Spotlight on Chris Lehmann: Building an agile brandMandarin QuarterlyJanuary 2016

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Spotlight on Chris Lehmann: Building an agile brandBy Long Yu, Senior Editor, Mandarin Quarterly

Landor’s Chris Lehmann discusses design, career, agile brands, and Landor in his interview with Mandarin Quarterly.

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Many people are accustomed to buying a cup of coffee or a bit of breakfast at Starbucks, but do you realize that from the moment you walk in, the music, the color of the coffee cup, the Starbucks mobile app, the clerks’ clothing and greetings were all designed by a team to achieve a unified customer experience? Behind these seemingly casual details may be countless hours of research and debate and hundreds of abandoned proposals just to come up with a design that could catch people’s attention in a few minutes or even seconds. There is only one purpose behind these efforts: to convey a good brand image to customers.

There was once a time when people thought of branding as simply logo design, but now, in addition to the presence of an image,

“branding also involves the company’s actions and customer experience, which includes how to increase people’s positive awareness of a brand and how to find prob-lems and solve them,” said Chris Lehmann.

Chris is a managing director for the leading global consulting firm Landor. In terms of brand image design, one could consider Landor a ranking leader. The firm has 27 offices in 21 countries, providing consult-ing and design services to help define brand positioning and enhance brand image and vitality. Chris has been with Landor for 18 years, working his way up from designer to managing director in charge of the entire San Francisco office.

As a child, Chris’ first experience with design was creating a sixth grade class newspaper logo and header design. Even though it was a simple hand drawing, looking at it many years later, he realized that he was already following the design rules he learned later at design school. Although he grew up with an interest in design, Chris did not initially follow that path. After studying English literature and film in college, he finally decided to pursue graphic design. He said the reason it took him so long to come full circle is because he was worried he wouldn’t

Nine Suns is a family-owned luxury winery in Napa Valley. The name and identity comes from the Chinese legend of the God of Archery, who shot down nine suns from the sky in order to restore balance to heaven and Earth. Landor won gold in the design category at the 2013 Cannes Lions International Festival of Creativity for its artful interplay of story, name, and design.

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be good at graphic design—he only had the courage to work in other creative fields. However, when he began to study graphic design formally, it just felt right.

“While I didn’t feel out of place exploring other creative fields, I felt at home when I designed.”

Good designers are not necessarily good managers, and vice versa, but Chris grasped both roles with ease. This relates directly to his family and upbringing; his father was in the Air Force, with a very strict, detailed personality, while his mother was the opposite. She would often encourage Chris to take piano and drawing classes. These two approaches definitely contributed to him becoming a well-rounded designer and manager.

Landor was founded in 1941 by Walter Landor. In 1964, he moved the headquarters on board the Klamath ferryboat in the San Francisco Bay. Walter bought the Klamath at auction hoping the move would foster creativity in the firm’s employees and methods.

Currently, Landor positions itself around the idea of the agile brand. This concept encour-ages a brand to stick to its core values while continuing to evolve with its consumers and innovations in the market economy. It also requires brands to understand and find their own identity.

Chris says that every brand must answer the following questions: “What do I stand for? How am I different? Why should anyone care?”

Brand positioning and personality need to rely on design. “Design is the visual representation

of the brand image; it becomes the bridge between the public and the brand. Design needs to speak to the brand’s core and its advantages, and then reflect these qualities through design. At Landor, design is a service for brands.”

With regard to branding, Landor offers more than a single offering like logos or identities, focusing instead on the strategy of building a 360-degree brand. “Let’s say a company’s positioning is about being bold and taking an unusual path. Other than expressing that through its logo and store design, the message could also be delivered by actions, such as replacing the annual report with a newspaper, or creating short-term stores instead of attending trade shows.” Behind the most innovate solutions, of course, is the think tank that powers it all.

