Maven Marketing with Brandon Welch

The Other Cracker Barrel Lesson That No One Is Talking About

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Don’t Stop Telling Your Story (Yes, Cracker Barrel just proved it)

Scrambled or over-medium—either way, today we’re serving a simple truth most brands forget: you don’t need a new story… you need to keep telling the one that made you worth listening to in the first place.

Brandon & Caleb use the Cracker Barrel logo saga as a jumping-off point to show how repetition + relevance beats shiny “rebrands” every day of the week. 

Then we dig into how to mine and retell your origin story from fresh angles so it never goes stale.

In this episode:

  • The two levers that make advertising work: repetition and relevancy
  • Why your audience hasn’t heard your story nearly as often as you think
  • How to retell the same story from new POVs 
  • What big brands get right and how to steal the playbook
  • A quick framework to pressure-test your message before you “rebrand” it away

Try this this week:
Write your origin story in 3 versions: 1) your voice, 2) a customer’s voice, 3) a skeptic-turned-fan. Rotate them in your ads for the next 90 days. Watch recall go up.

Join the Maven Marketing Mastermind → mavenmethodtraining.com

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Host: Brandon Welch
Co-Host: Caleb Agee
Executive Producer: Carter Breaux
Audio/Video Producer: Nate the Camera Guy

Do you have a marketing problem you'd like us to help solve? Send it to MavenMonday@FrankandMaven.com!

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Speaker 1:

Welcome to the Maven Marketing Podcast. Today is Maven Monday. I'm your host, Brandon Welch, and I'm joined by Caleb. How do you like your eggs, AJ?

Speaker 2:

Scrambled every time.

Speaker 1:

You are a scrambled guy.

Speaker 2:

I'm a scrambled guy. How about you.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, you know what, over medium.

Speaker 2:

Over medium. Every time I don't like scrambled. I love scrambled.

Speaker 1:

I don't like scrambled, probably for the same reasons you do scrambled or over hard if I'm making it.

Speaker 1:

I don't really like those things give me them runny, no, yeah, no, that's a mess, I want the runny ones. Hey, speaking of breakfast, there is a lesson that we're all learning, but then there's another lesson that nobody's talking about. Yeah, and we're talking. We're not talking about logos. We're all learning. But then there's another lesson that nobody's talking about. Yeah, and we're not talking about logos. We're not talking about the sanctity of keeping classic values. We are talking about story, and you've seen the Cracker Barrel fiasco change back to original. Now I'm a thank goodness. I'm the thank goodness camp. Yeah, I like classic things. I like that. All the thank goodness camp. Yeah, I like classic things I like that, all that stuff is true.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, they should have had a little bit more sensitivity. We're not here to beat up Cracker Barrel. No, there's a lot of things that went on in that boardroom and in that process, and if there's one thing I know about branding hardest jobs, 100 anybody could have they probably had a terrible three weeks and then they're going to be followed by the best fourth quarter ever.

Speaker 2:

Could. That's my, that's going to be my guess. Um, they got more pr. This is not what we're talking about. They got more free press in the last two or three weeks than any restaurant in the whole world.

Speaker 1:

Yes, yes, they did. If only think about it, if only it were by design yes, maybe it was, maybe I don't know we would never.

Speaker 2:

That would be pretty wild would be that we would never know yeah, here's the thing, though.

Speaker 1:

Um, everybody's talking about logo and like, how dare you, and don't take my stuff away. That's fine and y'all you know that's an easy lesson to learn, but let's go to the positive side of that. Um, this episode is actually going to be called um, I don't know who know who needs to hear this, but, uh, keep telling your story. And then we just kind of realized at the last minute oh, you know what? That's exactly what Cracker Barrel did as well. So, um, quick, other story we were on our mastermind call this week. Hey, you should, you should join. How do you get on that mastermind?

Speaker 2:

Methodtrainingcom. I'll say that again maven method trainingcom, you can go there uh, read all about it and sign up.

Speaker 1:

We are making all things about all businesses better with marketing communication on this, uh by month, sorry by weekly call uh, and if you want to join that and basically get uh advice from our team for a fraction of a fraction of a fraction of what you would pay as a client, bring your stuff, bring your media plans, bring your copywriting, bring your branding ideas. Maybe we'll save you from a Cracker Barrel fiasco, maybe we won't, I don't know.

Speaker 1:

But hey, on there we had a guy who's doing some really cool things and he's basically wanting to grow his organization and he just kind of, and giving the summary of who he is and what he's doing, uh, he's like, how should I grow from here? I'm like, hold on, wait, you have done that amount of um impact in an 18 month period. He just he just spouted off some things like they weren't any big deal and he goes. You know, basically I'm not being mean to him, but he's like what should my message be? And I'm like you missed it, dude.

