MEIERTransformational Marketing

907 BroadwayNew York, NY212.460.5655meierbrand.com

MEIER is represented by Tricia Joyce212.962.0728

Welcome to MEIER. We are a small agency that does big work, the best of which is transformational. Award-winning in nearly every category of consumer impact, we take clients from the initial research and analy-sis, through strategy, and the creation of all materials, production, media buying and outreach (both traditional and digital). We present fully holistic solutions to the build-ing of brand value for growth, investment or sale – just as we always have for some of the best recognized, and most respected, names in the world.

Integratedmarketing for over 30 years.

They come to us with ideas they want to launch, and divisions they may want to close. They come to us when they want to enter a market, and when they’re looking for exit strategies. In some cases, clients come to us because they don’t know what they want. And we help them find focus.

We look at a client’s position from all angles: perceived, actual, possible; strategic, tactical, creative; and everything in between. Every point of impact between the brand and its targeted end-user is identified and assessed, polished, posi-tioned or just plain fixed.

Our clients do not come tous looking forsmall results.

Unlike a consultancy, we don’t just point clients in the right direction; we actually create the materials and

tools that move them to their goals.

< Chopard campaign by MEIER

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We helped Chipwich launch a brand new category of dessert - the first “Luxury Ice-Cream Novelty.”

The programs we developed for DeBeers allowed them a clear and persuasive voice within disparate and uncontrolled retail environments.

Our work for Balducci’s created a line of branded products and the first integrated gourmet food mail-order business – a division they then sold for just under $100M.

With an unexpected solution, we moved the perception of Neiman Marcus from a regional, Texas department store, to America’s preeminent luxury retailer.

Eleven unrelated, international wallpaper factories became a single brand under our guidance. Sunworthy, the largest wallcovering brand in the world, reversed a trend away from wallpaper, and

sold as a division, two years ahead of goal, for $850M.

While some of these accomplishments were managed with investments so small they might surprise you, all of them were based on plans that made best use of

our skills and integrated disciplines.

For more fully expressed case histories, turn to the stories section at the back – or take a look at a larger selection of Client Stories at www.meierbrand.com.

Just a sample:

What havewe done?

“Communication meth-ods have changed drastically, but our basic human urge to connect is as strong as ever.” Tara Strahl

“Everything the customer sees tells him about a brand. More often than not, it starts with display.” Geoff Howell

“Technology doesn’t define who we are, but it does change the way we live.” Bennett Meier

“Design isn’t about com-plexity versus simplicity. The goal is always to be compelling, and that’s a challenge I love.” Evelyn Frison

“We’ve won nearly every award our industry be-stows, but we judge our-selves on effectiveness. It’s how our work works that makes the difference to us.” Diane Meier

“We don’t use storytelling only because it’s effective. We use it because stories are important.”Ben Goodwin

“The MEIER offices are a 19th Century response to 21st Century technology.”

Wendy GoodmanNew York Magazine

We don’t have titles and we don’t

have a B team.

Our first question to a client is rarely

“What’s your budget?” It’s almost always “Where do you want to be in five years?”

Alongside the more conventional goals (“more business” or “greater market-share”) we’ve received some answers from prospects that required deeper thought: “smarter.” “more flexible,” “more informed about our options,” “realistic about the way we’re seen by our customers,” “stronger exit potential,” and perhaps the answer we like the best – “We need greater perceived value.”

< Kalkin and Co. campaign by MEIER

• Conduct primary research and analyze secondary research

• Develop business and brand strategies

• Build brand identity systems

• Create advertising and collateral materials

• Design, build and write effective websites

• Manage PR campaigns, promotions and events

• Launch and coordinate innovative social media programs

• Determine and negotiate media

• Design packaging

• Produce video and film projects

• Write books, copy, white papers, and case histories

• Direct visual merchandising and retail, showroom, headquarters design

• Successful product, divisional or brand launches

• Increase in sales or market position

• Increased awareness among target audience

• Increased customer recognition or satisfaction

• Reversal of negative trends

• Stronger presence at sales or retail

• Initiation of smart strategic partnerships

• Category leadership

• Increased valuation toward investment or sale

Services: Effects:

It’s called integrated marketing.We’ve been doing it for thirty

years with clients from Chipwich to Neiman Marcus.

