The toy retail business is a very different world. Finding out about it, we have discovered a whole new way of looking at toys, children moms and families.  merchandising is a key word and shopping is the new game. Toys are not just for kids anymore. Magic Factory is a franchised network of stores in Spain, that sell merchandising items made mostly in China and distributed across the peninsula. It focuses on objects, toys and personal items licensed under major brands like Disney, Warner, King Features Syndicate (Betty Boop), Sanrio, Cartoon Network, Nickelodeon & Viacom,  Marvel, and local brands like FCB Barcelona. These shops sell and promote brands featuring music, films, sports and cartoon characters. Among all these brands Magic Factory has develop a classification based on sales and permanence. Products related to Betty Boop, Hello Kitty and classical Disney characters like Mickey or  the Princesses are considered permanent and basic, somehow essential. Big impact characters like Sponge Bob, Spiderman or Cars,  are strong and versatile and  attract  younger generations. Third category would be short term brands like Hannah Montana, Jonas Brothers, Ben 10, Gormiti or Patito Feo (Disney LatAm) that come and go very fast and boost sales for one or two season. The Nostalgic Grownups : one of the things we first noticed while visiting our client was the massive affluence of  women in their 30´s and 40´s buying items like key chains, lighters, pens and watches, not for their kids or nephews but for themselves. That made me think of  another experience at the Barbie shop in Barcelona, where communications were clearly directed to moms raised with a Barbie instead of kids themselves. Grown ups with strong attachments to brands like Barbie, Hello Kitty, Disney or Betty Boop act as preaching fans to their own children and other grown ups about new products and merchandising Babyboomers & Young Couples: are also a strong presence in the stores, but as far as we could notice they are looking for ¨safe & standard¨ toys and contents for their actual or future children. this search is evident in the amount of questions they ask prior to buying anything. New babies or small children from young couples seem to be the basic parenthood learning course though commodities. Housewives & Grandparents: a very different approach was noticed when we asked about experienced parents, they know what their children like, how they would react, how to make it look like a reward or as a tool for negotiating with their children. In this case toys become a powerful tool to trade better grades, commitments Teenagers are the oldest population in these stores, usually attending in groups and trying to find a symbol of status, identity affirmation or acceptance trough merchandising and commodities. For them the object is not relevant, but the power it gives to their public image. Thinking about all these facts we created three pieces of communication: 1. shop window videos that include animated images featuring real kids with the main characters and store products, an updatable website where products can be seen as in a catalog linked to a facebook website 3. where all audiences can interact and get news and feedback from their local shop. 1 month of total work, 50 product shots, some backgrounds & wallpapers and a CMS were enough to bring some magic to magic factory. #website #design #communication #warner #sanrio #corporate #disney #studio #spiderman #service #films #communications #performers #sonypictures #video #HannahMontana #FCbarcelona #retail #toys