Today it is rare to find a company lacking talent, but Chris says Landor’s strength and uniqueness lie in the close alliance among its 27 offices. The offices all know each other and collaborate, so they are able to use their global resources to effectively solve problems. Since the company has a good amount of talent, a big part of Chris’ job is to put the right people in the right places. “My goal is to get everyone to succeed. This requires me to let people go when it is time and allow them to learn from their mistakes. A lot of people in this industry think that they can do a certain job or that their method is best. But it isn’t. You need to understand that sometimes your method may be better, but at other times others will have a better approach.”

In addition to the requirements of possessing excellent talent and breadth of thinking, a designer’s personality is very important.

“I want my employees to have a curious, fearless, and humorous personality,” said Chris. “They must pay attention to their surroundings, continuing to observe and digest what they see so it becomes a source of inspiration for design in the future.”

What do I stand for? How am I different? Why should anyone care?

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Above: With over 90 locations and 100 years of history, MetroBank Group had a strong local presence, but no unified brand. Landor created Byline Bank with a clear positioning: Byline Bank exists to make Chicago a great place to live and work

left: Butcher Thick Cut Bacon is Oscar Mayer’s most premium product, but consumers weren’t buying it. Landor broke category conventions by using the back panel of packaging as the front—instantly differentiating Butcher Thick Cut from every other bacon on the market.

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With the development of online social networks, everyone can have a platform to express themselves. Consumers are now more in touch than ever with preferences that express their individuality. Some people like Apple iPhones and some like Androids, some people like to drink Coca-Cola while others like Pepsi, some people like to buy books on Amazon and others like buying secondhand books from the bookstore. Chris noted, “The future of brand management will become increasingly mainstream, where false branding will easily be seen through and the brands that are loyal to their values will succeed.” ■

Above: Landor helped Barclays Center with everything from naming and signage to branded environments and dynamic content, helping transform and reshape professional athletics in Brooklyn. Less than a year after launch, Barclays Center topped all U.S. venues in gross ticket sales and finished second worldwide.

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The story of the Klamath

In 1960s San Francisco, Walter Landor was finding that success comes with its own problems. The profession he had helped pioneer was suddenly crowded, and so were his headquarters. His branding agency had given rise to imitators—some good, some awful—and to more new hires than he could fit under his roof. Many people suggested that he spend millions of dollars to build a large office that could fit all employees and make other agen-cies pay tribute. However, Walter did not take the usual route. He was able to spend just $12,000 at a bankruptcy auction to solve the problem: He bought a handmade wooden ferryboat, the Klamath.

This boat represented U.S. ship manufacturing techniques and the history of San Francisco. So, as startled commuters looked on, Walter had the massive boat that could fit a thousand people hauled slowly back to San Francisco and docked at Pier 5. Then came the doubters. City officials decided Walter needed to apply for some sort of permit, but couldn’t figure out which one. His floating headquarters wasn’t really a ferryboat anymore, but it wasn’t exactly a building either. And gossip hinted that moving to the old ship was a sign that Landor’s business was drying up. Landor ultimately proved them wrong through its success.

Leaving dry land and stepping onto the boat, Walter took his company off the standard map. Shipboard life required some getting used to, of course. In the early months, it was easy to spot Landor employees among the crowds on the sidewalk heading for lunch. While standing on the corner waiting for the light to change, they were the ones who would suddenly topple like dominoes. Everyone was so used to compensating for the rocking of the boat that the first few minutes on shore, they’d forget and fall over. Working on board was the coolest place to work: Employees enjoyed the sea breeze and held meetings in the cabins, they fished on the deck for lunch, or worked with the accompanying sounds of seals and waves.

The Klamath was Landor’s office for 20 years, until it could no longer carry enough power to operate the company’s computers, print-ers, and servers. But the value and vision that it conveyed continued to inspire generations of employees. They made the boat Landor’s trademark, printed on the company’s notebooks and business cards to keep the Klamath’s spirit alive.

This article was first published in Mandarin in Mandarin Quarterly (Winter 2015). Photography of Chris Lehmann by Jeremy Deming. Translation from Mandarin to English by Charlene Chen, Designer, Landor San Francisco.

© 2015 Mandarin Quarterly. Reprinted with permission.

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