MARIUTZA SRL

I have decided to be positive next week, today only a stating agent. I was lucky to take part and assist at the creation of brand and design industry in Romania.

My little share of madness told me i n ’94 that the majority traveled to Turkey to buy jeans, and I should do the same thing. All set, I began the job with a lot of seriousness, typical for a person from Ardeal, convinced that the results will speak for myself.

But it doesn’t seem important now to write the history of branding and design in Romania but to draw attention upon the “Mariutzele srl” that do not stop to show up in the industry. Pay attention to the inverted commas, because this is not a real industry, it is a niche zone of services, that 14 years after my business card that stated: brand and identity consultants” and 12 years after the re-launching one of the biggest Romanian brands, Ursus, is trembling and shaking.

We have professional, of course, serious people that put accent on” doing” not “ talking”. But “ Mariutza srl” becomes a phenomena and attacks our field. I confess I would have never thought that” boutiques” will invade us too. What seems weird is that it is enough to say branding and everyone becomes interested in the person who said the magic word.

Anyway, as the English say, the professionals mind their own business, and watch the actions and the results promoted by Mariutza srl. Please do not get me wrong, I do not criticize at all, but I strongly feel the need for the srl to get to the professional league or quit, in order to raise the level of results in the industry and permanently determine an arrangement of our clients’ perceptions on the high quality services we provide.

Our clients are the most important people in the world and that is why a permanent lobby is needed and long time delivered results to prove our usefulness 100 %. To be realistic, we talk about an industry of more than 2 million euros. Small, reported to the number of inhabitants, number of companies and brands, pib. We talk about sustainable business real profit share of 25%.

As long as an entire” branch” does not behave in a professional manner, the doubts will continue to hang, with repercussions for each individual. The best example is Romania who has to suffer due to negative singular examples. The longed for country brand, if it existed, would have diminished the negative impact. But it seems we still have to wait, learning and collecting. If from the amount of green branches would result a tree, it seems that from 3 dry branches results a sick tree, at least at perception level. Abstract, but I am sure understandable.

Some time ago, I was answering to a distinguished journalists’ question why brand consultants and designers are and what they do. Besides definitions I have mentioned that we are the ones who go with society wave and sometimes get ahead of it when we intuit the direction.

If you want, we are the ones that must feel the pulse permanently in order to deliver expected and proper results , with vision toward future. And I refuse to think that the present belongs to Mariutza, good and talkative housewife that promotes her pickles and the only choice norms of the pickles remains the level of decibels and frequency of visits paid to the neighbors, not the quality, the taste, the aspect and long time preservation.

Branding, at global level, has become one of the most important differentiation tools and generators of financial value. Great brands are built strategically taking into consideration all influential factors, financial forecasts. Design is the result of those strategies and the weapon of strategic-designers and not the star-designers or junior art-directors recently graduates, that have spent a few years in advertising agencies and recycled in personal brand flavor designers.

“ Hey, is this a pro branding manifesto?” most of you might ask. Yes and no, it is another drop in the bucket in order to fill it, in our actual and future clients’ benefit, and our personal benefit, of consultants and designers.

Nota bene: “ Mariutza srl” is a common species you can find everywhere and who develops unexpectedly well taking advantage of environmental conditions.