The most common question i get asked is, what next? After Letters to a Stranger, what's next? What's the big follow up? what's your next movie?
Have no idea how to answer that one. Wish I did but I don't. Why not? Dunno, guess am just waiting for the chips to fall where they may
Odd huh? For someone who yells Be proactive! Don't react, don't wait for something to happen, MAKE it happen.
Guess after a while you learn that there are certain things that you control and others that are out of your hands
Am watching Heroes as this. After seeing Ugly Betty season 2. What would I really love to do? Create my own TV show. My own great great TV show
One that'll be so massive that people will happily wear the T-shirt while millions will download the screen savers. And after season one? I'll get a million emails asking for the premiere date for season 2.
That's what I want right now. That's the dream. It might not be what I get. But it's what am aiming at. Will I get it? Who knows right?
Hey, what are YOU aiming at?
Victor Sanchez Aghahowa
Monday, April 21, 2008
Sunday, April 20, 2008
Once Again!
hello people! long time no see, by the way look at the comments on the last post. nigerians i hail o! once the topic is food we must show ourself! lol! but i appreciate all those who take the time to read this blog. and now for the news highlights. where have i been and what have i been up to? working working working...the same old same...what have YOU been up to? since i last posted up here i have said goodbye to the apprentice Africa. hello to another project, a soap opera by the way, details later...just popping in to say Hello!!!
Oh and by the way, have you ever gotten like REALLY depressed over stuff you think you should be doing as opposed to the normal yet everybody else thinks its great life that you have now?
Just asking...
Oh and by the way, have you ever gotten like REALLY depressed over stuff you think you should be doing as opposed to the normal yet everybody else thinks its great life that you have now?
Just asking...
Wednesday, April 2, 2008
EATERIES, MARGARET THATCHER AND AGEGE BREAD...
Today I am writing on a topic that most people will find decidedly odd,
Agege bread.
Makes no sense? Well at least not yet. For those of you who have never been to Lagos State and have never tasted this delicacy, I offer my condolences.
It is a very normal looking brick-shaped [as most of our local bread is shaped] of bread with a fan base numbering in tens [if not hundreds] of thousands and a taste that’s not only addictive but so rich that you just KNOW that it has to be bad for you [Indeed I heard about a year ago there was a big hullabaloo by health officials who said research had shown that it IS harmful, potassium bromate et al]
But why am I telling you about it? Why should you care? This began as a random thought – on marketing and a simple question
Why do loaves of bread have labels?
As to the larger size ‘family’ loaves I can think of a few reasons. Since they are usually whole family meals/breakfasts, there is a chance of brand loyalty – where a family can adopt one brand and stay with it [more out of convenience than loyalty really]
Also when traveling or intra-city commuting and a sweaty roadside hawker thrusts a loaf in your face unasked, [he must have a 6th sense that tells him you’re hungry] you can take a look at the label and in a haughty tone tell him that you don’t buy this brand – then sweeping a fast eye over the rest of his wares, you note a brand he doesn’t have and then loudly ask if he has that brand, and that it is the only one that you buy.
You see, that way you can turn him down, hide the fact that you’re broke and appear to have high taste in pastry all at the same time.
I’m not talking about the family loaves. I’m talking about those generic 30 naira bricks [and some, if not most, of them are as hard as bricks]
I decided to investigate. 100% of all respondents I interviewed said the same thing. Nobody reads those damn labels
So I took the questions to the bakers and the retailers. Answer = The labels are there to inspire loyalty between retailers and bakers. Does it work?
HA!
What’d did they expect? That we would all clamor for our favorite breakfast sawdust brick? And that the retailers who had to throw away a third of their stock daily would stay with them long enough to build a bond of any kind? Retailers tend to switch bakeries on the average of every three weeks.
And then there’s Agege bread. A veritable institution. A few days after I ingested my first loaf I was a hopeless addict. I mean it’s been discussed on NTA network shows. I have heard at least two songs ENTIRELY dedicated to its virtues AND seen an accompanying video on network TV. I’ve witnessed foreign exotic vehicles stop by the road side to buy the Big Powerful Oga in the back seat his daily fix...
Here’s a fun fact,
Agege bread has no label.
The point? You should have reached it by now. All the pizzazz, glamour and packaging in the world won’t build a brand for or save a product that is of low quality, no remarkability and has no value to offer
Forget the wrapping and trying to create perception. CREATE VALUE!
Yes sometimes value and pizzazz do go hand and hand, but sometimes value alone is enough...
That’s how institutions are born.
Let me tell you how NOT to build an institution. Go to the famous Allen Avenue, Ikeja Lagos State. Whirl around with your eyes closed and point to any building. There’s an 80/20 chance that you’re pointing at an eatery or clothing store.
Eatery 80%, Clothing store 20%
Doing what worked for ‘that guy’, or following an industry ‘standard’ is the worst thing that you can do. At best you simply become an unofficial brand extension of the pioneer.
Look at it this way; True or False all the eatery’s you’ve ever been in are all clones of each other?
See how ripe that market is for someone who is ‘label-less’ but with a menu that actually tastes like it’s worth the prices these clones charge? True, these eateries make money but in doing so they leave the REALLY big money right there on the table for some unknown to pick it up and walk away with it [basically what Bill Gates and Microsoft did to IBM and the ‘giants’ of their time, and Wal*Mart did to Sears and Co.]
If you REALLY want to talk cloning I have two words only to personify the ENTIRE trend.
Pure. Water.
Enough said.
So you have two choices. Spend a lot of money dressing up a monkey and try to pass him off as a woman, or dress up a teenager girl to pass for a grown woman...