Superar el pasado implica en un ejercicio de voluntad y comprensión muy fuerte y elaborado de los hechos que suceden en nuestra vida y del momento actual que vivimos. Un westpacket se referia a aquellos envíos que realizaban familiares y amigos desde Alemania occidental con ropa, regalos y cariño a sus vecinos del este. Ostpacket es ahora una tienda ubicada en Berlín en la cual los antiguos habitantes de la Alemania del Este pueden encontrar todos aquellos productos y memorabilia de una cultura que, tras la unión de las dos alemanias se ha ido diluyendo lentamente. Al recorrer la tienda uno puede ver claramente la estética socialista en los productos, libros, autores, objetos del hogar, música, ropa etc. y evocar otro tiempo y otros lugares. Todo respira un tiempo pasado y una manera de pensar que aunque quienes alli vivieran lo primero que hicieron fué huir de ello, hoy lo añoran y lo compran a precios desorbitados. El concepto es interesante y poderoso apela a aquellos objetos, imágenes, olores, sonidos y sabores que detonan la emotividad de un grupo específico de personas y que se materializan en objetos concretos que han hecho parte de la niñez o del pasado del grupo objetivo en especifico y que representan vivencias auténticas. Esta misma fórmula opera con el retro y los revivals pero de manera diluida y claramente artificial. Ospacket ha logrado transmitir un sensación de autenticidad, reproduciendo perfectamente los productos y ubicando objetos vintage dentro de la tienda. La diferencia principal entre Ostpacket y formulas similares como los colmados latinos, mercados orientales o tiendas de productos extranjeros, radica en el hecho de que esa cultura se extingue, pero sobreviven personas que la experimentaron y que la añoran. Estos productos posibilitan un viaje en el tiempo y recuperar aquello que a los Alemanes orientales se les escapa de las manos; su anterior estilo de vida, su paisaje urbano y su vida cotidiana que aún perciben como auténtica y que hoy por hoy es totalmente diferente. Lograr que productos del pasado se vendan en el presente y posiblemente en el futuro, es como la labor de resucitar a los muertos para que nunca nos abandonen, una dulce y rentable ilusión que ademas de perpetuar una cultura permite que sus simbologías no se asuman como invalidas o incorrectas, sino como maneras de vivir diferentes y momentos importantes de la historia. El valor potente está en la emotividad, el recuerdo y el impulso afectivo;  a pesar de que se trata de productos de bajisima calidad, detonan nuestro afán por capturar el pasado, el tiempo perdido y todo aquello que no volverá jamás. cada país y cada comunidad tienen su cacaolat, su chocolatina jet, su maltin polar, miguelitos o en este caso su paquete del este. Funciona es como un túnel del tiempo que trae al presente, a través de la compra, memorias, recuerdos y sobre todo objetos que detonan las emociones y un pasado que si no fue mejor hoy claramente ya no existe. El ícono del automóvil de Europa oriental con la  caja a cuestas atravesando la frontera hacia un nuevo futuro hoy recorre permanentemente las calles de Berlín como si nunca fuera a desaparecer. Un confort, un placebo y finalmente una ¨realidad virtual¨ que  está en la añoranza de quienes vivieron esa transición y que al resto nos parece un exotismo mas de Berlín. #cultural #communication #germany #research #alemania #berlin #communications #marketing #emoción #memorabilia #producto #ostpacket

