Know-How Exchange : Branding

The Chevy Nova was exported and the name wasn't changed. "No va" in spanish means "doesn't work".

i just remembered another one,

their was a pharmaceutical company(i cant remember the name) that made a drug that helped people feel better. well what else would it do Carl i hear you ask?

well the company expanded into the middle east and made there labels have pictures on them showing a person sick, then taking the drug then feeling better. later the company started losing money by the bucket load. it turns out that in Arabic people read from the right to the left instead of the way English specking people read left to right.

the people in the middle east read the label with pictures because of the low literacy levels. they read the label as showing a healthy person, then the person taking the drug, then being sick.

Carl Crawford

here is some more adding to Zahid's long list.

- " ColaCola Enjoy" had to be changed to "Drink CocaCola" in Russia as enjoy is perceived to be associated with sexual sensations.

- PepsiCola lost it dominant market share to Coke in South East Asia when Pepsi changed the color of its vending machines and coolers from deep "Regal" blue to light "Ice" blue as Light blue is associated with death and mourning in SE Asia.

- AT&T showed a Thumbs Up (you see the front side in the ad) ad in US and other parts of the world, but in Russia and POland thumbs up like that manner had offensive feeling of "F*** You". so AT&T had to change the ad and for Russia and Poland they showed the Thumbs Up ad by showing the back side of the thumb.

LOL and cheers!!

hi michal

extremely sorry pal, i just got that thumbs-thing from an article, (in fact i have lost the url of that article). Please accept my apologies for that.

probably the days under the Warsaw Pact and the communist regimes are too vivid in most of the people's mind (despite Lech Walesa and the Solidarity) that people tend to still call Poland part of Eastern Europe. but with the joining of NATO and knocking on the door of EU, i am sure people (at least from now on, me) will call Poland part of Central Europe. thanks a lot for reminiding us of Poland's disassociation from the Eastern Block.



Here are some more of the Famous Brand Name & Marketing blunders adding to what had been posted here so far.

# Coca Cola had to withdraw its 2 liter bottle from Spanish market as it didnt fit the local Refrigerators.

# P&G commercials for Camay, in which men directly compliment women on their appearance (a successfull one in many countries) was a complete failure in Japan as there men and women dont interact in that manner.

#Ford launched Ford Fiera, a low cost truck for developing countries in Mexico, but in Spanish, "Fiera" stands for "terrible, cruel or ugly" and the Ford faced sales problem with that Fiera model.

#Again Ford in Mexico launched popular car "Ford Comet" as "Ford Caliente" and had very limited sales, as in Mexico "Caliente" is a slang for "Streetwalker".

#an american airline (the reference book doesnt give the name of the airline) operating in Brazil advertised for a plush "rendezvous lounge" on its jets only to find that "rendezvous" in Portuguese means "room hired for lovemaking".

# GM's "Body by Fisher" was translated s "corpse by Fisher" in Flemish.

# Colgate's Cue toothpaste had trouble in France as "Cue" is a crude term for "Butt" in french.

# United Airline's in-flight magazine cover for Pacific Rim routes hsowed actor Paul Hogan in the australian outback. The caption stated "Paul Hoga Camps It Up". unfortunately "camps it up" is aussie slang for "flaunts his homosexuality".

# A Chinese company attempted to export "Pansy" brand of men's underwear to America.

# Kellog's "Bran Buds" translates into "burned farmer" in Swedish.

hope these helps. Please no offense intened to anyone from any part of the world.

cheers!!