Speaker 2:

You have the message. It's right there.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, and so secondary title of this episode is Do Not Stop Telling your Story. And what happens? As leaders, as entrepreneurs, we have done so much inside the bottle, we have done so much grinding and, you know, lost sleep and lost hours, and we have told the story to ourself hundreds of times and to others hundreds of times and I think we just forget how special that is and a lot of people stop telling the good thing long, long, long, long, before it's about to be their rocket fuel. Yes, and so that that is the thing right.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, and I think I think that shows up in, shows up in your marketing, it shows up in how you talk and a lot of times you end up. You end up. Maybe you get tired of saying it. I don't think you get tired of of talking about it, telling your story, but you think everybody else that's your perception. It's like I've said this a hundred times, so they've definitely heard it a hundred times. The answer is no, they have not and you haven't said it's probably to the same hundred people a hundred times. And so don't, don't give up, don't stop saying it. Somebody's hearing it for the first time. Somebody's hearing it for the right time. You know the first right time and you need to continue telling that story. We're going to talk about that today.

Speaker 1:

There's only two ways to make advertising work better. You increase the repetition or you increase the relevancy. And think about how many not millions, tens of millions, if not hundreds of millions of people just now learned who Uncle Herschel is and just now learned about the values that the store was founded on. And he's not just some random character in that logo. There was a real intention and that was the brand's origin story. Yeah, and what if? And not to pick on them, but what if they had just told their origin story to a generation that hadn't heard it ever?

Speaker 2:

Yeah.

Speaker 1:

Or a generation that hasn't heard it in 20 years. It's maybe stuck in some corner of an About Us page on their corporate website, but my goodness, I had never heard the story. I didn't know who that guy was and I'm a brand guy, right.

Speaker 2:

Yeah.

Speaker 1:

Those are things I stop and pay attention to, and I think that's the thing.

Speaker 2:

Everybody has that nostalgia, everybody has that semblance of our version of, maybe Cracker Barrel's story and you don't want to move away from that. You want to just remind me of that, cause I, if I have a connection with it, it's a part of me, if I've connected with it, when you sever that connection, you're almost starting over. You are starting over, yeah, uh, cause you have to retell a new story.

Speaker 1:

Yes. So the lesson isn't just don't change things. It's like realize the treasure that is in your origin thing. How many times has Nike told people to just do it?

Speaker 2:

Oh, 10,000.

Speaker 1:

Tens of thousands of times in tens of thousands of different ways. Right, I think of the big big brands Hopefully don't lose this but I think of the Clydesdales Budweiser. I think of the Polar Bear Coca-Cola 15 minutes could save you. Yeah, geico hasn't forgot it, and it's like it is still new, surprising and different, if you just treat it as an ever-living thing. So your origin story, why you started this thing.

Speaker 2:

Yeah.

Speaker 1:

Maybe it's your Uncle, herschel Like, who inspired you to do it Like we have an origin story. We don't stop saying it. We don't stop saying marketers that can't teach you why are just a fancy lie. But what you may not know is that that part of our origin story is not just repeated on this podcast. That's not just a slogan. That is something that is said literally every day inside these four walls. We start our Monday morning meetings with that. That's a core value of ours and it came from an era where I was trying to learn marketing and trying to grow some businesses and I realized every time I taught something, I got better at it and I became a more deserving consultant because I was teaching something, and I also learned that that was actually secretly the secret of us getting some really, really cool opportunities. I've literally been able to go all around the world with clients that are doing big, big things just because we originally before we knew why we were teaching, and so that's our little origin story. Yeah, you have one too.

Speaker 2:

That's right.

Speaker 1:

You have something that happened to you when you were eight years old that somehow aligns with where you ended up why, you wanted to be an attorney, or why you like to work with your hands, or that informs your craftsmanship or informs your why you do things. That informs your craftsmanship or informs your why you do things. And then we're all reminded of the famous TED Talk, simon Sinek, which inspired the book Start With why, and he says he says people don't buy what you do, they buy why you do it.

Speaker 2:

And then he says it again People don't buy what you do, they buy why you do it. Yeah.

Speaker 2:

And the thing is they will not just they buy why you do it, but they'll forget why you do it. If you don't remind them, if you don't reconnect with them, you will lose that, that inherent why, and that your story is that why. Your story is the connection to that why. So we're using a pretty broad, pretty broad language around that and every story is different for every business and so we can't be prescriptive in this. But there is some sort of missional, uh origin story or some sort of vision and how you are changing the world, and you can tell that over and over again. Um, the former ceo of starbucks, howard schultz, says only when you're sick of hearing yourself say it will your team begin to hear it A little company called Starbucks.

Speaker 2:

A little company called Starbucks.

Speaker 1:

And he when you are sick of saying it is when everybody else will start to hear it.

Speaker 2:

And so that's why we're having this episode today because somebody out there you think your message is dead. You think your story is dead, that campaign you've been running for a couple, few years. People are done hearing it. They're not hearing it anymore. We need to redo the whole thing. We need to throw it out the window. Take a lesson from some big brands out there. Don't throw it out the window. Now there are times to pivot your message.

