Lyrics on pots, pullovers, pans and panties - Sophia Brown uses lyrics as draws to branded items

Reggae singer Sophia Brown is hoping to pull more fans to her music through selling branded items with catchy phrases from her songs. Speaking with The STAR, Brown said that she first tried the idea in 2012 to promote her 'Catch Me If You Can' album released that year but has added a number of items to her stock recently.

"We had those stuff before, like underwear. We did underwear before and realised that they were generating huge interest in terms of the fellas who buying them for their ladies," she said. Brown says that titles of her songs are placed on the women's underwear in an effort to pull consumers to the products.

"Give Me That Good Love, that is a title of a song from the album Catch Me If You Can. I produced the riddim Lover's Rock, and if you go ahead and put that on an underwear, your gonna find out why your love is rocking," she explained. "So we tend to use catchy phrases pertaining to my music, like Catch Me If You Can and I am Wide Awake - those were the titles of my albums and my song. You can realise what that would mean," she added. Catch Me If You Can was released in 2012, Wide Awake coming about two years later.

Having tried the branded product strategy, she says her team has realised that many persons gravitate to the items sold on her website, www.sophiabrownmusic.com, and her online store at www.dazzle.com. Currently, she offers maternity wear, baby items, male pullovers, bags, and T-Shirts. "We will be looking to add like pots and pans to the brand. We will be adding things like socks and a whole bunch of other stuff," she said.

Brown, who was only recently cleared by doctors to return to the stage after a near, fatal accident last year, noted that it is important for Jamaican artistes to pay keen attention to branding.

"Many of us as artistes only think that we can go on stage and that's where you make money, from, but there are so many other things that we can tap into," she said, while noting that unscrupulous persons will seek to benefit from artistes' brands. And Brown stressed that with more that one income stream, she is able to pay persons who work for her even without getting booked to perform at events.

"Myself and my team decided that we can do other things to bring in money because of course, I have a staff," she said.