What is to come on brand personalization?

I found an article this morning about noodle brands in Japan picturing the faces of restaurant chefs on their packagings. An interesting revelation!

It seems that the brands have choosen not to use their brand names anymore and use instead the many different brands of small neighborhood restaurants and their chefs! And i am not talking about a group of celebrity chefs appearing on a TV program, it is really thousands of local chefs!!

Probably the reason for this move has been the ongoing commoditization of the category, aproblem well know in many categories. I dont know the noodle category well enough, but i could imagine the difficulty of brands to differentiate their tastes, passed the standard variants.

This trend could set an important milestone in terms of brand customization/personalization. The advantages for the restaurant/chef are obvious, but most importantly, for consumers it represents getting a real sense of ownership. I can already picture how companies could exploit this on social networks and create a truly 360° launch of a new product, from the product development to its communication strategy.

Take a look at the article, i am sure it will give you some ideas on how you can apply this principle to your own brand!

http://www.fastcompany.com/1778416/customizationbrands-noodles