Speaker 1:

There are times to Focus on the other character than the main character message there are times to Focus on the other character than the main character.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, there are times to approach it a little bit differently, but we don't throw out the story.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, I think I can say this the student we're talking about in the mastermind the other day, he's building homes for people in Ukraine and we were like you feel like you've come and told that story. Hey, I took the money you donated and I went and built this house and it's like you've only told it from your vantage point. Tell it from the homeowner's vantage point, tell it from the kid's vantage point, tell it from the dog's vantage point, and you can drop people off in the middle of that story and it looks different. You know those movies that have prequels and you see the same storyline but played through a different set of eyes.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, there, there are also those, those movies that I can't think of one right now. Carter would help us where it's like multiple vantage points and and then at the end they all come together and you realize you know you were seeing the same story. That's your campaign, yeah.

Speaker 1:

And whatever got you crazy enough to do this thing in the first place is still motivating, and let's just pretend you weren't changing the angle. You should change the angle, but let's just pretend you weren't. By way of attrition and media fragmentation alone, there are new people who have never heard it. And just like the origin story we all know to be true now for Cracker Barrel, which makes us want the old even more, there are people wanting your old thing even more. It's the first time they've heard it, so yeah, yeah.

Speaker 2:

So just for the record, we're saying tell the same story, don't lose that heart, that the heartbeat behind your business. Um, but we also when if you're thinking about big tv campaigns or radio campaigns we run new ads on a regular basis.

Speaker 2:

We are constantly changing our traffic, our ads but the story, the core, the core heartbeat of those ads has not changed. Inside of that, we are just walking up to it from a different angle and and a different approach at different times. And, um, you may be saying I'm not building homes in the Ukraine or or saving, you know, refugees or whatever your origin story is in there, how you want to change the world. It may be that you're rescuing the world from overpaying for whatever you sell. That literally could be. It is like I've seen too many people get screwed over by shysters and it's my mission to stop that. There are a hundred ways you can say that story.

Speaker 1:

Think about my friend Joey, who has a roofing company, and you think well, what's what's inspiring about a roofing company? Well, he's like I have. I envision a world where people can be lifelong friends with their roofer.

Speaker 2:

Sounds like Joey.

Speaker 1:

It sounds like Joey.

Speaker 2:

Yeah.

Speaker 1:

But think about that, like all of the transactional stuff that goes around the house and he's that's his roofer way of saying I want to be your friend. Wouldn't it be nicer to have a friend that you feel good about doing business with than somebody you just have to? So hey, it's a simple point, but it is a powerful point. Reputation breeds reputation, and you are what you repeatedly do. So just repeatedly do the thing you want to become, and the world will treat you like that. They will show up and trust me. Even when it's not exciting to you, they will be excited about it. Yeah, if you've never had somebody help you articulate that story and and read back to you why you're special, it takes an outside party, and that outside party could be, you know, your mom or your dad, or it could be a trusted friend. It probably should be somebody who doesn't mind shaking you up a little bit yeah, or we would be happy to be that or badgering you with questions yes, no, no, no, what is it really?

Speaker 2:

No, no, no, what is it really?

Speaker 1:

Our origin stories. For our clients take days to pull out of them. Yes, you add up all the time we spent grilling them. It's days.

Speaker 2:

And then they develop over years. Yes, we'll consistently find deeper levels of that origin story and we're like, oh, okay.

Speaker 1:

Now it goes further. Okay, now it goes further. There's a client we just had in today and we had worked with him for a long time I mean a couple years at least before we figured out he had a tattoo that was really iconic or not iconic, but nobody had seen the tattoo except for his friends who go to the pool with him, I guess. But he has a tattoo that had a big part of his origin story tied into it that ended up why he wanted to do what he did. We made a commercial about that tattoo. It's probably the most viral commercial that we've made. Yes.

Speaker 1:

And people ask him about it like all the time now, and so even his church friends. That was like really weird for him. So like you really, have a tattoo.

Speaker 1:

He's like, yeah, so anyway, there are different angles. You pull out and we just kicked the door back open again. But if you've never had somebody, help you do that. Join the mastermind, even if it's just for a month, and bring your thing and be like help me articulate this in a better way MavenMethodTrainingcom, you can sign up and we'll get you right in, but if not, the bigger point there is find somebody who is willing to grill you and say no, why no, why no, but really why? I'm telling you after doing this for 15 years, it takes hours and hours and hours to finally get to the thing. So go do that, find your story, tell it, tell it some more. There is always a new audience and who you are is unique and wonderful. Don't reduce yourself to some shallow set of marketing tactics and cliche phrases.

Speaker 1:

You have a story worth telling. You have an Uncle Herschel, and don't forget that. Yeah. Cool, we'll be back here every week answering your real-life marketing questions. Because, Because, repeat it again marketers who can't teach you why Are just?

Speaker 2:

a fancy lie.

Speaker 1:

Have a great week. Have a great week.