Positioning is dead

In my post We Now Sell Milk! I stated that Shoppers Drug Mart is now selling milk. Fusion Brand is talking about the death of positioning where a company no longer wants to know as the "leading provider of..." Companies who begin to realize the needs and time constraints of consumers will be rewarded by them. For instance a mother might make a trip to Shoppers Drug Mart for cosmetics etc., but also needs milk for the family and loves the idea of not having to go to the grocery store and waste time/gas(check the prices lately).

The signs of "positioning's" demise are everywhere. The number of branding failures, many based on "positioning," exceeds 90%, according to the consultancies Ernst & Young and McKinsey & Co. McDonald's, the premier mass market branding giant, announced that it has abandoned positioning. Says Larry Light, McDonald's chief global marketing officer: "Identifying one brand position, communicating it in a repetitive manner is old-fashioned, out of date, out of touch." Even more bluntly, Light highlights "the end of brand positioning as we know it," calling it "marketing suicide." Even a top executive at advertising giant Leo Burnett is willing to stand before his CEO peers and admit, "the old ways of marketing are not working any more."