Almost one year of planning, negotiation, confirmations, revisions and last-minute changes were necessary to complete the participation or retroVisor (a Colombia world music band) in Wassermusik 2010. Wassermusik is a festival created in 2008 by the Haus der Kulturen der Welt in Berlin that features music, film, lectures and other artistic expressions around the topic of water. It can be related to the oceans, rivers or life surrounding water landmarks of the planet. The HKW is  a place for international contemporary arts and a forum for current developments and discourse. We have perceived it as an ideal location where contemporary culture can be seen but also be experienced, and music bands may have a place to spread their word and creativity. Our link with HKW started one year ago at the MMVV a live music market held on Vic, a small town near Barcelona where we use to attend to keep up to date in the local  music business.  There we meet Detlef, who with a very sharp idea about the type of projects he wanted in his festival program talk o us in a friendly and open way, just the way we like it and it looked like the kind of project Algo Bueno loves to be involved with. By then, our music projects were going slow since the local music circuit seemed to be reduced to a few music halls around Barcelona, that payed very little, based on entrance sales, not very motivating creatively, economically or ¨communicationally¨ speaking.  No interesting musical projects or bands showed in the horizon, all bands and singers were looking, sounding and performing like something we had  seen before a thousand times. Music had become a little bit of a world of templates were stylish formulas blind the creative minds in search of success. We still wanted to give music a try, but the local music market was not helping. So again we looked into our friends. retroVisor is a musical project that started exploring dialogs between the colombian traditional music and electronic sounds in a way that seemed very committed to environmental and social issues around he world. One of my best friends from the arts school was involved creating the visuals for the band and exploring a new career in music, so it was the time to be there and lend a hand. In 2008 we signed our first contract with the band to help them promote their work in Spain and Europe, with the purpose to experience the way live and digital music revolution would change the world of communications and culture. Last year, during a show in Amsterdam , we discovered that the band had signed another contract with a manager in Switzerland. It was surprising since we had not been notified by anyone, but as we were talking friends business here, we had no problem sharing projects and  supporting the band our research of the music biz was intact and growing. It seems none needs anybody in this business since digital distribution have made things easy for the bands to be connected to venues, audiences and fans. Artists can auto edit, manage their shows, sell their music, get live show contracts and get involved in other projects to promote themselves anywhere in the world. But, is there enough  time and mind to create, be excellent, sell, negotiate, blog, reach the fans, make the biz, and still be committed to ideas or some substance? We have now discovered why all bands look the same, sound the same and forget their commitments and identity, there is simply no time to do everything or team that can handle it. Either creativity, identity or promotion may fail when a small group of people have to multitask this way. Bands adopt ¨templates¨ to be able to get along with the amount of work they hold in their backs, for being authors, artists, managers, bloggers, look pretty and try to convince the world they are original and innovative. Few of what we have seen during the last 3 years have an essence and a creative proposal that may last long or hold strong with the demands of fans and media. Few events and festivals care about what the band has to say. Many don´t even have side events like workshops, lectures or artists talks to let the fans get deeper into their artists worlds. The stage seems to be enough. The crisis around musical editions, CDs and DVDs leave just the band´s blog (when updated)  or MySpace profile with a few information about the band´s vision of the world and    the development of their image. We are still open to projects able to hold themselves creatively and in a couple of years when world music is not interesting to anybody can come along with fresh gourmet food for starving audiences that attend solid festivals like Wassermusik in Berlin. Consumption in the music biz has created massive fast food for hungry fans. Bands that look good on stage and in the pictures and repeat beats for a year or two. Like Burgers we are loving it, because it widens the space for corporate sponsorship and fast projects to reach huge audiences. But like burgers, we are also hating it because it diminishes the quality of pop music and pop culture around the planet. artist talk at wassermusik 2010 #art #production #festivals #communication #germany #corporateevents #gourmet #distribution #music #berlin #live #marketing #adaptation #burgers #media

This site is aimed to will serve as a tool for information, fundraising, recruiting and social presence for this organisation in Catalonia. The commited collaboration of Toni Calatayud ex-CEO for Walter Thompson Spain and Ramon Prats, made possible a bridge between an organisation with more than 200 members and our creative team at Algo Bueno Studio to materialize their needs and requests. Secot is a non profit organisation with headquarters at the Barcelona Chamber of Commerce that offer support to entrepreneurs, small companies and government. their team counts with most of the CEO´s and VP of multinational companies and big national corporations that have recently retired and wish to stay active in business givng back to community, after years of company service. So this guys know a lot and have a lot to say together. During this year we have learnt slow cook taste better and even when sometimes fast times are on top of us, well done things are more rewarding than fast-food-like projects. This organisation has taken the time to discuss, test, rethink and evaluate all processes in a way that only a really experienced executives can possibly think today. Thanks for showing us the taste of a well cooked project in fast food times. http://www.secotbcn.cat #CEO #slow #cambradecomerç #online #barcelona #corporate #assesment #tools #communications #Secot #marketing #media #fast #senior

