Youtube link

https://youtu.be/eEzKcphch3c

PPD

I am happy with my concept of my Brand extension. I think that having a leather jacket collection for Dr Martens really works and would be incredibly successful. Although, I do regret only having it as a pop-up store, I think if I could do it again, I would place the leather jacket collection in a few major shops over the UK such as Glasgow, London and Cardiff.

Overall, I have loved but also disliked this project at the same time. I really enjoyed the branding and marketing part of this project, also the promotional video, as it was completely up my street, I have previously done media in sixth form and knew I would enjoy planning and creating this. I honestly feel that the promotional video was probably my best work within the project. My worst, on the other hand was finance and management. I really struggled to find suppliers and the whole concept confused me a lot. Also, I felt that, in marketing you do not often have to deal with all the finance.

Also, after being unwell again with my illness, I found it very difficult to get work done as fast and as practically as I had hoped, and feel I should of questioned things more rather than trying to understand it by myself, which made me feel more un well because I had stressed myself out. Also, I have always had a very bad problem with being aware of how much time I have to do the work, which makes me struggle even more.

I have realized that I am capable of doing a marketing plan but when it comes to business plans I struggle increasingly more on all the other aspects of it.

My blog turned out ok I thought, as I feel I explained my thought process well towards the start for example the planning and research into my brand extension idea. I feel as it got towards the end I was saying less as I was trying to focus more on the report, and so I was struggling to explain my creative thought process as much.

I also enjoyed being on photoshop, designing the logo for the new Dr Marten collection. I felt that in this particular project, I excelled in creative work. The logo was one of the best things I created, as it matched well with the collection and the culture of Dr Martens, they are so well known for being simple yet so British, and the logo really showed that.

Week 6

I am getting nearer to the deadline, and the video is almost all done! And in my report it is mostly the main marketing communications section that I must finalize. I am so happy with my video, in the end I changed the music to a song named “Close to me” by the cure.

I believe that this was the best option for me, as they also wear Dr Martens, and are known in recent history, but for my video, which is A young women walking around east London, did not quite fit well with The Who, The Jam or even the clash! I found this song to be very feminine and just right for the footage that I had produced!

As my location is based at Box park, I had a long thing about where I would want the launch event to actually be. Having it just in the room that is rented out would not be enough, and so I researched about other box park events as well as what Doc Martens have previously done at events in store, and what I found was quite interesting, also they have put on shows which relate to the shoe brand. 

Which has inspired me for the launch event held at BOXPARK. As well as this, which they are currently doing worlwide around different shops :

In store events have been popular within Dr Martens. They do it a lot to market their shops, as it is a brand that is targeted at younger people therefore they enjoy this type of thing. Also, 20% off in store is a huge discount. Although, I will not be doing this on launch evening. 

Week 5

I began shooting this week, which went great although I did not get all of the footage I wanted which I will do tomorrow (Saturday) to get about half more of the footage. I have found I need a lot more footage for what I wanted to do for my fashion film as the constant changing of backgrounds around East London.
Here is Amy styled how I thought was right for Dr Martens, along with the Leather Jacket that has no specific designer (It was found in a thrift shop and I feel has a very vintage feel to it, just as I imagined) Along with wearing the Doc Marten boots.

And here is the Tartan skirt that I believed was very Grunge and British, perfect to style a long with the jacket. 

Here, you can see a brief screen shot from my promotional video. This is one of many, of her exactly in the middle of the screen, walking towards the lense. I am getting a lot of enjoyment out of editing, although finding it difficult to get exactly the right timing with where each screen changes as to where she is, making sure she is walking in to the same spot and not going too far forward or back!

During filming, it was very difficult to also get the right angle, making sure she was centred correctly so it flowed, as well as the lighting (although this could be changed on Final cut Pro).

Week 4

This week I have been mainly focusing on my actual report for my brand extension for Dr. Martens.
Thinking about competitors was a difficult task, because there is not many brands in the UK market where their USP is leather and focus on leather jackets. So, therefore I did some market research on this.
This first and main competitor that stuck out for me the most, was ALLSAINTS. This is because the brand is commonly known for their quality, leather jackets that do well internationally, and also being rich in British, heritage similar to Dr Martens, which is also closely related with Music, mostly british but stemming all around the world also. Many A list stars wear the Allsaints leather jackets, therefore I feel that Dr Martens will be hugely competing with this brand. Although, both brands are similar and different target markets. Allsaints are a bit more premium, and do not target youth culture as much as Docs.

Another brand I found to be a huge competitor in terms of leather jackets was Muubaa, specialising in leather jackets which I had not heard of before. So I plan to do some more research in, other brands I found that sold leather jackets a lot in shops such as Zara, on ASOS, Topman, Topshop etc.

One thing I found summed up my inspiration was the picture below:

I believe this because, you can clearly see the Dr Martens all upon the bands feet. And they are ALL wearing leather jackets, and are all a seriously iconic, punk band that formed in 1976 (The Clash), highly associated with Dr Martens. They were also seen as style icons which really helped with Dr martens success, as all of the bands fans wanted to dress just like them, therefore buying docs.

