If you were a cheese

Here's a little exercise that I like to run with clients. You will find it useful in thinking about the qualities of your brand and where your business sits in relation to it's competitors such as on price.

If your business were a type of cheese which would it be?

Is it one everyone loves, or a specialty flavour?

Soft and creamy? Sharp vintage? Pre-sliced? Cheese Stringers?

Who made it or where can you get it? Is it from the bargain basement, the fancy deli in town, or a mountain hermit named Sam at the top of an 8 hour hike?

Be as creative as you like, I'll not be scoring it! But justify your answers. The more elaborate you get with this more you'll get out of it.

Don't like cheese? Choose something you can relate to and consider how it represents you.

"It has to be BMW"

I once had a client who is a business mentor tell me his brand was, "A motorbike, because for the most part, business leaders have to navigate the terrain on their own and you can't sit back and relax. Not a Harley Davidson (their marketing is great but they're no longer authentic), obviously not a postie bike or Vesper, it has to be a BMW adventure bike. The best of German engineering for top performance on-road and when things get rough. The power you need. 100% dependable. Integrity. Promises a feeling of freedom of the kind you get when you achieve financial freedom".

Nice answer!

If Studio Outside were a cheese

Either a soft blue or a chevre goats. These are specialty cheeses, people either love them or don't. Soft so you can spread them on a cracker or piece of sourdough bread. Artisan-made at a small salt-of-the-earth type of cheese maker steeped in tradition (but up with the latest technology!) and with a passionate set of followers. You get what you pay for, this is cheese for moments that matter.