Last year, while hacking Democrats’ emails and working to undermine the American presidential election, the Russian government also granted extensions to six trademarks for Mr. Trump that had been set to expire. The Trump trademarks, originally obtained between 1996 and 2007 for hotels and branding deals that never materialized, each had terms that were coming to an end in 2016.
.. Four of the approvals were officially registered on Nov. 8 — Election Day in the United States.
.. Although Mr. Trump has not managed to develop hotels in Russia despite attempts over the years, and has disclosed no active business ventures there, his intellectual property holdings are a valuable commercial interest. The extension of trademarks such as “Trump International Hotel and Tower” protects his brand in that country and preserves conditions for potential business deals.
.. In a 2015 deposition related to an infringement dispute in the United States, he testified that Mr. Trump’s trademarks generally were “one of his most valuable assets.”
Naomi Klein: Trump is the First Fully Commercialized Global Brand to Serve as U.S. President
So, I think we need to understand that Trump is not playing by the rules of politics. He’s playing by the rules of branding. And, you know, there have been presidential conflicts of interest before. There have been presidents with business interests before. But there has never been a fully commercialized global brand as a sitting U.S. president. That is unprecedented.
And the reason that’s unprecedented is because this is a relatively new business model. It is—the business model that has been adopted by the Trump Organization is really not one that existed before the 1990s. It is what I called in my first book, No Logo, the hollow brand model, right? And the model comes out of the fact that in the—so, the original history of branding is you have a product—you know, maybe it was rice, maybe it was beans, maybe it was shoes—you’re a manufacturer first, but you want people to buy your product, so you brand it. You put a logo on it. You identify it with, you know, some sort of iconic image, like Uncle Ben’s or whatever it is, right? You give it a kind of personality.
.. an advertising executive who said, “Consumers are like roaches. You spray them and spray them, and they become immune after a while.” It’s just lovely insight from a marketer, yeah, about how they see customers. So, marketing started to get more ambitious, and then you started to see these companies that position themselves as lifestyle brands. And they said, “No, we’re not product-based companies. We are in the business of selling ideas and identity.” Nike was the ultimate example of this. Nike CEO Phil Knight stepped forward and said, “We are not a sneaker company. We are not a shoe company. We are about the idea of transcendence through sports,”
.. Starbucks wasn’t a coffee company; it was about the idea of community and the third place. And, you know, Disney was family.
.. So, Trump was more of a traditional business in the 1980s. And Trump was just sort of like a guy who built buildings, but—built buildings and had a flair for marketing. But the game changer for him was The Apprentice. That’s when he got to—he realized he could enter the stratosphere of the superbrands.
.. And his business model changed. It no longer became about building the building or buying the building. That was for other people to do. He was about building up the Trump name and then selling it and leasing it in as many different ways as possible. So you’ve got the Trump water and Trump Steaks and Trump’s very so-called dodgy university.
.. Trump’s big idea, the idea at the center of his brand, is the power that comes with wealth. And so, the more powerful he is—and, of course, he happens somehow to have got himself the most powerful job in the world—that fact alone is massively increasing the value of his brand, which his sons are cashing in on busily on every front by selling that name for inflated prices.
.. this idea that we’re going to somehow catch him out, damage him by proving that he is corrupt, you know, that he treats people awfully, that’s his brand.
His brand is that he’s the boss, and he gets to do whatever he wants.
.. The Apprentice, as you so aptly describe, was really based on selling a cutthroat brand of capitalism to the American people as the way that people should be.
.. Yeah, it’s televised class war. I mean, it opens up with an image of a homeless man sleeping rough on the streets of New York, and then cuts to Trump in his limousine. And it’s basically like “Who do you want to be? The homeless guy or Trump?” Right? And so, you know, this happens. You know, the show launches at a time when people understand that this—that neoliberalism is not lifting all boats. It is this cutthroat world of winners and losers. And which one do you want to be?
.. I didn’t know that in later seasons they deported half of their contestants into tents in the backyard. They called it Trump’s trailer park. And, you know, they would overlay the sound of like howling dogs at night. And it was this idea of creating drama out of the massive inequalities of our economic system. The people who were sleeping in the backyard, who had been deported into Trump’s trailer park, would peek over the hedges to look at the people living in the mansion, you know, drinking champagne and floating around in the swimming pool, right?
.. if you play by my rules, you end up in the mansion. And it will be even sweeter because people are sleeping outside, right? Because you won.
Rating a Semi-Accidental President
If he does nothing, America will be better off. If he delivers tax reform, he’ll be great.
In an interesting piece of analysis, two sociologists semi-independently find that photos of Donald Trump on election night show him displaying facial expressions typical of sadness, not joy... Those in New York business circles who know Mr. Trump best generally saw his presidential dabblings as a brand-building endeavor. This column during the campaign certainly questioned repeatedly whether he really wanted to be president. He obviously was not willing to spend enough of his own money to give him a chance in the popular vote. He found himself in the White House only due to a flukishly small margin of voters in three states that delivered him the Electoral College... So much of Mr. Trump’s recent career involved pretending, not doing. The day may come when we have to admit this is one of President Trump’s chief virtues.
Workers endured long hours, low pay at Chinese factory used by Ivanka Trump’s clothing-maker
Workers at a factory in China used by the company that makes clothing for Ivanka Trump’s fashion line and other brands worked nearly 60 hours a week to earn wages of little more than $62 a week, according to a factory audit released Monday.
.. contractor, G-III Apparel Group, which has held the exclusive license to make the Ivanka Trump brand’s $158 dresses, $79 blouses
.. Its release also comes as the president’s daughter has sought to cast herself as both a champion of workplace issues and a defender of her father’s “buy American, hire American” agenda. Trump, whose book “Women Who Work” debuts next week, was in Germany on Tuesday for public discussions about global entrepreneurship and empowerment.
.. Chinese factories are by far the dominant suppliers for Ivanka clothes, though G-III also works with manufacturers across Vietnam, Bangladesh and South America. G-III factories overseas have shipped more than 110 tons of Ivanka-brand blouses, skirts, dresses and other garments to the United States since October, shipping data shows.
.. The clothing line licensed by President Trump’s private business is also almost entirely made in foreign factories.
.. The factory’s workers made between 1,879 and 2,088 yuan a month, or roughly $255 to $283, which would be below minimum wage in some parts of China.
.. Fewer than a third of the factory’s workers were offered legally mandated coverage under China’s “social insurance” benefits, including a pension and medical, maternity, unemployment and work-related injury insurance, inspectors found.
.. But it did not commit to increasing worker pay and at times pushed back against recommendations that could improve workplace safety.
.. sales of Trump’s brand have boomed in the months since her father began his pursuit of the White House. Net sales for her clothing collection soared by $17.9 million in the year that ended Jan. 31, G-III data shows.