Part of what makes a strong brand so useful and powerful is that it describes for its staff what they could achieve. It points to the horizon and says ‘that’s where we’re going’. Rather than merely documenting where a product/service/company is right now and what it can fairly easily achieve (sadly the case for most brands), a strong brand dares to look further ahead.
It may be hard to imagine that the organisation behind the brand can get there by the next quarter, the next year or even in five years’ time. But a strong brand will push in the right direction, it will spur the organisation on when it’s got doubts or gets bogged down in the reality of market changes, recessions and tough competition.
Hästens looks at beds in an incredibly ambitious way just like Four Seasons does with hotels and AKG with headphones. All these are companies at the top of their industry. The question then is – how did they get there and what keeps them going? Do you just one day decide to produce the world’s best bed, hotel or headphone? And once you produce things or deliver services that are of such quality and success, you’ve arrived at the horizon – what’s next?
As we know from the autobiographies from many successful leaders in business and government, what’s next is the next horizon. The same is true of all strong brands – they have an original view of what ‘best’ is, a conviction that the best is achievable and a relentless urge to do even better, to tweak, to perfect, to expand. So a strong brand and the idea that drives it are a target you set yourself but will never quite arrive at. Whenever you get close, you move it to the next horizon.
