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Something must be in the air, because today it seems there are a number big companies joining forces to offer new services, etc. That’s not the problem, the problem is that these new partners are from seemingly opposite ends of the globe, and their team-ups strike me as completely random, if not absurd.

First, Nickelodeon and Marriott anounce they are teaming up to launch a new brand of family resorts called Nickelodeon Resorts by Marriott. Makes sense, I suppose, just take the successful characters of Nick, and throw them inside a Marriott. Paint the town orange. This combo is more along the lines of the Nautica and Eddie Bauer editions for those vans and trucks of the late 90s — basically the product of one, dressed up in the attire of another.

According to an article from The Hollywood Reporter:

The first hotel, filled with such favorite Nickelodeon characters as SpongeBob SquarePants, Diego and Dora the Explorer, is set to open in early 2010 in San Diego, and plans call for 20 hotels around the world by 2020.

Doesn’t Nick Marriott sound like a cool name for a 1940s private eye? Nick Marriott is one bad cat.

Second is a team-up between Dunkin’ Donuts and Mapquest. The two companies will soon be launching myicedcoffee.com, a website with maps showing Dunkin’ Donuts locations, and maybe some other stuff. (Ahem, doesn’t Google Maps already do this, what with their open API and all?).

The effort here is to get families and travellers to map out their journies in advance, making certain to stop along the way for some smooth, tasty iced coffee from the big D. I think they would have been much more successful taking the cheeky approach and marketing it as a ’survival tool’ for motorists — on the road and lost? Crab a coffee and check mapquest at your nearest Dunkin’ Donuts. Or, use that little satellite navigation gizmo to chart your way to a Dunkin’ when it’s late at night you’ve got to be in Cleveland by 9 am. Road trips and coffee go together quite well, so it’s not surprising these two have teamed up. But still, it seems a bit strange to me. Five bucks says this website is a flop, Google will crush them anyway.

The online push comes as Dunkin’ faces increasing pressure from java rival Starbucks and fast-food chains like McDonald’s, which is offering higher-end brews and iced beverages. Dunkin’ needs to up the ante when it comes to cementing loyalty and finding new ways to talk to consumers as executives take the brand across the country with its national expansion plans, according to restaurant industry analysts.

Finally, is a marriage that makes logical sense, but seems in many ways unlikely. The “content industry”, eg, record labels, movie studios, seems to be taking baby steps toward acting in a manner the people (“users”) actually desire. EMI Music, the British conglomerate which owns Virgin, Blue Note, and others, is teaming up with Google-YouTube (the new ExxonMobil?) to provide acccess to content online! YouTube will allow users access to music videos, audio content, and other stuff that previously would have earned the wrath of the EMI lawyers.

“With this deal,” said Chad Hurley, CEO and co-founder of YouTube, “all four of the world’s major music companies are now official YouTube partners.”

Seriously people, this is great for us. The ability to acquire content legitimately online is secondard to what I hope is a new era of not being held under the thumb of death-by-lawsuit. Are the music labels finally coming around to our way of thinking logic? Or are they finally seeing the dollar signs that come from freeing content from restrictions and putting in front of the audience?

EMI is the same company which recently entered into a deal with iTunes to sell higher quality, DRM-free music from its daughter labels. These tracks recently became available on iTunes after a delay of a few weeks. Here is a case where the team-up is beyond welcome, but random in it’s unexpected nature. A turnaround of this magnitude is worth noting, as EMI (and the rest of Big Content) has made greed and control of intellectual property by any means part of their brand creed.

You heard it first. The next unlikely brand tag team will be Betty Crocker teaming up with Nike to produce “Running Snacks”. Dehydrated snacks that you can eat while running — just add sweat. Hey, it could happen, and wouldn’t the most random thing we’ve seen.

// a tale of brands & branding, music, the internet
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