When Lehman Brothers filed for bankruptcy on 15 September 2008, many brands ducked and ran for cover, cut spending, and started saving for the hard times ahead. Accountants crunched numbers, senior management drew up lists of expendable items, and middle managers’ palms got very sweaty indeed, marketing and advertising budgets were among the first on the chopping block. But was this a rational response, or knee-jerk reaction?

The end is here…
While a look at financial firms’ results in the Interbrands Top 100 for 2009 supports “rational response” (UBS alone lost half of its brand value), other segments say “knee-jerk reaction”. BlackBerry raised its brand value by 7% (proving the CrackBerry is addictive); Wrigley jumped 10% (job interviews require minty breath); Zara increased by 14% (must look hot no matter what) and Heinz lifted its value 9% (canned food tastes better somehow). Even brands that are considered less “essential” did well – Apple went up 12%, Nintendo posted a 5% increase and Ferrari, possibly the least necessary item of the lot (albeit very manly and cool), held its value. So what gives?

“People look for a sense of certainty in a recession, and for an anchor when times are unstable,” says Steve Garton, Synovate’s Global Executive Director of Media. “The recession was a great opportunity for brave advertisers to provide this certainty, yet so many failed to grasp the golden opportunity,” he adds.

And the winner is…
Hyundai had laid off 50 workers at the beginning of 2009, but jumped onboard when General Motors quit its long-term role as exclusive automotive sponsor of the Academy Awards. While the move is not characteristic of budget conscious advertising spend, Hyundai’s results in the first six months of 2009 saw market share in the US rise to 4.3%, up from 3.1% a year earlier.

Instead of thanking their mothers in an acceptance speech, Hyundai management should have cited a clever marketing team. “Brands that discovered what their customers wanted could use advertisement as a means to carve out a larger market share, at exactly the time when consumers were also more open to considering new brands,” says Garton.

And for brands willing to put their best foot forward, results from a Synovate survey released in October 2009 show that in Asia at least, there were many willing takers. In a study with more than 20,000 of the region’s most affluent consumers, ownership of laptops jumped from 40.8% to 48% from Q2 2008 to Q2 2009, with digital cameras going from 58.7% to 63.5% and LCD/plasma TVs rising from 32.2% to 36.5%. In Korea for example, luxury watch ownership among those surveyed rose from 13.6% to 16.5%.

“The affluent groups do not want to give up their lifestyle, no matter the condition of the economy,” says Kyungeun Chang, Managing Director of Synovate in Korea. “This is an insightful finding for marketers, as they should not eliminate their advertising budgets but instead target them to effectively to reach this group which is still spending as usual.”

In other words, don’t hide in the closet and wait for hell to freeze over during a financial crisis – get out and advertise.