On Dropping the Dead Lion: A Tale of Rebranding and the Secularisation of Contemporary Culture

Before (good) and After (bad)

 

 

I. Opening Remarks

 

The recent hoo-ha surrounding the decision by Lyle's to remove their iconic dead lion logo from its Golden Syrup in a rebranding effort that is intended to broaden its appeal amongst a younger generation of shoppers and avoid causing any possible offence, reminds us of two things: firstly, just how feeble-minded some of those working in marketing and brand promotion can be and, secondly, just how deeply disturbing is the Bible story upon which the original design was based.  

 

Let's discuss each of these points in turn ...

 

 

II. What Were Those Idiots in Marketing Thinking? 

 

Actually, thanks to press releases and statements made on social media, we have a very good idea of the thinking that shaped Brand Director James Whitley's decision to abandon 140 years of history and replace the world's oldest food logo [1] with a heavily stylised but soulless image which reminds one of Disney's Lion King [2] rather than Samson's heroic exploits in the Book of Judges. 

 

This obsession with refreshing the legacy and moving with the times in order to remain relevant to a modern audience has resulted in a number of disastrous decisions over the years; just ask the rebranding geniuses at Tropicana, for example [3]. 

 

And so, whilst I'm not opposed to change and happily acknowledge that, when done well, rebranding can help bring in new customers and dramatically increase sales, the fact remains that it involves more than shitting on your own past and designing a friendlier logo. You have to produce a strong new narrative in place of the old one and simply telling people that your product meets their current needs and remains an affordabe treat doesn't really cut it.     

 

As Mr Whitley and his team at Lyle's have now discovered, when attempting to rebrand a long-established and much-loved product you run the risk of losing more than you gain. And when, as in this case, rebranding seems to be driven by a certain woke sensibility, it can quickly lead to a PR disaster.

   

III. What Were Those Old Testament Lunatics Thinking?

 

The Scottish food manufacturer Abram Lyle (1820-1891) was, first and foremost, a deeply religious man. An elder of the Presbyterian Church, he was also a strict teetotaller and would proudly tell people that he'd sooner have a son of his carried home dead than drunk.

 

So it's perhaps not surprising that he would choose to give reference to an Old Testament narrative on his tins of Golden Syrup ... 

 

The story he chose - in which the superhumanly strong Samson kills a young lion with his bare hands - is, I have to admit, not one I was very familiar with until news broke of the rebranding exercise discussed above. 

 

But now I'm a lttle obsessed with the story, in all its horror ...

 

Returning to the scene of this lion-killing some time later, Samson discovers that a swarm of bees have built a hive in the animal's carcass [4]. Having tasted the honey made by the bees, Samson decides to take some home as a gift for his parents (although he doesn't reveal to them the origin of the honey).  

 

Shortly after, Samson decides (at God's bidding, but against his parents wishes) to marry a Philistine woman and, at the wedding feast, he challenges a large group of guests on the bride's side to work out what it is that he refers to in the following riddle: 

 

Out of the eater came forth meat, and out of the strong came forth sweetness [5].  

 

Obviously, it's impossible for them to guess as the riddle is based upon Samson's own experience. However, after threatening her with extreme violence, they force his new bride to obtain the answer for them (which she does by begging her husband to be let in on the secret). 

 

The guests then reveal to Samson they know the answer and, having lost the wager made, Samson is obliged to provide them all with new clothes. 

 

But, being a sore loser and a schizophrenic prone to auditory hallucinations that he believes to be the voice of Yahweh, rather than simply donate items from his own wardrobe or pay for some new garments, Samson murders thirty Philistines, strips the corpses, and hands the clothes over to those who solved his riddle.

 

Angered by his wife's betrayal (as he sees it), Samson decides to return to his own family and hand the woman over to his best man to do with as he will. 

 

It is, I trust readers will agree, a shocking tale; one involving cruelty, divine madness, deceit, extortion under threat of violence, racism, and mass murder. 

 

I know these things are not uncommon in the Bible, but, even so, they're probably not topics you want to be reminded of when pouring syrup on your pancakes in the morning, which makes me think that perhaps James Whitely and his rebranding team at Lyle's were justified after all in dropping the dead lion logo and that the secularisation of contemporary culture is a good thing (even if it results in a more boring, disenchanted world).       

 

 

Notes 

 

[1] Golden Syrup's green tin featuring a dead lion surrounded by a swarm of bees, has - until now - remained pretty much the same since the product first launched in the early 1880s and holds the Guinness World Record for the world's oldest unchanged brand packaging. 

 

[2] The rebrand will take place across the full product range, excluding the classic Lyle’s Golden Syrup tin, which will retain its original identity and logo. This is called hedging your bets (and it's probably not a bad idea).  

 

[3] Tropicana is an American fruit juice company. Founded in 1947, it soon became an internationally recognisable brand. In 2009, however, the powers-that-be at Tropicana decided to radically simplify the design of their cartons sold in the US. Unfortunately, this move was not well received and after two months of negative consumer reaction - and a 20% drop in sales - they switched back to the original design of an orange skewered by a drinking straw.

 

[4] Samson's discovery of a beehive in the lion's dead body obviously lacks natural realism; bees would normally avoid rotting flesh. However, it's been suggested by those looking to get around this fact that the word usually translated as carcass might more accurately be read as skeleton. 

      Unfortunately, I'm not sure that really helps matters and I think it's probably wisest to view this incident as just one more miraculous occurrence in the Bible - albeit one informed perhaps by the ancient belief in spontaneous generation, i.e., the emergence of living creatures from nonliving matter.

 

[5] Judges 14:14 - click here to read this chapter in full (KJV). This astonishing line has been open to multiple interpretations. For me, it sounds like something Zarathustra might have said and one is reminded of Nietzsche's view that virtue is born of strength.