Only one of them has a chance to really ever become one
And like Margaret Thatcher once famously said “Being a Leader is like being a Woman; if you have to tell people that you are, then you are definitely not one...”
Victor Sanchez Aghahowa
Agege bread.
Makes no sense? Well at least not yet. For those of you who have never been to Lagos State and have never tasted this delicacy, I offer my condolences.
It is a very normal looking brick-shaped [as most of our local bread is shaped] of bread with a fan base numbering in tens [if not hundreds] of thousands and a taste that’s not only addictive but so rich that you just KNOW that it has to be bad for you [Indeed I heard about a year ago there was a big hullabaloo by health officials who said research had shown that it IS harmful, potassium bromate et al]
But why am I telling you about it? Why should you care? This began as a random thought – on marketing and a simple question
Why do loaves of bread have labels?
As to the larger size ‘family’ loaves I can think of a few reasons. Since they are usually whole family meals/breakfasts, there is a chance of brand loyalty – where a family can adopt one brand and stay with it [more out of convenience than loyalty really]
Also when traveling or intra-city commuting and a sweaty roadside hawker thrusts a loaf in your face unasked, [he must have a 6th sense that tells him you’re hungry] you can take a look at the label and in a haughty tone tell him that you don’t buy this brand – then sweeping a fast eye over the rest of his wares, you note a brand he doesn’t have and then loudly ask if he has that brand, and that it is the only one that you buy.
You see, that way you can turn him down, hide the fact that you’re broke and appear to have high taste in pastry all at the same time.
I’m not talking about the family loaves. I’m talking about those generic 30 naira bricks [and some, if not most, of them are as hard as bricks]
I decided to investigate. 100% of all respondents I interviewed said the same thing. Nobody reads those damn labels
So I took the questions to the bakers and the retailers. Answer = The labels are there to inspire loyalty between retailers and bakers. Does it work?
HA!
What’d did they expect? That we would all clamor for our favorite breakfast sawdust brick? And that the retailers who had to throw away a third of their stock daily would stay with them long enough to build a bond of any kind? Retailers tend to switch bakeries on the average of every three weeks.
And then there’s Agege bread. A veritable institution. A few days after I ingested my first loaf I was a hopeless addict. I mean it’s been discussed on NTA network shows. I have heard at least two songs ENTIRELY dedicated to its virtues AND seen an accompanying video on network TV. I’ve witnessed foreign exotic vehicles stop by the road side to buy the Big Powerful Oga in the back seat his daily fix...
Here’s a fun fact,
Agege bread has no label.
The point? You should have reached it by now. All the pizzazz, glamour and packaging in the world won’t build a brand for or save a product that is of low quality, no remarkability and has no value to offer
Forget the wrapping and trying to create perception. CREATE VALUE!
Yes sometimes value and pizzazz do go hand and hand, but sometimes value alone is enough...
That’s how institutions are born.
Let me tell you how NOT to build an institution. Go to the famous Allen Avenue, Ikeja Lagos State. Whirl around with your eyes closed and point to any building. There’s an 80/20 chance that you’re pointing at an eatery or clothing store.
Eatery 80%, Clothing store 20%
Doing what worked for ‘that guy’, or following an industry ‘standard’ is the worst thing that you can do. At best you simply become an unofficial brand extension of the pioneer.
Look at it this way; True or False all the eatery’s you’ve ever been in are all clones of each other?
See how ripe that market is for someone who is ‘label-less’ but with a menu that actually tastes like it’s worth the prices these clones charge? True, these eateries make money but in doing so they leave the REALLY big money right there on the table for some unknown to pick it up and walk away with it [basically what Bill Gates and Microsoft did to IBM and the ‘giants’ of their time, and Wal*Mart did to Sears and Co.]
If you REALLY want to talk cloning I have two words only to personify the ENTIRE trend.
Pure. Water.
Enough said.
So you have two choices. Spend a lot of money dressing up a monkey and try to pass him off as a woman, or dress up a teenager girl to pass for a grown woman...
Only one of them has a chance to really ever become one
And like Margaret Thatcher once famously said “Being a Leader is like being a Woman; if you have to tell people that you are, then you are definitely not one...”
Victor Sanchez Aghahowa
The Last Day
Hey people! Been gone for a minute, but now am back! Today is the last day I shoot the boardroom at Apprentice Africa - I am not saying I was the best AP on the show, but I really think I had the best crew
For all those who worked on the boardroom shoot, I cannot thank you enough. You guys are the greatest!!!
Watch the show people! It's great!!!
On a more personal note, there are a lot of people that I met on this show that I will NEVER forget, for good or for otherwise. More of the former thankfully...
There are certain faces that I will miss the excuse to see everyday - to all of those people (and those 'persons') I will miss you SEVERELY...
Today's shoot is going to bittersweet for me, but ah well, the show must go on - 8 minutes to go. Have to go check on my crew - one last time
Lights, camera - ACTION!!!
Victor Sanchez Aghahowa
For all those who worked on the boardroom shoot, I cannot thank you enough. You guys are the greatest!!!
Watch the show people! It's great!!!
On a more personal note, there are a lot of people that I met on this show that I will NEVER forget, for good or for otherwise. More of the former thankfully...
There are certain faces that I will miss the excuse to see everyday - to all of those people (and those 'persons') I will miss you SEVERELY...
Today's shoot is going to bittersweet for me, but ah well, the show must go on - 8 minutes to go. Have to go check on my crew - one last time
Lights, camera - ACTION!!!
Victor Sanchez Aghahowa
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)