This is Shinola

There was a saying where I came from about unfortunate people who are easily confused or taken in. “Graham can’t tell his arse from his elbow”, we’d say.

Americans have a pithier expression: “Wade can’t tell shit from Shinola.” The alliterative ‘sh…’ sound here adds an important degree of subtle memorability and sibilant symmetry.

Until recently I had no idea what Shinola was, but whatever it was I was instinctively sure I could distinguish it from shit.

Shinola, as it turns out, was an American shoe polish brand. Wikipedia reliably informs me that it was introduced in 1907 by Shinola-Bixby Corporation of Rochester, NY.

The -ola suffix for product names was all the fashion at the time thanks to the popularity of the Pianola, a player piano that possibly derived its name from the violin-viola relationship. In 1906 the Victor Talking Machine Company launched the Victrola gramophone. Galvin Manufacturing later introduced the Motorola car radio, a ‘Victrola’ for your motor, and the whole crapola naming trend ran its course soon after.

Shinola (add shine to ‘ola’) polished its last boot in 1960 when the company went out of business but its name now lives on as something more than a euphemism for something you step in.

Shinola has been reborn as a luxury brand.

Yes indeed. You are now urged to think of Shinola in the same way you think of Mont Blanc with its expensive pens and other luxury ‘lifestyle’ accessories you don’t really need.

The company behind Shinola, Bedrock Brands, was started by a founder of the Fossil brand of watches, Tom Kartsotis. Last year, Crain’s Detroit Business reported that Mr. Kartsotis commissioned a study in which people were asked if they preferred pens made in China that cost $5, the United States at $10 or Detroit at $15, and when offered the Detroit option, they chose it regardless of the higher price.

And so a luxury brand was born, trading on the manufacturing prowess of a city that was once known as Motown, the Motor City. And its name is Shinola?

Shinola opened the doors of its flagship store in New York’s Tribeca neighborhood in July. The Shinola product line consists of an unlikely paring of watches, bicycles and leather goods, many of which are made in Detroit, or at least assembled in Detroit. Yes, you can buy Shinola shoe polish at$15 a can and, if the impulse takes you, there’s a “Rare American Flag” going for $15,000 in the ‘curated’ section its website. Add it to your cart.

All-in-all, Shinola leaves you with an odd, empty feeling. The product set has no brand focus. The faux authenticity of its story, straddling a “storied American brand, and a storied American city”,  is bizarrely schizophrenic. Shinola is by no stretch a ‘storied’ brand. What stories are told about Shinola apart from its association with shit? It is all off-the-mark marketing cliche and hype.

Detroit, on the other hand, could be a winning idea. Clint Eastwood’s raw, gritty Super Bowl commercial for Chrysler in 2012 “Halftime in America” hit exactly the right note.  It was an uplifting tribute to a great American city and a great brand.

The sentiment behind the Shinola brand tries to capture that same spirit but fumbles it. What have Detroit and Shinola got to do with each other?

Is the brand Detroit, is it Shinola, or is it something you just want to wipe off your shoes?

Up in smoke: pot brand names are snuffed out

For three heady months marijuana dealers had something they could only dream of before: the stamp of approval of a federal agency.

On April 1, the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office created a new trademark category: “Processed plant matter for medicinal purposes, namely medical marijuana.” The patent office, part of the Department of Commerce, posted the new category on its website.

The change set off a land rush by pot dealers in the 14 states where laws permit medical-marijuana sales.

Keef Cola

The patent office received more than 250 pot-related trademark applications in the three months after it created the new trademark category. There were applications for trademarks on “Tartukan Death Weed,” “Pot-N-Candy,” “Namers Nirvana” and numerous businesses incorporating “Green” and “4:20″—a number that pot smokers often associate with weed, sometimes smoking it at 4:20 p.m. and celebrating April 20 as a pro-pot holiday. Two companies applied to trademark psychoactive sodas named Keef Cola and Canna Cola.

The trademark rush began to haze the mellow of pot traders.  Some staked claims on rights to long-used names such as like Maui Wowie, Chronic,  Purple Haze and Acapulco Gold, made famous by comedian Tommy Chong more than 30 years ago. Arguments flared over whether such  long-used pot names are subject to “prior art,” meaning their use in the past precludes a trademark.

Weed entrepreneurs hired mainstream intellectual-property law firms like Knobbe Martens in Southern California and Weide & Miller (that’s right) in Las Vegas to register their weed trade names.

But last week the patent office snuffed out the promise of federal recognition. After questions about the new pot-trademark category from a Wall Street Journal reporter, a patent-office spokesman said the office planned to remove the new pot classification by week’s end, and the category is now off the website.

Marijuana dealers, their appetites whetted by the three months of hope, said they haven’t given up. Scott Ridell, a brand-development consultant for Panatella Brands, a Colorado pot-grower consortium, said his clients are still “moving forward” with branding efforts and hope the patent office will grant trademarks.

Keep smoking the weed dude, you’re in for a long wait.