Continue to read some of ourspecific client stories...

You may recognize a few of our clients:

Neiman Marcus. Tekserve. Borden/Sunworthy. Chopard.

Esquire Magazine. Harry Winston. DeBeers. Orrefors. Kosta Boda.

Georg Jensen. Balducci’s. Honora. Kohler. Henri Bendel. Collier

Campbell. WilliWear/Willi Smith. Elizabeth Arden. Primak. House

Beautiful. The Rouse Corporation. Harbor Place & South Street

Seaport. Pierre Balmain. Angela Cummings. Limoges. The New

Yorker. Saks Fifth Avenue. Frank Delaney. Zezé Flowers. Primak.

Biba Cosmetics. Chipwich. Namur Chocolates. Wempe Jewelers.

Among many more...

Balducci’s was single-location retailer who had “owned” the category of Italian Gourmet

Food in NYC for more than sixty years. When an interloper with deep pockets and inter-

national fame was about to open his own Italian emporium, we got a call from Balducci’s.

Instead of trying to outspend the newcomer in local media, we created a line of brand-

ed products and a direct mail catalog, backed by major national advertising and PR, all

designed to increased demand far beyond their local New York reach. In all, we launched a

discrete and separate division that the family sold for just under one hundred million dol-

lars, while retaining their original location and their name.

And the punch line? The competitor, who thought his food store would run Balducci’s out

of town, didn’t last two years.

Q. How do you protect market dominance when a competitor enters your arena?

A. You change the game.

In the hands of an innovative husband and wife design and import team, Honora’s fresh-water Chinese pearls were creating a stir in a market dominated by Japanese cultured pearls.

We were called in by the founders who wanted a campaign as beautiful and unique as their products. A pearl’s glow is called luster, so we duplicated the soft, pale luster of a pearl on the flesh of our model. We didn’t allow her eyes to distract us from the beauty of the pearls, and we paid attention to the glow in the air around her skin. The result was an ad that looks like no other brand – except, of course, Honora.

Q. How do you change everything for a client without changing anything?

A. Do it better.

When do you listen to data?The Swedish crystal companies of Orrefors and Kosta Boda had been merged in a corporate blend, and the data suggested that two brands were one brand too many. The designers and artists of Orrefors and Kosta Boda disagreed.

Are aesthetics the same thing as positioning? Does an artist’s instinct make business sense? Would a blended brand make sense to consumers? It’s not our job to second-guess. It’s our job to fi nd out.

Our fi rst task was to determine why consumers bought crystal or luxury glass in the fi rst place. We found two distinct reasons: personal fulfi llment and commemorative gifts. In terms of consumer satisfaction, it became clear that these two gestures were diametrically opposed. Separating the two brands allowed us to meet both consumer needs with clarity.

Art isn’t commerce. But if it isn’t art, it’s not likely to be effective.We created a pair of powerful campaigns that heralded the two brands’ differences and strengths. In the process we created stronger sales programs, robust brand-led national and local co-op promotional campaigns, in-store signage, display, out-reach and events programs. We launched their Madison Avenue store and created their signage and packaging.

We won the ADDY for the best cam-paign of the year – and increased sales and profits for both brands.

Q. How do you protect your image when you share marketing dollars?

A. You respect your partners, but you speak in your own clear voice. Because of the promotional dollars attached to a licensing agreement with Martex, Collier Campell, the most celebrated textile-pat-tern designers in the UK, became known in America as a “maker of bed-sheets”.

We needed to allow them to speak in their own voice to further options for value and growth to new strategic partners. Most of all, and supporting the MEIER creed, the promotional work for Collier Campbell looked like no other textile imaging. Not then, not now and not ever.

Tekserve, the Chelsea-based Apple retailer and business solution provider, has been answering the

technical needs of New York’s creative community for more than twenty-fi ve years. Today, they face a

landscape where all things Mac are now available at a store called, well... Apple. Daunting.

What was their own ace in the hole? We knew that no one could match the peer-to-peer expertise, direction, skill and curation of Tekserve’s staff. The fact that Tekserve carries, promotes, and services the many great prod-ucts that amplify technology - explains why such a groundbreaking NYC tech community has gathered around its their iconic store front.

