Branding
There are two things that impress me about American businesses - Branding and Franchising. America has some of the most powerful brands and franchise operations in the world.
After all, "coke" is the most recognized word around the world after "hello".
In the US, everywhere you look you have excellent brands and each of these brands has done a good job of burning some associated features onto your brain. For example, Pepsi - Youthful, GAP - hip, Apple -Unique, creative, Ford - Tough, Wal*Mart - Cheap
Businesses spend a lot of time and effort building their brands and are very careful to safeguard it from any sort of blemish - For example, as soon as Kobe Bryant was accused of having an extra marital affair, he was no longer allowed to endorse McDonalds.
My dad was in the US in 1990 and I remember he brought back a suitcase that he bought there. It said Made by ABC, Fine Luggage since 1989 ! The company was only a year old and already they were trying to associate their brand with the features - Durable, Long lasting
However, there are some cases where brands havent been protected very well - The prime example is the GM range of cars. GM sells its cars in the US under the brand names Buick, Chevy, Pontiac, Cadillac, GMC, Oldsmobile, Saturn, Hummer and SAAB. Most of these were seperate car companies that were acquired and merged by Alfred Sloan Jr (MIT- Sloan school) in the 20's and 30's.
At that point, each of these cars had a distinct feature set and were clearly distinguhable. Cadillac was an exclusive car, Buick was for the successful middle aged man, and so on.
However, today there is a lot of confusion about the GM lineup. There are some models that are duplicated in multiple product lines and compete with each other. For example, the Oldsmobile Alero, the Chevy Cavalier, Pontiac GrandAM and Saturn Ion all look the same and as a result, none of them have done well.
The European car companies have done a great job of brand management.
Volvo - Safety
Benz - Comfort
BMW - Driving pleasure
Once you spend a lot of effort building your brand, you have to make sure that you don't dilute its effect - For example, if Mercedes made a cheap car, it would probably suffer a huge reduction in sales of its premium models ....
Toyota did something smart - When they wanted to make a premium car, they created a new brand - the Lexus. As did Honda with Acura and Nissan with Infiniti.
I noticed the other day that Listerine, the maker of mouthwash now has Listerine disinfectant spray as well. That left a bad taste in my mouth - I will never buy a Listerine mouthwash product again ....
After all, "coke" is the most recognized word around the world after "hello".
In the US, everywhere you look you have excellent brands and each of these brands has done a good job of burning some associated features onto your brain. For example, Pepsi - Youthful, GAP - hip, Apple -Unique, creative, Ford - Tough, Wal*Mart - Cheap
Businesses spend a lot of time and effort building their brands and are very careful to safeguard it from any sort of blemish - For example, as soon as Kobe Bryant was accused of having an extra marital affair, he was no longer allowed to endorse McDonalds.
My dad was in the US in 1990 and I remember he brought back a suitcase that he bought there. It said Made by ABC, Fine Luggage since 1989 ! The company was only a year old and already they were trying to associate their brand with the features - Durable, Long lasting
However, there are some cases where brands havent been protected very well - The prime example is the GM range of cars. GM sells its cars in the US under the brand names Buick, Chevy, Pontiac, Cadillac, GMC, Oldsmobile, Saturn, Hummer and SAAB. Most of these were seperate car companies that were acquired and merged by Alfred Sloan Jr (MIT- Sloan school) in the 20's and 30's.
At that point, each of these cars had a distinct feature set and were clearly distinguhable. Cadillac was an exclusive car, Buick was for the successful middle aged man, and so on.
However, today there is a lot of confusion about the GM lineup. There are some models that are duplicated in multiple product lines and compete with each other. For example, the Oldsmobile Alero, the Chevy Cavalier, Pontiac GrandAM and Saturn Ion all look the same and as a result, none of them have done well.
The European car companies have done a great job of brand management.
Volvo - Safety
Benz - Comfort
BMW - Driving pleasure
Once you spend a lot of effort building your brand, you have to make sure that you don't dilute its effect - For example, if Mercedes made a cheap car, it would probably suffer a huge reduction in sales of its premium models ....
Toyota did something smart - When they wanted to make a premium car, they created a new brand - the Lexus. As did Honda with Acura and Nissan with Infiniti.
I noticed the other day that Listerine, the maker of mouthwash now has Listerine disinfectant spray as well. That left a bad taste in my mouth - I will never buy a Listerine mouthwash product again ....
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