Good Week/Bad Week in Branding

Good Week: Snapchat – The company began selling its coveted Spectacles – sunglasses with a built-in video camera – in extremely limited quantities through a “pop-up” vending machine that will make limited, unannounced appearances across California. The idea: drive demand to create a secondary market for the $130 glasses. It’s working: they’re selling for as much as 10x on eBay.

Bad Week: GM – The venerable automaker announces its first layoffs since 2010, affecting 2,000 workers: 800 at the Michigan plant that makes the Chevy Cruze and 1,200 at the Ohio plant responsible for the Chevy Camaro and the Cadillac ATS and CTS.

Worse Week: Hertz – News of weak Q3 earnings and a greatly reduced future-grown forecast combined to send the car-rental giant’s stock into a nosedive that saw it drop as much as 50%. Blame – in part – the growth of ride-sharing: late last year, Uber and Lyft surpassed car-rental companies’ market share of ground transportation for business travelers. Bucking its “We Try Harder” slogan, perennial #2 Avis’ stock only dropped 18%.