DAMAGED by Richard Brooks, is the body of work we have chosen this summer to be featured as the cover of FUEL. His images seemed clean, direct and had this kind of tragic beauty that caught our eye. Richard says: ¨I used dolls to represent victims of people trafficking. The dolls are resin based and, like the people they represent, fragile. The full series starts with a set of black and white portraits that speak of the ideali…sed image of the person who is then damaged by being trafficked.I chose a map as a device to address the issue of people trafficking, influenced by a couple of Guardian articles – a 2008 article included the key phrase “down your street” and a 2009 article included “across small towns and large cities”. The repetition of the map and the smaller images is indicative of the recurring nature of the problem of human trafficking. I was shocked to discover that there are currently more people enslaved by people trafficking than at the height of the transatlantic slave trade.The colour portraits, represent the damaged individuals.The prints are deliberately in glossy, reflective laminate. This was chosen so that the work interacts with the viewer, with the viewer glimpsing something of their own reflection. This added another layer to the work that speaks of our shared culpability in the suffering caused by people trafficking. Other contributors participating in the summer issue of FUEL are: Ingri Haraldsen, Claudio Parentela, Alvaro Sendra, Gracie Weinrib, Lavv Photography, Kara Seaman, Whathetreesee, Volathevist, John Broadley, What Surreally Matters, Studio Zlamal and Levi Miller. Click and enjoy at http://www.flickr.com/groups/fuelmagazine/ http://www.rwbfineartphotography.com/Damaged.html http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=2411978180 (requires login) #mexico #communication #curatorial #germany #uk #online #berlin #photography #london #magazine #madrid #illustration #arts #media #newyork

Well we are now becoming specialists on Medical media production. For the last 3 year, individual interviews, expert panels and events have been produced for maple Leaf, WebMD and theheart.org, this time a new company based in New York has required our services and we were happy to produce for them. It all started the day we got trapped in Helsinki by the ash cloud from the volcano in Iceland. The first day we arrived we were contacted by Kate asking us for an estimate for a series of interviews to doctors attending a Hematology Congress in Barcelona in June and needed a production team with experience in developing the whole process (studio, equipment, crew, video , sound, set & decoration, catering, etc. It took us about to week to enter exact details like lighting , camera movements, furniture on the set, timings, transportation, transfers, menu, etc to cover every single part of the production. It was going to be 1 hour interview and it had to be just perfect. So our team foun out crew, location and resources that will reproduce exactly the format projects in Knowledge normally does during their recordings around the world. production day arrived and even though we had never worked together before, working with some time in advance and planning to the las detail was helpful. last mu¡inute changes always come up but if the rest of the production is under control they don’t really affect the schedule. Doctors comfortably talked about hemathology for one our during a sunny Saturday morning 4 blocks away from the Barcelona beach. As soon as the taping was over we digitized a security copy and the same day Susan and Kate from New York, had their medical interviews ready to be postproduced at their headquarters. A good lunch on a beachfront restaurant followed work. #production #corporateevents #barcelona #lighting #camera #crew #congress #studio #summit #expert #cast #interviews #video #pharmaceutical #medical

CCOO  needed to enter a new approach to the equality concept  trying to generate interest in topics as complex as discrimination at the workplace, equal opportunities at work and prevention of origin, race and gender discrimination and homophobia. All these topics being quite  new to these type of organizations worldwide. The fight for rights at work, seemed to have an image based on the old syndicate figure: a fat male construction worker with a protest sign who drinks beer has little education, a housewife and a low salary. But things have changed a lot in the last 50 years and workers unions and syndicates currently have an amazing diversity of members and offer an incredible range of services and programs, being Equality one of them. To address this, CCOO contacted us looking for an event to commemorate the World Day Against Homophobia at their headquarters in Barcelona. They wanted us to create something to start talking about gender discrimination at the workplace and introduce the gender equality topic to their members. Since we considered a one day event may be forgotten easily and may not give many people the opportunity to talk about these new interests,  we proposed two weeks of activities around gender, work and equality and focused on social and educational activities that may provide both members and visitors to the headquarters with a new and refreshing look about CCOO and the concept of Equality. Under the slogan Nothing is Normal Nothing is weird (Nada es Extraño, Nada es Normal)  we created a new local version of the Amor Universal Love Exhibition that incorporated a historical timeline about relevant people, achievements, history gossip and current news on gender equity, an exhibition of local  lgbt graphic novel artists, a permanent book-reading table with magazines and books from different organizations working on equity and a workshop about discrimination at the workplace.  A very positive impact was created both for members and visitors, a new way of generating content inside this organization was achieved and new possibilities of work for this organization have come along with the event. The opening cocktail for the program was  crowded with people interested in this new approach to rights, a more open, more contemporary image of the a workers union, linked to what workers  and equality are today. This slideshow requires JavaScript. More Images about Universal Love Exhibition at CCOO Barcelona #communication #history #CCOO #institutional #reserach #exhibition #rights #events #institucional

