As the parent of an 8 year old, I get to go to Friendly’s Ice Cream on a pretty regular basis. This is an establishment I grew up with. I even tried to work there as a teen, but wouldn’t do the haircut! I have observed their troubles for many years. For the longest time, their advertising and offerings were unfocused and unappealing. Lately, they seemed to have picked up a lot of momentum. Just yesterday my family stopped in for a late lunch and there was a wait! I have commented to my wife about their fun new themes, focus on kids and young parents (this chain has always been very popular with seniors). Friendly’s is working with Zimmerman Advertising. Seems this group has done a great job of re-branding the company on television, all the way through point of purchase, web and social networking. I did search on twitter pulled up hundreds of messages about Friendly’s. That’s not a coincidence.  Friendly’s gave away more than half a million scoops of ice cream during a promotion on June 6. (200,000 more than the previous year). Friendly’s attributed the increase to “blog coverage and the company’s social media presence.”

If your marketing is still doing things the old way, maybe you need new people working on it? If your brand is getting stale, why not mix things up? As this old chain has learned, it can be done!