Brian Lara is possibly the biggest brand T&T has produced to date. Think India, Australia, UK, South Africa, Canada, Scotland and a few more cricket countries when making your own assessment. Other mega local brands are Sparrow, Kitch, Hasely, Jack Warner, Machel, Angostura Bitters and Vidia Naipaul who has disowned us. So when a mega brand like Brian Lara agrees to add his name to two projects that go bad (to put it mildly), what is the effect on the Lara brand?
I believe the same rules don’t apply to national heroes like Lara as national products. Lara is more resilient than Angostura Bitters. Part of the reason is the poetry in a Lara cover drive and the happy place it puts us in. Kitch did/does the same for us. So this comprehensive mess in the form of the BL Tarouba Stadium and a BL Cancer Centre by the stadium, puts his brand in the news in a rather unflattering way.
Should he be more careful what he agrees to put his name on? Yes. What should he do about these two ducks? Does he need to call a press conference or put out a release disassociating himself from these scandals? I think the Tarouba Stadium debacle is different from the Cancer Centre one. Responsibility for the Tarouba one will be placed at the foot of politicians and governments. And we all know how much brand equity they have. The other one is private enterprise and people may think he benefits from its operation. So he does, I think, need to come out and say where he stands. And he also needs to watch the company he keeps in future. He is far too precious to all of us Trinidadians and Tobagonians. We want to remember Brian’s cover drives, not his ducks.
