Intentional | Audio Identity Blog

Well, there you have it. As much as I promised myself I’d stay away from writing about today’s Apple coverage — there’s more than enough coverage out there besides this li’l blog — I just can’t help it. Here’s why:

Today a computer company and a coffee company agreed on a deal sell music together. Or, put another way, two significant lifestyle brands extended their reach beyond their core businesses to provide more of what people want, in the easiest possible delivery system.

Under the new deal, wi-fi enabled iPods will sense when a Starbucks is in range, and provide instant access to that store’s playlist via the iTunes music store. Like that Feist with your latte? It’s yours now — but it at the counter or download instantly with just a few clicks.

Personally, I don’t think this particular deal is incredible, nor do I think this will affect my life in any significant way. (I’m a tad more hyped about the “low-tech” 80g iPod classique.) But this isn’t about me — what this signals from a branding perspective is interesting when you peel back the onion.

I mention the “computer company” and “coffee company” because most of us have a very hard time envisioning our brands being successful at something so far away from primary core offerings. IBM is still in the PC business, McDonald’s is still about food (for the most part) and AT&T is (still) in the telco business. For the little computer company from Cupertino and the original Pike’s Place Market Starbucks coffeeshop to be where they are today takes a visionary understanding and management of one’s brand and its trajectory and an ultra-keen sense of our relationship with music and sound…we’re people with ears and money to burn.

Oh, and it takes a boatload of cahones to pull it all off as successfully as these brands have. Kudos to them for seeing what others don’t see, and for building what others can’t or don’t. Reminds me of a little commercial we scored for Apple a while back. You may know it:

Enough with the hyperbole. Next question for another time: what on God’s green earth is holding Apple up from offering contactless payments via iPhone? You buy your coffee, you wave your iPod, your payment is done. Suddenly, my life is affected in a very significant way. C’mon, it can’t be that far off, can it?