We’re helping them to shape their store from the ground up - from banners to signage; from window displays to in-store merchandising;

from website to trade-show booths; from Christmas cards to the merchandise mix.

This is fully integrated marketing - Business to Consumer, Busi-ness to Business: It’s all one Tekserve. If it’s brand positioning and

holistic marketing, it’s up our alley.

Q. How does New York City’s oldest Apple dealer stand out in the shadow of a world renowned brand?A. By celebrating their heroes.

BRING TECHNOLOGY HOME

Home, they say, is where the heart is. For a long time that heart did not have much to do with technology. Boy-oh-boy, are things changing! We saw people take to the iPhone, with its user-intuitive icons and touch-screen technology. Folks who didn’t know a megabyte from HTML found their way home on Google Maps. As iPads came to the table, customers asked for stands so they might follow a recipe.

The space between technology and lifestyle is closing fast, and it’s happening on the home front. We have adjustable hue and brightness lamps to blend with your computer screens for color-checking, but also to meet your moods. We have home and baby monitors to keep an eye on everything, even from afar. And yes, we do have stands for iPads – so you can follow Ina and her Basil Chicken. To grow your own basil, we have a rather brilliant plant monitor – think of it as a techno-green thumb. Expand the idea in a vertical farm with a smart but simple watering system. Think of it; technology has brought home something organic and green!

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Q. What do you do witha client who is alreadyat the top?

A. You secure their position across all points of impact.New York’s most important florist, Zeze, rose to the top with nary a logo, bag or program. In many ways, and for twenty years, their almost-secret location in an old carriage house near the East River worked for their status as artists who happened to work in flowers. A vendor only those in-the-know might know.

When their move to a large luxury space on a major avenue suggested the need for a more professional approach to the business of business, we came in to create their integrated program: logo and signage; bags, ribbon and tissue; all printed materials – including invi-tations and a beautiful system of hand-painted postcards; the opening launch party and on-going outreach.

Q. How do you sell dolls in the mass market?A. By remembering they’re a luxury item.Goldberger Dolls, nearing it’s 100th anniversary, came to us from a marketplace that had seen the demise of most of its independent toy-store customers and was now being squeezed to death by the large chains out of all profits. We knew that we had to act decisively and quickly to save the company.

We focused Goldberger on baby dolls – a category where there was little competition. We stressed the element of innovation in all design. We created a strong branded look through new packag-ing and the identifiable dressing and design of the dolls themselves with a high-end graphic system that tied the line together – understanding that regardless of price, a doll is a luxury item.

In the third year, we determined that the area of youngest infants was our strongest approach, and created Baby’s First, with a palette of proprietary branded patterns and colors that identi-fied boxes, dolls and accessories.

Goldberger, who faced closing its doors, is in vigorous business today and considering acquisi-tions to expand the Baby’s First brand.

Here are some pictures of the brand and products, including a look at the showroom we helped to create.

Blanc de Chine was the realization of a Hong Kong-based client’s lifelong dream to bring traditional Chinese cultural values to modern fashion and lifestyle. We are delighted to have been a part of the planning, the development, and the launch of the brand.

MEIER was involved from the original imagining of the line through the creation of the positioning and strategy of the brand. We managed the concept and presentation of the collection, the development of the Fifth Avenue store and, of course, the launch and promotion.

Our work tells our audience everything about the blend of Asian purity and chic style. We love everything about Blanc de Chine. Especially its voice.

Q: How do you launch a brand that’s so quiet it’spractically Zen?

A. You whisper.

Small product, small brand, small budget.

Big personality.MyCube, a smart fashion-colored safe with an internal electronics charger, is the first prod-uct in the launch of a brand that means to dominate personal security with style.

Like most launches, the budget was tight. To get across the idea of protecting valuables, we collected color-coordinated objects around different personalities. To show the link with savvy technology, we chose Wired Magazine and a launch in its holiday store. To illustrate the dynamic color and breadth of the line, we bought all four corners of a Wired spread. It’s a MEIER signature placement.

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Charges your devices as it keeps them safe.

M Y S A F E F O R M Y S T U F F

m y c u b e s a f e . c o m | @ m y c u b e s a f e

907 BroadwayNew York, NY212.460.5655meierbrand.com