There are no rules in branding, save for the law of the jungle. We live in a world where it's possible to buy Nascar brand meat snacks, Burger King-themed underwear, Harley-Davidson cake-decorating kits. Money is no respecter of decency and logic. Personally, I love beer-flavored frosting.
But perhaps no brand hookup makes less sense to me than Ed Hardy -- a tattoo-themed street wear imprint of fashion megalomaniac Christian Audigier -- and wine. Yet there it was at my local Whole Foods, stacked in orderly end-cap pyramids.
(The notoriously man-tanned Audigier will be signing wine bottles at the Whole Foods in Venice on Saturday).
Wine is a cultivated taste of a delicately cultivated product, a source of savored satisfaction and nuance, a living liquid that rewards reflection and restraint. The haute-trash Ed Hardy brand -- as near as I can parse it -- represents getting wasted in Las Vegas and leaving your $50 trucker hat in the cab on the way to the airport.
And yet, of course, I am wrong. The Audigier empire is pillared on a single brilliant concept, which is the ecumenical emptiness of branding itself.
A little background: Audigier, who is from Avignon, France, but lives in Los Angeles, began his career as a designer of pret-a-porte jeans and other clothing. He made his branding bones as the tastemaker behind Von Dutch, based on the graphical work of L.A. pin-striping artist Kenny Howard. Audigier is, in fact, the fashion criminal behind the Von Dutch trucker hat (worn by the likes of Ashton Kutcher, Britney Spears, Madonna and a billion loutish wannabes).
In 2004, Audigier scored a licensing agreement with tattoo and graphics artist Don Ed Hardy, a Bay Area legend in ink, and soon Ed Hardy graphic designs began appearing on, well, everything: T-shirts, hoodies, purses and perfume, socks and sunglasses, barware and bedding, swimwear and underwear. The brand has pretty much exploded.
Audigier's conglomerate now comprises eight global brands -- including the modestly titled Christian Audigier imprint -- and more than 75 licensees. Las Vegas nightclub, Beverly Hills boutique . . . you feel me, dog? There is, apparently, no shark Audigier dare not jump. In March, Audigier announced a licensing agreement with Beverly Hills "celebrity" dentist Eric Fugier to create a line of Ed Hardy branded toothbrushes, dental floss and mouthwash. Ay ay ay.
