Honey, Pass Me the Kodak? Moments Acetaminophen

I could write a whole book, or at least a bittersweet docuseries about the Kodak brand. I could talk about the human mishaps I witnessed happen on the 8th floor of the iconic 343 State St. building in Rochester, NY. But I won’t—at least not now.

Now I want to focus on recent events.

I could also write about the insanity of the market, or the story behind the policy that triggered this week’s events. I could even have an opinion on the insider trading of its latest CEO, but I won’t. I will let others work on that.

 I will write about what I write best, or at least I think I do: The Brand.

When I first heard the news on Tuesday, that President Trump announced the company would receive a $765M loan to launch Kodak Pharmaceuticals, and that the shares rose in a crazy spiral that made the stock market need to halt trading 20 times, I got an avalanche of texts, emails, and Skype calls from people that knew how much I know about Kodak and how close I was to upper management back in the days.

My affair with one of the world’s most beloved brands lasted a decade. It started slowly. I was their agency for the professional market in 2001 and by 2002 I was in the HQ building feeling so humbled in front of a display case that proudly showcased several Oscars?. I was greeted at the reception by an extremely kind and friendly lady who handed me her card, Pamela Young, “Director of First Impressions.”

After that date, the relationship between Kodak and me became tighter and tighter until January 19th, 2012 when I received the call, “Ester, I have some bad news. We just filed for bankruptcy protection.” AKA Chapter 11. I received pennies on the dollar represented in about 1000 shares. (If only I would have known, I would have made some good money this week.)

I still believed I owed Kodak much more than what they owed me. When they decided to entrust their brand to this Colombian immigrant in her forties, I was a nobody. My brand was Rabi…What??? So, in a way, the Kodak brand built the Rabinovici brand. I also owed them for the still sort-of-sharp photos of my great grandparents kept neatly in a shoe box somewhere in my parents’ house.

With that brief story for context, you can imagine the first reaction when I heard the name “Kodak” associated with the word “pharmaceuticals.” I started to imagine the new way of talking about the brand, “Honey, please pass me the Kodak Moments Acetaminophen.” The frenetic texts between my still-close friends and me, who I worked with during all those years, started to shape my opinion. Will this be another fading fever like the launch of KodakCoin or was this the real medicine for the brand? My first take: of all the categories in the world that the brand could have any equity in, pharmaceuticals was last on that list.

But before I made a case for the inexplicable choice of the President—at least from initial perceptions standpoint—I went, like I always do to seek answers from the matriarch: The Brand. In this case I had to go quite far back in time.

I had to go to what I call the Big Bang to find the idea, or in in this case the ideal of a young inventor called George Eastman, who decided to transform the very complicated, time consuming, and expensive art of photography and made it accessible to the masses. The meaningless Kodak name, with its phonetic appeal, and ease to pronounce in every language, reached celebrity status soon and by the year 2000 ranked 24th in the world among the best global brands and was worth $11,822M. That was right before it all went downhill.

My question was, how can a brand synonymous with the great American life and memorable moments go so very bad? A legendary consumer brand that failed miserably at becoming a technology brand…and almost died of underlying conditions by believing it had equity as an inkjet printer brand…can make it as a brand of components for the pharmaceutical industry? Well it might be less farfetched than you think. If you rewind the film and go back to 1890, Kodak was one of the first American firms to mass-produce its goods and to maintain a chemical laboratory.

So, after about 700 words of prelude here is my opinion: The Kodak brand can be redeemed through its turn toward chemicals. But it will take some serious management and marketers to make sure The Brand has the weight and heritage to ask American consumers to pay a premium of 35% in their generic medicines for the pleasure of ingredients made in America and proudly packed in yellow and red boxes.

Here’s a look at Kodak’s new mission and the values it will need to bring to life:

MISSION

According to Kodak's current Executive Chairman, Jim Continenza: “Utilize vast infrastructure, deep expertise in chemicals manufacturing, and heritage of innovation and quality" to help restore "a reliable American pharmaceutical supply chain.”

VISION

To restore a place in Interbrand's reputed top 100 brands by year 2025.

VALUES

 Sustainable: Because no Millennial or Gen Z consumer will buy anything no matter how American it is if it leaves grounds of chemistry-contaminated land.

Cutting-edge: Techniques like continuous manufacturing—processes that divert from the more than 100 years of batch production found in the industry. Or in the words of Mr. Trump "advanced manufacturing techniques."

Trusted: Unlike the foreign-made ingredients we are so dependent on today.

Memorable: It’s Kodak—what can you expect?! And at this price, it better keep me headache-free for at least two generations.

Resilient: If all the above doesn’t tell you that this brand has more lives than a cat, what will?

Jokes aside, I can’t believe that a brand that created so much value and was imprinted in the back of the most emotional moments of people’s lives around the world, can exist as a commodity ingredient for other brands. As a business, it might work but it definitely will erode the little equity it has. And as a one of the last Kodak consumers that remembers the brand, I will be sad all over again.