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This is Frank Radice with our continuing series on the future of
content, powered by Red Touch Media. Here at CES 2014
we had a chance to stop by the Krusell booth to talk to CEO
Ulf Sandberg about his products and about the way he markets those products
through the use of content and social media. This is Frank Radice in our continuing
series on the future of content brings us to
Ulf Sandberg the CEO of Krusell.
Tell us a little bit about Krursell and the other brands that you run.
We're a Swedish company and we've been in the mobile industry since 1991.
Exporting our products into
approximately 70 countries around the world. We have three
brands in the house, Krusell, Motorheadphones
which is an audio product and Walk on Water.
Lets talk a little bit about each of the brands individually lets talk about
Krusell for
a minute.Tell me about what the primary products are and
who the audience is for the product. The primary products are
mobile phone cases, tablet cases and laptop cases.
Our target group is an urban
30, 30+ consumer living somewhere around the world.
Do you find that because there's so many products out there, so many different
types of phones and phablets and tablets now that every time you turn around
somebody else is coming up with one
that you have to re-tool regenerate re-innovate that sort of thing?
Yeah from two different angles. First
there's new phones coming out every week and we do a lot of model specific
products.
So we need to be out there
getting the phones and start new development every week.
That's one side of the story, the other is that
it's the user,
how the users are using their devices changes over time.
So the accessories are changing with the consumers.
And historically we have made
traditional leather products that you were hanging in your belt.
Like 10-15 years ago we swapped over and the PDA's came to the market
which was before the smartphones. Then we had different kinds of designs
for that
now with the smartphone and the touchscreens it's
constantly evolving. I'm an early adopter and every time something comes
out I usually go out buy it. Now I am an
early abandoner as well because I now have a box full of
equipment. Whether it's a piece of hardware or a case. And I found myself
buying
maybe eight different cases for my iPhone not even sure which one I'm
happiest with. Is the consumer for
these types of accessories as fickle as I am? Some are.
Maybe you're a bit extreme but what we can see is that
depending on how you're using your device and what
other devices you have you cannot change your behavior on the accessories side.
Here's an example, we have made a flip case which has been...
flip cases are popular now maybe more than hardcovers especially in Europe.
But we also add your credit cards, how do you put it,
on the outside so that you don't have the credit cards destroying your screen.
And it would demagnetize the stripes too I suppose? Yes.
I did notice that in Europe the
flip cases are so much more prevalent than they are here in America.
Why do you think that is?
The American market is looking more into rugged and
big, biggest, beautiful. In the
US and I think the European consumers
have different opinion,
a different taste in a way. My wife would say that the European consumer is a more
elegant consumer.
I agree. Tell me a little bit about the
other brands. Let's start with the really
beautiful leather products that you have. What is that brand and
what is the philosophy behind that? Walk on Water
is a pretty young brand.
It's a Swedish brand, Swedish designed brand and with products like
these.
Here we have another example.
The trend here is to be more with street fashion,
aiming for a younger target group than Krusells.
The main
satchels for Walk on Water
so-far being a APR's.
Which also has consumers that are
very designer
focused. They have an interest in good-looking products. As
an Apple consumer...
These are just gorgeous. I mean are these leather products? Yeah.
They're just absolutely gorgeous. Your designs
are they're simple. And, you know, I think of Swedish design as
simplicity in its purity and that seems to be what
I'm seeing. It's the keyword we often talk about
when it comes to the design. To not overdo, simplify, simplify, simplify.
One of the other products, take a look at a couple of these other products here tell
me about a little bit about that.
These are designs that we have made especially for some of the Sony
products that were launched during
the last year, where you have a kickstand function for example on your phablet.
So for when we do products for
phablets which is six inch screens and up, then we try to add
a value. And a kickstand function is one of them.
But still, as you can see here we're talking slim very slim.
Same if you look at the world's
thinnest tablet which is the Sony Xperia tablet.
We of course need to have a kickstand function,
but still make it the slimmest possible.
So for us, if you buy this one which is pretty expensive hardware
and you buy it because it's the slimmest. Then the accessory needs to
follow that trend. Yeah, certainly an elegant design. And one of these things that I thought
was really fascinating was the Sealabox.
My goldfish has disappeared! I don't know where it is. Somebody ate it for lunch.
Yeah this is a waterproof case.
And if you look at what's available on the market
there's not really any other semi-universal products like this.
This only contains four pieces, I can't really open it now but
you just take them aside and you can take your phone out.
You have full functionality here in the way that you can talk, you can
touch the screen you can go with your Spotify or whatever
music service you're using. And then, of course, you can attach your Bluetooth
headset so that you
can listen to music when you're in the pool. So
is this product fully waterproof or just water resistant? Fully waterproof.
You can go diving. Let's talk a little bit about the Motorheadphones.
Tell me about, obviously, one of the world's
best known bands and a product that
signifies who that band is and what your product goals are.
Yeah Motorheadphones is a project we started like two years ago.
Mickey D the drummer, he is 20
something years in the Motorhead lives in Gothenburg where we are based.
And we had an idea or a vision of creating something with you know audio.
So we took a discussion with Mickey and he introduced us to the band with
Lemmey and Phil
and they just loved the idea of going to market with a high quality
product.
Which is very important. This product is designed in a different way than many
other of the audio products you can see on the market.
Many of the
products you see today are aiming for a rap or hip-hop audience.
What they constantly are talking about is that they have this
extra bass or heavy bass or super duper bass.
What we are aiming for is to be
giving the best to the consumer for played music.
And when we define played music it's like guitars,
strings, vocals, drums.
And by law of nature
if you overdo the low frequencies like at the bass
then you lose mid-range and you lose high frequencies. So the sound becomes a
little bit.
So if you're listening to real rock n' roll,
you need to have the mid-range and that's what we have been focusing on
on our frequency chart. We talk a little bit about the marketing of your product
specifically about how you might use social media to market the product?
One good example of how we use social media is when we talk about the
Motorheadphones
because
they have a big fan base of course related to the band and the music.
But also to the lifestyle of rock-and-roll. So we have been
fortunate enough to have a lot of musicians, for example,
that support us; the band and the brand.
Since many of them have been listening to Motorhead since they were
kids. So through our social media
sites, through other band social media sites
we have been able to you know kick off the awareness
on our new brand on
the social media. So that's an interesting way to talk about
the link between your products and
content and content distribution. So music,
its content. The distribution of your product through social media is utilization of
that content distribution platform
to get a conversation going about your product. Yes and to get people to,
if they like the lifestyle, if they like the music
and normally then would like the product of course.
So they talk about it, they connect to other bands, bands connect to other users.
And it's a self-perpetuating philosophy.
Yes.