfer market last year. It's not like we beat out San Diego State, St. Louis, UNLV, etc., for those guys. They were all single digit scorers at smaller institutions. The fact that they all played better than expected (and better than they had ever before in college) says more about the evaluation and coaching prowess of the Titan staff than it does about anything related to branding.

I've yet to hear anyone make the case that adding Mercy to the University name does anything beneficial. But we have constant examples of how it isn't working, even after 30 plus years.

I appreciate your graceful concession!

You might infer I hope that I admire Coach Watson from my handle. I don’t know when coach made the statement attributed to him. I will assume it is true. Coach was hired in what, 1993? We merged in 1990. That was almost more than 30 years ago? Coach retired in 2008 right? That’s 13 years ago. If it hurt his recruiting that bad how did he land that all time great Rashad Phillips? Sure I suspect it might have been easier for Coach early on if it was still U of D, sure. But you know what? It was UDM that hired Perry! Seems like he had his eyes wide open and joined the Titans even if it was UDM so he didn’t think that name was that huge a burden when joining us I can fairly infer. Suspect he might concede he is glad it was just a little. Because if it was not UDM ole U of D would have been out of business maybe and he never would have had the chance to recruit for us at all. We merged in 1990. Maybe the name vexed Coach’s efforts 25 years ago? Ok. But the does the Brand resonate with anyone but us 30 years later? Hmmm? I’m living in the now with all of you I am not convinced the U old D brand is a panacea or huge brand now. Our best wordsmith The Commissioner (Silent reverent bow and pause) brings us a hallowed an old brand name with the scoreboard every year. Great old school brands. All of them gone now. I loved a lot of them myself Well not my Uncle in the furniture business so much but then I wasn’t in the market for furniture during the Doore heyday. And someone didn’t like his branding efforts as I recall? The founder end up tucked in his own trunk in Sterling Heights...bad mojo that. So there were a lot of cool old brands dearly loved long ago. Strohs (still to be found with some efforts thank the pilsner gods....and I personally think that new fangled “Shorts” is just a Strohs anagram play), Altes, Goebels, Perry’s, Crowleys, Sibleys, Hudson’s. I feel like you guy think Macy’s wouldn’t be on the rocks now if only they called the local remaining stores Hudson’s. U of D was a great brand in the 60s half a century ago. Don’t see that it resonates today. The brand that is working is the one that upped the endowment to 100mm and started a new school of Optometry, has a nationally competitive and respected physician assistant school with a waiting list, a great expanding health science school, a remodeled very cool law school building, a new beautiful school of dentistry, a respected school of architecture, a law school which every law firm hiring committee knows as UDM when hiring our grads and which current grads call UDM without second thought and nary a wince. All that happened under the UDM brand. I’ve no kick against the old Brand. But I just don’t see how it holds us back as many see. I cited examples of real progress of which we are all proud I think. I just cannot get with the idea we are held back by not using a name from three decades ago. I think facts belie that. Those old brands are gone. They aren’t coming back. Time to move on.

And let’s ask our current coach if he ever spent even minute fretting about the brand name. He’s the guy recruiting in the now. Not Coach Watson whom I greatly admire, so I’ll pass on your offer to attack him and his words. I imagine Coach Davis would smile and nod, pat you guys gently on the shoulder and move on pretty fast quietly shaking his head in bewilderment! I await you explanation about how all of the progress I point out does not answer the question you posed to me. I think my case is pretty persuasive... but it is my case of course so I’m a bit biased 😀

If you think that having an easily identifiable brand is less important now, in the era of instant gratification, social media, and short attention spans, than it was in the 90s, you're obviously not a marketing guy.

You started this convo by trying to make the case that concerns about the brand were overblown because we managed to recruit some players. That point was countered, and instead of staying on that track, you took a different tack, saying that our brand was never any good. Then you switched up to talking about other things that are not related to basketball. While I am glad of all the positive steps the school is taking, the subject is the impact of the brand on sports programs, particularly the basketball program. That doesn't have anything to do with Stroh's, or Macy's, etc. So while your manifesto above kept you from being bored, it didn't really address the subject of the impact a lesser brand has on the basketball program.

Watson's team was the UofD regardless who hired him. Rebranding mistakes happen all the time. Kids that play college basketball are very much into style, The Detroit Mercy name
in general for it's basketball team has not been a positive style statement. But going back to the UofD name likely after 30 years would likely not be a positive either.

Certainly a big empty lot at 6 Mile Road from a college that once was, that closed 30 years ago might have made the old Packard building mess a minor event in Detroit's history.

This seems to be a men's basketball thing, certainly the value of the degrees haven't been affected. Locally in Oakland County, Andover HS is now BH HS, and the pickets aren't marching.

Maybe I liked the Univ of Detroit Titas because who they were, and will like Detroit Mercy every bit as much when they are in the Sweet 16.

I think that's because we just spent a million bucks three years ago on a "branding study" that seemed to have a predetermined outcome. They're not going to bring that up again anytime soon. I'd love to see us go with the some retro uniforms, much like Memphis (State) and some other schools do. I think in addition to the Hall of Fame display (which is a great idea), a separate display showing all the Titans who have played in the NBA would be an attention grabber.