ABSTRACT
“This company is about icons.” That’s the way Patricio de Marco, the chief executive officer of Gucci, described the brand (quoted in Christina Passarillo, “Gucci Unpacks ‘La Dolce Vita’”; Wall Street Journal, September 22, 2010, B1, B5). And spokespeople for most of the upscale brands would say the same thing about the brands they work for. What they mean by describing their brands as icons is that their brands are distinctive and known for being beautifully designed, well made and expensive. Gucci products can be identified by the Gucci logo—a mark that distinguishes Gucci products from other brands of products with which it competes. We can think of the various tourist sites I will be discussing in this book as being like “brands” that are competing with other iconic sites for visits by tourists.
