Capital C

In-N-Out Burger: Cult Cuisine

In-N-Out is a Californian restaurant chain that has achieved cult status among the burgerati. The owners opted to keep it privately owned to retain control over the quality and the customer experience. Good move. Estimated revenues are at $216.8 mn, and by staying true to their 'Quality You can Taste' slogan and indie culture they've been able to sidestep the stigma associated with corporate chains (read McDonald's) and become a movement.

My favourite snippets:

• IN-N-Out is the only fast food chain allowed to open up in the fiercely independent Fisherman's Wharf
• An extremely limited menu offering, with only three burgers on the cards
• Host of secret menu items ('animal style', 'veggie burger') that become popular purely through word of mouth
• Gordon Ramsay chose an animal style-burger as his 'death row' meal :)

They kept it simple, kept it scrumptious. Amen

scalpel-sharp insight

 
Just read a superb profile piece on Dr. Atul Gawande- surgeon, health policy expert, and journalist for The New Yorker.

My take-home for the day was how Gawande embraces diverse knowledge streams to inform his medical writing- below is his take on blushing

What is this peculiar phenomenon called blushing? A skin reaction? An emotion? A kind of vascular expression? Scientists have never been sure how to describe it. The blush is at once physiology and psychology. On the one hand, blushing is involuntary, uncontrollable, and external, like a rash. On the other hand, it requires thought and feeling at the highest order of cerebral function. “Man is the only animal that blushes,” Mark Twain wrote. “Or needs to.”

The rich undercurrents of philosophy, history and literature in Gawande's writing transform a routine description into something magical.  It got me thinking-As a marketer, how can I expect to create game-changers if I'm only looking to other marketers for inspiration? I'd do well to leap into fields such as art, design, and medicine to challenge myself, and conjure up new playgrounds in which to discover.

Paranormally Phenomenonal

 I was lucky enough to catch Paranormal Activity last night. The movie is hands-down the scariest thing I've ever seen- go watch it, it's genius. Shot in under a week and with amateur actors, the film explores the most primal cause of fear- a lack of understanding of what's going on.

The preview is composed almost entirely of reaction shots of people watching the movie. Spookily brilliant, it creates an empathy with the freaked out folks and compels you to join them in the experience.

You come home and as soon as you're over the initial terror (which is a while), you can't wait to get out there and discuss and share feelings.

Marketing and the macabre, made my day :)

Toys "R" Us 'Chief Play Officer' means serious fun.

To help celebrate their 25th birthday, Toys “R” Us brought in some experts. The Chief Play Officer (CPO) is an esteemed role and a dream job for any kid. Check out the Toronto Star press here.

The CPO's job is to play for a living, providing insights on the 25 hottest toys of the holiday season as well lending a great deal of nostalgia to toy lovers across Canada by promoting the vote on the Top 25 Toys of all time.

The goal: crown a victor to be deemed the Top Toy of All Time. There are 25 toys on the list that are sure to make you remember the days of playing on the carpet.  As well, TRU is giving away $25,000 worth of toys in an online giveaway.

Here at Cap C we're always thrilled to get involved with Toys "R" Us, and we're proud of how our concept turned out. There’s more celebration details to be announced but if the kid in you can’t wait, come on over to the Facebook page and to be sure you’ll get all the news.

AToMIC 09- A conference loaded with insight and charisma

Some thoughts on the Atomic conference, would love to share them with you. Atomic09conference

Retail now plays in the Digital Space

Cap C partner James Fraser spoke at a CODACAN (Canadian Out-Of-Home-Digital Association) event last week, outlining his vision for the future of retail and its leap towards digital.

Dave over at Sixteen:Nine has done a great review of the speakers' talks, highly share-worthy.

The Awesomeness Manifesto- Visualized

Umair Haque over at the HBS blogs has created a compelling manifesto that deals with the essence of 'Awesome'. His ideas connected with me instantly, so I thought I'd try a mini-visualization with my new toy, Mind Manager. Haque's open-sourced his manifesto and is looking for examples of awesome, so I urge our readers to contribute.

Scouting for Social Media folks

Please check out the available positions on our job page...

Capital Acclaim at the 2009 Promo! Awards

Cap C took home major honours at the 2009 Promo! Awards, with 7 awards including 4 golds. A big thank-you to the CAPMA folks for putting on a snazzy and memorable show.

The list:

GOLD - Best Multidisciplined campaign - Dove Sleepover
GOLD - Best B2B - Nissan/Infiniti Dealer Web program
GOLD - Best Account Specific - Sunlight Eco-Action Kids
GOLD - Best Dealer or Salesforce - Nissan/Infiniti Dealer Web Program
SILVER - Best multidisciplined campaign - Becel Heart Truth
SILVER - Best activity generating brand loyalty - Dove Sleepover
SILVER - Best Cause Marketing - Unilever Go Blue

We're thrilled, humbled, and more committed than ever to creating campaigns that showcase content, creativity, and humanity.

Kanye taps into Murakami Madness

After Kanye West’s outburst at the VMA last night, I visited his site to see if he had attempted to explain his bizarre behavior. No dice, but I was in for a treat regardless. Designed by the Time 100 visual artist Takashi Murakami, kanyeuniversity is a community playground with plenty of amusements such as music clips, videos and a newborn blog. We’ve marveled at Murakami’s work before, loving his ability to capture pop culture in what Wikipedia calls a 'blurring of high and low art'.

Inspiring enough to make me forget what I was looking for.