Personal stories have become of more interest in the latest years. We have made our life public using social networks and letting the world we are all here. pictures, applications and opinions have made us participants of the collective now. But most of us would like to go one step further and try to express and share more stories, more opinions and more personal points of view about our daily life, the word we live and the places we don´t know. Social networks, smart phones, applications, online events, webvideo, online friendship and digital life have become our alternate home. Videopolis 2010 is a traveling exhibition centered on personal urban stories and encourages people to tell and share what they like, wish and enjoy. We have developed several activities and programs that help people´s interaction become a reality. First experiencing other people´s life stories on the screen at festival screenings and public venues and then providing participants with tools to tell their own story making their own films. Everyday we become more and more audiovisual and interactive, our daily life is full of images and interfaces and our brain as adopted it as a new language, a new way to communicate, express and even dream. So there is the language and there are the tools, in your pocket. Let´s tell stories. Our first workshop was energetic developed in Helsinki with a very small but dynamic group of mobile phone users, who in just 2 sessions told us a lot a bout their life and interested through their own short film. participating of the AAVE festival held in Malmitalo. Further Workshops have been programmed in Madrid, Barcelona, Geneve, Berlin, Milano, Rome, Paris, Amsterdam, Copenhagen, Stockholm and London during the year. More activities, workshops and festivals to come where the movie industry should search for what the people is looking for. #workshop #festival #shorts #production #communication #warner #research #online #mobilephone #socialnetwork #users #technology #webcam #opinion #video #pda #Helsinki #sony #group #film

Five months ago and after being tired of reading and watching printed and online visual magazines, where the hands and thoughts of an editor clearly state a line of thinking, we decided to create a space where artists themselves could be the actual editors and think for themselves what to publish as a personal decision and as an act of sharing. The content would reveal what the real art world is today, what the real artists want the readers to see and read and what is done when participation is open. As a collective construction FUEL MAGAZINE has reached today 365 contributions from 60 photographers, artists, illustrators, designers, painters etc. The nicest thing about FUEL is that it is entirely made by participation, those who put their works in our pages, choose carefully what to offer to themselves and to our readers.Completely visual, FUEL is being constructed by all of us and let us know more about what the real art world is today, than any other specialized magazine online. Come and participate, think well before adding your content, and then give us all and give yourself the best that you got.check out the current content, grab a cup of tea, enjoy and take you time to think about these images at Vodpod videos no longer available. more about “FUEL MAGAZINE : The Power of Arts gro…“, posted with vodpod #travelingexhibits #read #collaboration #creativetalentbank #photography #magazine #collective #expression #artist #arts #cooperation #publication #exhibit #write #lifestyle

