In 1916 a designer from Root Glass Company of Terre Haute, Indiana was asked to design a glass bottle. The brief was pretty straightforward. To design a bottle which when broken, the pieces would still be recognizable as part of the whole. He succeeded beyond his wildest dreams. The bottle he designed was the classic Coke bottle, which has become one of the most famous glass icons ever. The bottle is still in service, still recognizable, and been passing the smash test for every generation over the last 80 years.

The Coke bottle story reveals a fascinating aspect from a brand-building perspective, because in theory all brands should be able to pass this sort of test. So if you removed the logo from your brand, would it still be recognizable? Would the copy stand up to it? Would the colours, graphics and images standing alone pass the text?

The Smash Your Brand philosophy considers every possible consumer touch point with a view to building or maintaining the image of the brand. The images, the sounds, the touch and the text all need to become fully integrated components in the branding platform. Each aspect playing a role as vital as the logo itself.

Smash Your Brand into 12 different pieces. Every piece should work independently of one another, although each is still essential in the process of establishing and maintaining a truly smash-able brand. The synergies created across the pieces will be essential for your brand's success.

Can your brand survive being smashed? It is an interesting exercise which removes a logo-fixated mindset and brings you closer to a philosophy valuing all elements that create the brand that it is. Two black ears from a well-known mouse are instantly recognizable as Disney. A Singapore girl suggests Singapore Airlines. These are only components of the brand, and yet they're unmistakable.

The trick is to create each element so that it's so strong, so able to stand alone, yet at the same time so integrated and synergistic that it can take the brand to a whole new level of familiarity.

If you want to understand the dynamics of sensory brand building this chapter summarizes every element of it. It takes you through fascinating statistics from the BRAND sense study and present aspects of branding you most never have noticed before now.

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Learn more about the BRAND sense Symposium - the world's biggest branding conference - exploring the world of sensory branding. Or click here to learn more about Lindstrom's latest BRAND sense DVD program on sensory branding taking you through the steps required to implement 5D branding in your organization.