Mother of a Man-Child

The people at Bonds must be in marketing heaven.  After all, if you can charge $20 for a pair of jocks, and have them so publicly displayed by your target market and freely promoting your brand, you’d be in marketing heaven too.  As are the people at Dunlop Volley I am sure. 

For those who may have been asleep for the past 12 months, the photo shows the trend I am referring to.  I’m not sure if it heralds from the original home-boy look,with the low hanging jeans, which has then morphed into a private school boy look all of their own.  In our house, only the man-child is into this look, and happily wears his Bonds above the waistline of jeans, shorts, bathers.  Our teen-child doesn’t seem fussed by the look himself. 

And if you’re thinking there are loads of mens jocks out there with the wide branded waist band, yes there is, but only Bonds cuts it in our house.   You can’t buy brand loyalty like that, for all the money you might throw at it.  Although as a marketer I’d be quite keen to know if they did seed this look with early adopters/trend setters in the market to help it take off? 

For me, I find it very difficult to justify the price – especially when the boys are now wearing mens sizes (and therefore paying mens prices).  I’m sure Bonds have made the most of the trend by inching up prices without us noticing – but that’s the key to marketing isn’t it – managing supply versus demand, so who can blame them.

As trends go I guess it’s pretty harmless – we should be thankful they at least have their jocks in place, with only their jeans hung low –  the alternative view doesn’t bear thinking about does it!