What A Brand Feels Like
And why I've never liked the "favorite campaign" question
Most of us think we know what a brand is. After all, we recognize logos even when they’re far away and blurry. We can name a jingle after a few beats or picture a cereal box from childhood. But a brand is more than something visual or aural; it’s a feeling that lies somewhere deep in your chest.
At its most personal, a brand feels like flipping a bottle of Heinz upside down, striking the logo with your palm, and trusting that the sweet, salty tang will hit your fries exactly the way you want it. It’s being five and holding a My Little Pony, inhaling its powdery plastic scent, and believing fully in glitter and unicorns and possibility. It’s walking into Nordstrom in the ’90s at thirteen and feeling like you’ve stepped into something elevated, the perfume associate offering a spritz, and in that moment, you’re not a kid; you’re a grown-up.
When creating a brand, you’re deciding if the banner’s hue signals cool. You’re wondering whether a semicolon is what’s needed for someone to absorb a thought. You’re paying attention to whether someone steps into your website to meander. And if they don’t, you ask yourself what else you can do, so the next time they stay.
Building one draws on instinct and good taste as much as analysis. It requires really knowing people and understanding the references they share and the fantasies they escape to. It’s translating that understanding into hundreds of tiny decisions.
Years ago, I interviewed for a brand manager role at Heinz. This was before video calls, when all you had was a voice.
After the standard introductions and a walk-through of my résumé, she said, “I’m obsessed with campaigns. What’s your favorite?”
Sigh. I always hated that question.
My mind went back to my ad agency days, and a Super Bowl campaign: the secret code name for its pitch, the dinners and drinks, the forced late-night hangs, the execs posturing during budget discussions, scripts read over and over. The requests to make the brand’s icon bigger and deciding the optimal moment—before or after the half-time show—to run the spot. The debates about which celebrity would do the voiceover, and whose idea would make it to the client.
I remember we chose Robert Duvall.
But when the ad finally aired, I felt nothing. Even though it was one of the most expensive campaigns the company had ever produced.
Other images flashed by. A stylist I followed on Instagram whose photos alone made me feel freer. A man stepping onto a subway platform in a tutu, twirling and smiling at strangers, reminding me to be fearless. The Zabar barista who spelled my name correctly, and how that simple detail kept me coming back.
“Hello? You there?” she asked.
“Yup, I’m here,” I said, staring at the wall, searching for words. There were plenty of them, but none that seemed to fit what she was asking for.
What I wanted to say was that it wasn’t about campaigns; it was about the small, specific moments with a brand that made me feel something. It was the textured ridges of pressed, handmade cardstock that made me feel loved. A subway sign that made me want to yell, “fuck yeah!” A video that made me sputter with laughter. Feelings that were built from thousands of decisions woven together, both deliberate and true.
BeMinded Studio, a creative marketing studio supporting those who do good.