A partir del 2009, en Algo Bueno Studio hemos buscado ampliar la mirada hacia nuestros clientes y proyectos abriendo la puerta a nuevos retos y colaboraciones. Hablando mucho cada día nos hemos dado cuenta que la creatividad no ha de tener límite y que abordar nuevas experiencias y encargos nos plantea retos que hasta el momento han sido super nutritivos. Nuestra primera experiencia nueva fue la concepción de páginas web ágiles y rápidas de producir para Sitges Royal Rooms y Secot para las cuales miembros del BTC colaboraron con creatividad y alegría. Abrimos la puerta a los eventos de broadbar, creamos la red de emprendedores online EBCN con base en nuestra colaboración con Barcelona Activa y nos lanzamos a crear Videopolis como muestra de video urbano viajero. El Postgrado de coolhunting ha terminado con éxito su primera edición y Amor Universal está apunto de florecer. Al finalizar 2009 vino la concepción de la presencia en Forest Day 3 del Ministerio de Relaciones Exteriores de Colombia , un proyecto complejo desarrollado en tiempo record y producido desde su concepto hasta su montaje final y del cual se pueden ver detalles en nuestro wall. En Julio haremos la producción de una videoinstalación y un concierto en HKW en Berlin. Un libro, una película, un programa radial o un megaevento…otra campaña, no lo sabemos. Creemos que hemos aprendido a verlo todo frugalmente y aprovechar nuestros recursos al máximo. Proponemos ampliar la mirada de quienes como nosotros quieren atreverse con proyectos nuevos y exigentes. Siempre esperamos nuestro próximo reto con emoción y estamos abiertos a lo desconocido, nuevo y complejo, ojalá en colaboración con nuevos amigos o en red con diferentes paises. #travelingexhibits #shorts #production #electronica #cultural #music #service #Videopolis #singers #video #arts #ForestDay3 #EBCN #makeupartists #livecinema #lifestyle #HKW

It was quite awkward last week, when this ghost company from Brooklyn contacted us for a research about Spanish trends. As we always do with new clients, verifying the company was the first task. Even though we discovered the company did not exist  and the budget was laughable, we took it as a team exercise. The brief looked pretty simple, asking for very basic information. We had  gathered similar information  in recent months for another client, so we went for it A Tricky Project Brief Soon, we discovered  they would want more and even a lot more, the brief was just the top of an iceberg. The project brief described the work was calculated to be developed in 2 half days (4-8 hours at the most) with simple descriptions of 2 deliverables: one for general trends and another one for descriptions. When the first deliverable format document arrived we noticed it was going deeper on the description of the trend and now asked for the sources of the information, authors, dates, location, etc. that wasn´t good. A good cop never reveals his sources. We completed the first deliverable and sent it the same day, receiving a not very kind feedback from our ¨new boss¨. She wanted more specific and explained information, more details and descriptions so we felt like in the old times at school, when that lousy, rude and strong boy took your lunch and made you do his homework based on threats. Mmmm bad memories but also a bad idea, since our team does not respond well to threats, in fact we don´t respond to threats at all. To be honest,we have found that a nice talk, a good tone and an interesting task has made us move mountains in the past and other types of dialogue make us very lazy. Some of us were uncomfortable because of the tricky brief, but still kept our word and provided some of the information in a first deliverable. The tone of our client´s emails  became more and more bossy, trying to make us feel we were not providing enough accurate information but just willing to get more than they asked for, this really bothered us. A High Maintenance New ¨boss¨ The second deliverable format arrived the next day and  now it was asking for at least one hundred images, trend descriptions and sources and the influence of those trends in at least 9 aspects of life, that was enough information to develop a national trends report. A complete report that would have been worth  at least ten times the budget offered by “Ghost USA” . We know how much information and analysis is worth since we have been working on similar things for years, but now we felt trapped between demands, bossy emails and our rejection to the project. Then we decided to let our client know about our feelings for the project. Bad response again, the tone suddenly changed to ¨…come on guys, this is not that much…¨ . That was too much for us. We decided to send the last info, an amount  we considered enough for the price and the time ¨agreed¨and say goodbye, it was time to let go. This was definitively the kind of client that would buy a one dollar piece of glass from you and sell it as a diamond in thousands. Now we ask ourselves if a fair trade movement for those of us working on information and research would be really necessary? Would clients pay the real value of the information and analysis they receive? Since hundreds of teenagers see themselves as coolhunters, speculation and a black market are on the rise…! #research #clients #coolhunting #corporate #information #service #investigacion #team #value

Happy 2010 to everyone!! on Vimeo by Algo Bueno Barcelona, originally uploaded by AlgoBuenoStudio. We wish all our friends, team, customers, collaborators, clients, providers and fans that in 2010 all their projects, good wishes and desires become a reality. And of course we wish Algo Bueno for everyone.! Watch this video on Vimeo. Video created by Algo Bueno Barcelona.