I read the Taco Bell Chihuahua bit in your book and was left bewildered that you did not classify that campaign as a big bang idea. After all, according to your book for an idea to go bang it needs to:
* expand exponentially in the culture
* make a brand explode onto the marketplace virtually overnight
* simply too outrageous, too different, too polarizing to go unnoticed
* buck conventional wisdom and stops people in their tracks
* make a dramatic, immediate and irreversible impact
* become an icon

The Taco Bell "Yo Quiero Taco Bell" campaign accomplished all of those things.

What the campaign may not have accomplished is an increase in sales. However, I don't recall your book specifically outlining that big bang ideas need to drive sales in order to be christened being a big bang.

I would appreciate any clarification you wish to offer.

To the previous commenter:

The answer to your question is in the blog entry itself:

"The problem? It didn't sell very many tacos."

Agreed. Same-store sales at Taco Bell did not increase during the time the "You Quiero Taco Bell" ads ran.

However, that doesn't mean the creative idea was a bad idea. The creative idea seemed to resonate well with consumers. If it didn't, then the Chihuahua would not have become an icon and the "You Quiero Taco Bell" slogan would not have been uttered by the masses.

All this reinforces that marketing (including advertising) cannot under-deliver on the promise.

Let's face it, the quality of the Taco Bell product is poor. Taco Bell can't talk quality. They can't talk authenticity. They can only talk "cheap, fun, fast food." When these ads ran, the economy was booming and people were trading up more than they were trading down.

What I am trying to get at is ... if you start with a poor product and or poor experience, no amount of marketing is going to alter the ultimate fate of the company. Sure, a little marketing may spike sales in the short-term but sustaining success will continue to be elusive if the product/experience isn't good to begin with.

These days, Chiptole, Baja Fresh, or Qdoba will get my money long before I would consider trading down to Taco Bell.

I'm confused. And what does a duck have to do with insurance?

The problem was never the idea of a dog selling tacos. The problem was that the marketing just wasn't really edgy enough to create a spark.

The commercial efforts weren't interesting or funny. They didn't really have staying power. The dog was put on T-shirts and mugs, but when did you ever actually see someone wearing a T-shirt with the Taco Bell dog on it?

The commercials were bland and predictable. The AFLAC duck is not ( at least not initially ).

The other factor is that it's common knowledge that Taco Bell has decreased the quality of their products. The company doesn't market THAT, but that's what people really think; The company decreased taste, increased price and produced some weak dog commercials to sell it.

You can't create a 'bad idea' category and put any marketing plan that didn't work into it. There are reasons why it will or won't work, not a basic "a+b+c-d" 'formula' for a bad idea. Even a bad marketing idea implemented in the right manner can work. Heck, who thought Jared would become a pop culture icon?

Excuse me but can anyone tell me where I can buy one of these Taco Bell Chihuahua's. I called Taco Bell and apparently they don't sell them. I asked them if it was like some kind of "Hot Dog", they had no comment.

M.
zorromark@consultant.com
(Mark Twain wasn't Mark Twain, Mark Zorro isn't Mark Zorro)
http://www.markzorro.blogspot.com

PS Buy your Taco Bell Chihuahua from me today and just taste the difference that a dog makes.

I'm also thouroghly entertained by some of the Budweiser beer commercials. Thank you Budweiser.

By the way. I don't like your beer and nothing in your commercials has convinced me to try it again. Most of your commercials don't try to convince anyone of anything.

Awareness? Sure. I recommend watching the commercials. But I recommened against drinking the beer. Same with Taco Bell.

I love Baja Fresh...and I Love them Clydesdales.

I remain unconvinced that Big Bang ideas are worth much if they don't increase sales. Oh, it might be nice to be remembered as a company that came up with a really edgy, iconoclastic (or iconogenic) idea. Yeah, that's nice. But this is Fast *Company*, and the goal of a company is about making money now and in the future.

If the idea is Big Bang but No Bucks, then it can rot, as far as I'm concerned. The only real money that the Taco Bell dog made was for the advertising company. For them, maybe, it was worth it.

Being remembered as the company with the way cool ideas is no replacement for being remembered as the company that made the biggest profits and continues to do so.

Sean in response to your post I would add a different perspective.

In the new economy the company that holds the best ideas wins the market. Great ideas will become the currency of the next revolution in business. Previous business cycles have focused on quality or price, but in the next 5-10 years we will see a shift to the idea behind the commodity as the driving force for creating a Big Bang!

Jose

jalapeno flavored creativity

jose@thinkcrank.com
www.thinkcrank.com