Markenmeister

On a recent trip to the UK, I popped into Lidl just to see how much thinking global and acting local was going on out there in the chill cabinet.

It was a rather interesting mix with familiar German specialities such as Lebkuchen (it was October, after all) rubbing shoulders with Indian-style ready-meals (the closest you'd get to this in a German Lidl might be a chilled Currywurst.)

It looks as if Lidl has certainly claimed some of the UK's stomachs, if not their hearts.

So I wasn't surprised to see two German brands up in the 20 final contenders for The Marketing Society's Brand of the Year. This will finally be decided at their Annual Dinner on 18th November by text vote amongst the top five.

And the nominations from Germany are...Audi - not surprising as Vorsprung durch Technik is one of the few German phrases that most Brits know that isn't connected directly with the Second World War. And the other brand that is up for it couldn't be more German if it tried - Jägermeister.

But our old friend Leberkleister has been very cleverly marketed in the UK, via music festivals, playing on the "heavy metal" look of the brand. Jägermeister experienced 100% year-on-year growth in 2009 in the UK and should do well again this year.

Somehow I don't think this would have happened if they'd called it "Hunt Master."