I also, saw a video on youtube in research for my Fashion film next week. I know I already included the music, but on this occasion it is what I would like my video to look similar to BUT around east London, setting location, as BOXPARK where I have decided where my store will be for the year is. The reason why I chose boxpark is I believe the right target audience shops around shoreditch, and I know Dr Martens are trying to reach out to other areas than Camden, which where they are highly associated with, because recently they did a pop up at Spitafields for just the shoes, which is just around the corner from BOXPARK.
Here is the link I saw of a man traveling the world, as he walks towards the camera screen, the background changes as to different places where he is been. I wanted to do this, but for London, on an average girls day out in London, walking around. Including walking by the canal, spitafields market, walking down an old street! All things she will do, whilst modeling the jacket.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aGBZny5dmkg

Week 3

This week, I decided to look into what I felt I wanted to do for my 30 second film. Obviously, I had a brief idea about what I wanted to include in my video, for exmaple, I really wanted the heritage to stay in the video like Doc Martens have done previously in their fashion films, infact that is often their main focus, reliving what goes into the brand.
For example their video called"A history of standing for something"

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Dkv1UVKF608

In this video you can see, what Dr martens have stood for, involving who has wore the shoes in the past; like the working class man, and then going on to show their past in music, and in other youth cultures "We stand for the reckless youth". Then going on to say "We stand for being British". Differently' from there, it goes through a computer to china, displaying a girl over wecam showing off the boot then the next caption on screen is Chinese. Which suggests the brand are saying, yes we are British but everyone with their own individual style, internationally, should show that through our boots. Ending caption being, "I stand for being individual" Which I personally thinks defines the brand. Throughout this short film, the different boot and shoe, is shown throughout the times and what it has developed in to now, to also demonstrate that not a lot has actually changed in their style.
In my video, I plan to use London to set the scene, they may not have been born there, but it is the capital city of where they were born, also, in terms of Docs becoming fashionable, it always started in London. So when it went from the factory to the music scene, it was a London Gig where Pete Townshend was seen wearing the boots, and this is where the MOD craze started. Most British fashion, stemmed from London. So I feel this is a good place to start, by using London's Mis En Scene, to demonstrate the heritage of the brand. The leather jackets may be a new collection to the brand, but what I want to demonstrate is that they still have the heritage of the brand.

In terms of audio, I look into this a lot more. I explored many different british bands that have been associated with Doc Martens such as, The clash, The Jam and The Who.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NCl25RJQPbA

"A Bomb on Wardour street" By the Jam, A very british band, associated with punks/mods, infact in this song towards the end, they say about Doc martens in their song. I thought it was quite a catchy song and possible a potential for the kind of song I was going for.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qN5zw04WxCc
"My Generation" The Who. Another song, that I have found to be greatly suited to what I was going for. The who are the band that actually bought Dr Martens on to the music scene.

These are just a couple of examples of audio which I have being doing research in, but I believe the audio is incredibly important to the fashion film, to set the vibe you want the viewer to feel when watching!

Week 2

This week, I designed a new logo for my brand extension which is a Jacket collection within Dr Martens. I considered using the logo below (their original logo):

But, as you can see, this logo gives off the image of their boot, as well as having "With bouncing soles" which promotes their footwear more than anything. Therefore, I decided I wanted a completely knew logo, with similar font to the original logo, but instead of focusing on the shoes, focusing on the brand in general.
First off, I had the right font i got from myfonts.com under the name of "Ryno slab". Which was very similar to the Dr Martens font yet I felt it was more modern. After I found the font, I decided I wanted to reinforce that the brand is very British and proud of this. They have always took much pride in being the footwear of various, British subcultures throughout the past, such as Skinheads, punks, two tone and more. Over time they have developed a community through youth culture, so I felt that the whole idea of the brand being proud of its heritage, and all the leather used is "Made in England" I decided using the British flag somewhere in the logo was very important to me. At first, I considered filling some of the letters with a British flag, similar to what you can see below:

But, after different testing within photoshop, I found it was too much and did not suit the style I was going for, which is very simple but classic and cool, similar to most of Dr Martens designs since they started. As the boots were designed for comfort and practicalness in the factories. Therefore, I decided on cropping part of this vintage british flag:

I cropped the picture, where you could particularly see that it was the british flag as an underline for the logo. My final logo looked like this:

I think this logo is perfectly suited to Dr. Martens and my jacket collection, as I feel it is more modern but still, the public will be able to identify the iconic text Dr Martens usually use, as well as embracing the fact that it is a British brand. 

I also decided that the jackets in my collection will be focused around cowhide leather (the leather used to make Dr Martens) and also Vegan leather. As Dr Martens have recently launched vegan leather shoes, which have been popular, as it is accommodating other customers that may have different beliefs. Leather jackets were a huge part of youth culture, as well as being a constant garment that bands have worn, whilst wearing Dr Martens, they often come as a pair. I believe that Dr martens USP is their good, quality leather used for their shoes, so having leather jackets that are as good of quality as the shoes should attract many customers.   

Introduction to the Individual Major Project

After a lot of thought into what I am going to do for my IMP, I have chosen to do a Brand extension on the label Dr Martens. Below is a mood board showing different aspects of Dr Martens, including their iconic footwear, which they are known internationally for.

Firstly, I believe that this brand is right for me to do the project on due to being hugely fond of their shoes for a long period of time which is there USP, as well as being rich in British heritage. As well as footwear, they also have a clothing collection which they are not very popular for therefore only bringing in a small portion of their sales, other products that they have recently excelled in, is their leather bags.

After some thought, I decided I wanted to do a range of jackets for the brand, because Jackets were a very common thing back in the 1960's when Youth culture was very much alive, and Dr Martens in the past have never focused on different clothing ranges within their brand.

Here is a brief mindmap of different jackets types that fit within the brand.