boost to national wellbeing to the swing away from AV.
The combination of this year's royal wedding and next year's Olympics seem likely to catalyse 'Brand Britain' in the eyes of the world Photo: GETTY IMAGES
7:45AM BST 08 May 2011
Comments To that roll-call of unintended consequences we can safely add another. With a global audience of 2bn viewers and a social media buzz that made it the fifth most discussed event ever on Facebook, the wedding was perhaps the biggest advert ever aired for Britain and one which I suspect will feed "Brand Britain" and indeed British brands for many months and years to come.
Marketing experts were too quick to call the negligent impact of the nuptials on the brands that had raced to be part of it. One heroically misguided pre-wedding poll reported that no fewer than 100pc of Londoners felt their purchasing behaviour would not be influenced by any brand associated with it.
That's bad research, because few people ever admit to the influence of advertising (our suggestibility as consumers is not something we are proud of, or even aware of) and a bad call. The bank holiday scrums in the supermarket told us as much before the first tents had even been pitched along The Mall.
Brands galore in fact benefited: from those that successfully surfed the run-up to the event, to those that had starring roles in this uniquely sponsor-free jamboree, to those that will simply enjoy a discernible swell in their fortunes by dint of selling "Britishness" to some degree or other.
Pre-match winners ranged from the obvious (the Royal Mint with its special editions and, ahem, the nation's party goods suppliers) to those brands that piggybacked the moment with well-branded chutzpah. T-Mobile's spoof wedding dance spread like wildfire across social media; John Smith's "no-nonsense" brand of paper plates boasted "Ta for the extra day off" with less fanfare but equal aplomb.