Branded Male: Marketing to Men by
Mark Tungate
Outstanding Book Packed With Info
The male consumer market is exploding. Thanks to emerging social and
cultural trends, men are becoming consumers to reckon with. In 1990 only
4% of men claimed to regularly use a facial product, compared to 21% in
2001. By 2015 the figure will have risen to one out of two men. Male
consumers are the targets of advertisements for cars, computers, business
travel, and alcohol. Though still underdeveloped, this market is robust and
growing.
In Branded Male, Mark Tungate, author of Adland and Fashion Brands,
paints a portrait of the male consumer. Following a typical modern male
through his weekday, Tungate considers how marketers can target him in
all his activities, from morning through night. Through this framework

Branded Male examines male-centered marketing in areas as diverse as
cars, restaurants, technology, fashion & grooming, bars, gyms, and books.
Tungate also traces the evolution of the male consumer over the course of
recent years, providing insight into how marketing experts have
successfully targeted men. From razor blades to beer, from aftershave to
hotels, he finds out which marketing messages have the most impact on
male wallets.
Personal Review: Branded Male: Marketing to Men by Mark
Tungate
I have to admit, I'm one of those tough sells Mark Tungate writes about in
BRANDED MALE: MARKETING TO MEN. I hate shopping and see it only
as an evil necessity. I don't buy trendy, and I hate the whole corporate
look because I'll never look like the models that parade around in that
attire.
Women have a rougher go of it than men do because our society pushes
them into constant upgrades. Men tend to roll along stuck at whatever
pinnacle they reached shortly after graduating high school. Generally men
buy clothes when they gain weight (of course, the clothes are SHRINKING
in the dryer), ruin a favorite shirt, or run out of necessities like tee shirts,
socks, and underwear due to attrition. Most men have shirts that have
birthdays and anniversaries.
Tungate addresses all these issues in a much more elegant manner than I
have here, but I think I've summed up his approach. While shopping for
clothing or toiletries is a social experience for most women, giving them the
chance to catch up on life stories as well as get a supporting vote for a
new and daring purchase, men don't gather like that. I've seen men gather
to buy shotguns, and generally they go for a two for one to buy a his and
his, bass boats, or golf equipment. Even that doesn't require
accompaniment, though. Guys just get together after the initial purchase
and ogle each others' goods.
I approached Tungate's BRANDED MALE: MARKETING TO MEN with
more curiosity than interest. I like to speculate on what markets are going
to open up and how advertisers are going to address them. Being a self-
employed novelist, I pay a lot of attention to emerging technology,
consumer paradigm shifts, and marketing.
Tungate's tour de force covers clothing, cosmestics, grooming, cars,
periodicals and books (which offered me some insights I hadn't considered
before and found very interesting), and sex. I thought most of it seemed

Euro-centric to a degree, or maybe East Coast here in the United States,
but it was intensely readable.
I love history, and Tungate brings a lot of history into the book that I didn't
expect. I found the marketing aspect interesting, but I was more taken with
the history that he delivers. These manifested as brief snippets laced
throughout the text that anchored the points he made and allowed me to
better understand what he was saying. I'll bet most readers that pick this
book up will experience the same thing.
I actually planned to allow myself time to read a chapter a day, basically
covering each of the topics Tungate proposes. Instead, I was sucked in by
the writing and compelled to keep turning pages. I hadn't expected to be
as captivated by the subject as I was (after all, I am male and we have
short attention spans and tend not to over think dress and style).
As a novelist by trade, I found a lot of information in the book that I plan on
using in my writing. I know I've read a good book when it finds a place on
my shelf (and I've got limited space at this point). BRANDED MALE:
MARKETING TO MEN is a great, fun read with plenty of information and
marketing tips. The text is broken up into a modified block format (each
paragraph has a double-space between it that allows plenty of white
space) and that layout actually made the book even easier to read.
If you're interested in marketing, or understanding your husband's
reluctance to go shopping even when he needs to, Tungate explains some
of what's going on. Anyone that's read Alissa Quart's book BRANDED:
THE BUYING AND SELLING OF TEENAGERS will enjoy this one as a
follow-up. And if you haven't read Quart's book, you're in for two books
that are definite eye-openers.
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