Branding for life makes its mark

But he’s no drinks salesman or modern-day Hans Christian Andersen.

He’s the driving force behind The Edinburgh Consultancy, which, although a tiny company, is one of the flag-bearers in the global "experiential" marketing sector.

The aim of such marketing is to take brand consumers and turn them into brand ambassadors by inviting them to deepen their relationship by tapping into the story and cementing their emotional values with the brand.

"Companies spent the 20th century managing efficiencies. They must spend the 21st century managing experiences," says Mr Buxton.

"The ultimate expression of loyalty to a brand is seen in people like those who buy Harley Davidson motorbikes then get the motif tattooed on their arm," says Mr Buxton.

"They bought a bike, but they’ve got such intense and passionate feelings about the bike and bought into the story behind it to such an extent that they have become brand ambassadors effectively. It’s amazing."

Mr Buxton insists he’s not advocating tattooing as a sales pitch. But in a world where brands are the spirit of the age, he believes that companies that invest in the brand experience and build on distinctiveness can gain an edge in the battle to win not just the cash of consumers, but their hearts and minds as well.

Companies including Coca-Cola, Volkswagen, Ford, Dewar’s and Bacardi are all in the vanguard of experiential marketing.

The Edinburgh Consultancy has recently been involved in the creation of experiential visitor centres for Dewar’s World of Whisky and rum giant Bacardi’s Casa Bacardi on the Caribbean island of Puerto Rico - financially, the group’s biggest project to date.

The group is also hoping to reap more from previous business it has done with Coca-Cola - arguably the world’s leading brand.

As Mr Buxton explains, the key to the brand experience is substance.

"It can’t be anything superficial," he says. "It must have depth, and that’s often expressed in the history and heritage of the brand."

And the stature and quality of the brand is also an obvious factor. "If you look at the car market, you could probably do a lot more with the Jaguar brand than, say, Daewoo, as it’s got a much more interesting story behind it in many ways."

What experiential visitor centres do, says Mr Buxton, is open people up to the underlying story of the brand.

Like any emerging sector, it’s difficult to assess the market. But if judged by the number of projects undertaken by companies such as Ford, Bacardi and Guinness "it’s in the hundreds of millions of dollars a year", Mr Buxton estimates.

He says: "The market’s growing and the project sizes are growing. Coca-Cola is going to completely redevelop its visitor centre in Atlanta at a cost of at least $50 million (30m).

"Ford is also looking to spend into the low hundreds [of millions of dollars].

"They don’t have to be big projects, just scaled to the appropriate market. Dewar’s only spent 2.5m on its World of Whisky centre."

Spending relatively modest sums on a permanent yet developable attraction such as World of Whisky compares very favourably in Mr Buxton’s book with the 1m or more it will take to knock out a TV commercial.

"And that’s dead within a year. Once people have seen it, it’s time to bang out another one," he offers.

"Each advertising medium is different, but the visitor centre experience is different because people tend to connect more with it - many are even willing to queue at the door to get in.

"The visitor centre space is about seducing and romancing people because they have been willing to enter into a relationship with you."

Mr Buxton says visitor centres are marrying technology and iconography in the quest for memorable visitor experience.

He says: "We obviously take some of the exhibition techniques of museums, but ultimately we have to remember we’re trying to help sell a product."

Mr Buxton - who last month was part of the advisory council for EXP3, the first global conference in Philadelphia for the experiential sector - describes the Edinburgh Consultancy, which has just six staff, as "a niche player" in the "growing global sector" of experiential marketing.

Competition comes in the shape of a couple of "good and bigger players in London, a couple of companies in Europe and a bunch in America". With much of its work in that particular sector effectively exported, one of the firm’s aims is to do more business in the field in Scotland.

Last year was the firm’s best with turnover in "six figures" and profits reinvested in the business.

Financially, experiential marketing is the biggest part of the Edinburgh Consultancy’s business, but the more routine consultancy and marketing demands of smaller private firms and public sector agencies and exhibition staging are key staples in helping keep the books healthy.

The company, launched in 1991, was involved at the early planning and fundraising stages for the Scottish Seabird Centre at North Berwick and has recently been involved in devising a development strategy for Rosslyn Chapel.

Mr Buxton says: "The problem with Rosslyn Chapel is that it now has about as many visitors as it can cope with. If it gets any more people it will take on the Venice backpacker syndrome, where too many people start to spoil the experience.

"We’ve just finished looking at how to develop the visitor experience without damaging the historic fabric and sense of atmosphere of the place."

The current global economic situation is "a little tough", says Mr Buxton. But he’s hopeful that the company can still improve its income this year.

"There’s not the same amount of money floating about, particularly in the US. There will probably be some knock-on effect on us but it’s too soon to know what that might be."

Still, Mr Buxton doesn’t envisage a "huge" company. "It’s not what we’re interested in," he says. "It will become as big as clients and work need it to become, rather than growth for its own sake."

However, "five years from now with a fair wind behind us, I think we’ll have doubled our size, have a wider spread of projects and hopefully be bringing some of this international expertise back home to be applied to projects here", he says.

Diehard Hibs fan Mr Buxton was "so devastated" with the way ex-manager Franck Sauzee, the former French international player, was sacked from his post with the Leith club after just 69 days that he arranged a collection, raising thousands of pounds to buy a parting gift for him. But that’s another story.

Niche work if you can get it in growing industry

THE Edinburgh Consultancy was launched in 1991 after Ian Buxton, a former marketing director with Glenmorangie, stopped seeing eye to eye with his boss.

It had been a desire to run his own business, so he left and set up one specialising in the international brand development.

"The town wasn’t big enough for both of us, as they say," he explains. "He was the boss and he clearly had no intention of going."

While some may see that as unfortunate, Mr Buxton saw it as the trigger for his new project. "For the previous few years, I’d had a yen to get away from the big corporate sector where I was controlling and parcelling out work to other agencies and felt it would be more interesting doing the work myself."

He adds: "I had spent most of my career in blue chip marketing - I also worked with [brewers] Bass and Whitbread - and had enough of corporate politics. It was going to happen anyway, this just made it easier."

As well as consultancy work, the firm is also involved in exhibitions and has developed as a major player in the niche, but growing area, of "experiential" visitor centres.

Mr Buxton sees the strong mix of skills among the firm’s six-strong workforce, including blue chip marketing, heritage marketing, experiential design of interiors, graphic design and architectural qualifications, has helped the firm carve its place in a growing industry.

Among the names the firm has carried out work for are Bacardi, Coca-Cola, the Scotch Whisky Heritage Centre, VisitScotland, Dewar’s, Scottish Enterprise Edinburgh & Lothian, The Whale & Dolphin Conservation Society, and Rosslyn Chapel Trust.