Dairy Queen in the News

Just yesterday, I posted a video I had done about Dairy Queen and franchising in general. Later on I came across this article from a retail news feed I subscribe to. In the article, Dairy Queen’s chief brand officer, Michael Keller, talks about building a brand. Its interesting to see that what I noticed locally, is being addressed nationally. Read the article below from the St. Cloud Times to see their take on it.

How to build a brand: Lessons from a Dairy Queen executive
Teens learn skills at Minnesota Business Venture

July 16, 2008

By Amy Trang

Michael Keller was on track to become a doctor when he was a freshman at Dartmouth College in New Hampshire.

That is, before a tough organic chemistry course detoured his route.

Keller, chief brand officer for Dairy Queen in Minneapolis, put his efforts toward psychology and eventually a master of business administration.

“I had no clue I had a marketing career ahead of me,” Keller said.

Keller spoke to almost 177 Minnesota teenagers Tuesday at St. Cloud State University about his career path and the branding behind one of the oldest Minnesota fast-food companies.

The teens are participants in Minnesota Business Venture. MBV is a one-week program teaching teens about business skills and financial literacy.

“I like how he connected it with real-life experiences,” said Samantha Benning, a second-year MBV participant from Fridley. “Dairy Queen is something we all can connect with.”

Carving a niche

At 43 years old, Keller worked a number of jobs before settling into the $3 billion Dairy Queen company. He worked in marketing for food companies such as Nestle, Jamba Juice and Koo Koo Roo.

“What I love about food is it’s universal,” Keller said.

As chief brand officer, Keller oversees everything under the Dairy Queen and Orange Julius brands, including brand concept and product strategy.

“Brand building is about making a promise and delivering a promise to customers,” Keller said. “You build that on trust.”

Faced with high costs of labor and foods, Keller said it’s necessary to keep making the 68-year-old brand exciting to get customers to the chain’s 5,900 locations.

A 75-person team worked on the advertising and marketing of the company’s latest product.

“There are no accidents in ads,” Keller said. “Every word, prop, music is intentional.”

Marketing also has grown to involve a wider scope than just advertising, Keller said. Branding helps retain customer loyalty by developing good experiences with the brand, from its location to customer service to product quality, he said.

Career advice

Keller left the teenagers with the notion that they themselves are brands to employers, from appearances to skills.

“Who you are is the unique competitive advantage,” Keller said. “Yow have to know how to differentiate yourself from your peers.”

Keller drew on personal experiences to advise the students. He cited a seven-month stint at Homestore.com, a job he mostly took because of the salary, although he did not agree with the corporate culture or the company ethics.

“It was completely inconsistent with the values of me individually,” Keller said.

Keller said that the teens should listen to themselves and figure out what the values, needs and goals are for their careers.

From there, the money will follow.

“The worst mistake is doing something because someone tells you to do it,” Keller said. “At the end of the day, you must make that decision yourself.”

To Franchise or Not to Franchise

A few days ago I stopped by what was a Dairy Queen that recently became the Dairy Dream. I use it as an example of how franchises can go wrong and discuss the reasons a business would want to leave. Take a look and check out my other YouTube videos when you get a chance.

Marketing: Big Guys vs. Little Guys

Recently, I visited a local FedEx Kinkos to discuss how national retailers make decisions versus how independent retailers make decisions. As small retailers we have opportunities to market to our customers in a way that mass merchants don’t, and we need to capitalize upon this fact. Grab some popcorn and watch the following video to see what I have to say.

Wal Mart’s strong suit comments from Tom Shay

This past week I was speaking to a group in Henderson, Nevada and the issue of a challenging economy. If more people are looking at Wal Mart because of the economy, this indicates it is definitely not appropriate for small businesses to try to target the same customer. Move to a different focus; granted there are fewer customers, but your small business does not need as many customers as it takes to make a Wal Mart viable.

Here is a link to the article that appeared on MSNBC’s website:

Weak Economy may be Wal-Mart’s strong suit

And here is a link to the presentation information from the Profits Plus website. You can even listen to a free audio presentation of Tom Shay’s topic: Your Customer doesn’t live here, anymore.

Your Customer doesn’t live here anymore! by Tom Shay

Tom Shay’s new presentation on the Internet for small businesses

We have a new presentation available for this year. It is entitled, “If the Internet works for Amazon, why won’t it work for me?

Visit this page to see details of the presentation:

Tom Shay’s If the Internet works for Amazon, why won’t it work for me?

Visit this link to see an article about how large retail is changing their web presence:

Seattle Post Intelligencer article: Regular retail turns to Web

What’s in general discussion

General discussion is where we put all of the comments that won’t fit neatly into one of the other categories. Of course, when we find an issue in general discussion that grows too big, we will start a new category for that particular issue. These are my twin sons, generation #5 and their first business.