This short “film” — it is so beautiful and elaborately portrayed that “video” doesn’t seem to be the correct term — brilliantly conveys Cartier’s positioning and branding. The French jeweler and watchmaker’s heritage is on display. Worth a showing when you cover positioning, retailing, branding, or promotion.
The battle of the brands is the “competition between dealer brands and manufacturer brand” (from our text books) over which will be more popular. Dealer brands, sometimes called private labels, are brands created by store chains (for example Safeway’s O Organics line of organic foods) and manufacturer brands are created by a producer (General Mills Cheerios). Dealer brands have been gaining share — boosted recently by economic downturn induced consumer price sensitivity.
This Bloomberg Businessweek article “Why Grocers Are Boosting Private Labels,” gives an update and some great examples. Dealer brands used to differentiate on price and then more recently offered comparable and sometimes higher quality. Now many retailers are adding brand managers and investing in more aggressive promotion. Surprising fact: in 2009, 8.7% of food and nonalcoholic drink new products were private label – by 2011 the number more than tripled to 31.4%.
The article will provide good examples when you cover branding and/or retailing. Also posted at Learn the 4 Ps.
Mercedes Benz has struggled in recent years in its battle with other Germany luxury carmakers — both BMW and Audi now sell more than the fabled German icon. This BusinessWeek article, “A Mini Mercedes with Big Ambitions” (September 22, 2011) describes the B-Class, smaller and more affordable Mercedes Benz — which targets a “younger, hipper clientele.” The move is an example of expanding a product line downmarket. The decision has implications for Mercedes positioning and brand equity. There are also questions about promotion to a new target market. This is also posted at Learn the 4 Ps.
The new Phantom jeans from True Religion have a list price of $375 — which is a deal when you consider Gucci jeans can go for $495 to $665. You might ask the same question I did “How Can Jeans Cost $300?” — fortunately the Wall Street Journal (July 7, 2011 – non-subscribers may have to click here) asked the same question. The article notes that costs are higher due to material costs and manufacturing — as well as the markups at wholesale and retail. There is also a nice graphic that lists all of the material, trim, labor and other costs. On top of that add the advertising costs — and relatively low sales volume.
This article might provide a nice addition to a discussion of branding, pricing, or manufacturing/costs (in Basic Marketing we cover marketing cost analysis and examine costs and production in our cross-functional chapter).
