Part 3 – Applications (I suggest you read Part 1 and Part 2 first, if you haven’t done so)
Quick Summary: This is part 3 consisting of excerpts of my senior philosophy major thesis at The College of New Jersey that I wrote under the direction of Dr. Consuelo Preti.
In part 1 I argued that the jointly necessary and sufficient conditions of a brand are much more vast than a logo. Additionally, I honed in on the subtle differences of a “brand experience” and [the mental state of] “experiencing a brand” through the accumulation of its identity conditions.
In Parts 1 & 2 I broke down the brand experience. It might be said that experience is the only necessary condition of a brand – however in a similar way that claiming that a brand is a product, this claim, too, is an oversimplification. The brand’s external onlookers (the audience) have experiences; yet this raises the question, “Experience of what?” The experiences are of external content such as product, environment, brand-mark, and logo that are placed together in a manner that provokes a particular experience. In Real Time, Mellor (1981) argues that experiences are events since an experience is never isolated as one experience but rather we perceive a sequence or “succession” of experiences one after another. In a similar way, “a brand experience” is most accurately described as an “experience of various experiences.” The “brand experience” is an identity condition of the brand extended throughout time in the form of an “event” with temporal parts.
In Part 3, this is where the fun starts and what some may label as “abstract stuff” all of a sudden becomes more “concrete” and is applied to brands that have undergone a kind(s) of “brand change.” This is what I’ll discuss in Part 3. As always comments a are welcomed.
Part 3
In this section I will show how the above arguments can be applied to examples of real brands. The examples that follow are brands that have undergone a change in one or more of their identity conditions. Moreover, this example will show how the above construction of “brand” as a perduring entity can help understand, analyze and have a positive impact on future brand strategy when modifications are made to a brand.
Abercrombie & Fitch was founded in 1892 and started as an establishment selling formalwear, outdoor gear, fishing equipment, and guns to an older, affluent audience. (Zimbalist, 2005) Yet around 1992 the brand underwent a massive and intricate brand change along with expanding into various newly created “sub-brands”, or a brand within a brand. While the brand is still a retail establishment, the target audience dropped to ages 14-22. The entire product line was replaced with new types of product. While the name and (moose) logo stayed the same, it is safe to say that this example qualifies as a “re-rebranding” effort. Furthermore, while the company did not change the brand did; and underwent such a substantial modification that the “new” Abercrombie & Fitch does not seem, in any way vaguely identical to the original. This observation sounds reasonable; after all, the product, environment, and audience all changed. The experience one has with the brand is different, yet that alone need not qualify a new and distinct brand. The experience is different; yet the brand retains some of its “essence” or historical identity conditions that constitute it as “Abercrombie.” While these conditions are not directly observable they are discretely placed to create an “updated” Abercrombie from Abercrombie at T1. However, Abercrombie retained the “love of outdoors” environment or contextual setting of the brand while dropping the age of the audience that they intend to see in that ‘setting’. If the “Abercrombie brand” is the four-dimensional entity, perduring through time, the “new” Abercrombie is not that different but is simply an evolved time slice of the original brand. The Abercrombie logo is a graphic representation of a “moose” and the evolved Abercrombie brand did not change the logo. This supports my prior argument that change in a brand’s logo does not constitute an all encompassing re-branding (even though the brand changes) – the other changes in the brand’s conditions are much more substantive and are what dictate the re-branding. However, as mentioned before, the Abercrombie “brand-mark” is not it’s logo and it can be argued that the brand-mark did change especially in how the product is made and presented to the consumer. The evolved Abercrombie offers products such as jeans that are torn and covered in paint stains. While these features might be shocking to find on new product in a clothing store, these are attributes of the new Abercrombie. Moreover, these new features in product help provoke a new type of experience in the consumer, along with attracting a different type of consumer.
However, with that said, closely after the time of re-branding, Abercrombie introduced various “sub-brands” or brands that are financially owned by the company but are distinct from the main Abercrombie and Fitch brand. In particular, I will focus on the concepts and brand extensions of “Hollister Co.” and Ruehl 925.” The question is whether these two entities are metaphysically speaking brand extensions of the Abercrombie brand or are different and distinct brands.
While the isolated Abercrombie brand can be argued to be an updated time slice, the addition of Hollister Co. and Ruehl 925 in the Abercrombie company portfolio (added after the time of Abercrombie’s brand change) present an interesting problem. A common characteristic of all three brands is that they target a common audience of the similar age range; yet Hollister Co. and Ruehl 925 have no overt indications that they are included in the Abercrombie brand. Each has a different experience and it is reasonable to say that they could be viewed as two different brands that are unrelated to Abercrombie. Therefore, it seems that these “sub-brands” are related to the main brand but are distinct even though they are a part of the company in a colloquial sense. The actual “brand” perdures while its spatial components endure through time. The above “sub-brands” can be treated as spatially extended entities of Abercrombie in a similar way that the conditions of a brand are spatially extended.
The sub-brand “Ruehl 925” is especially interesting to examine since it no longer exists. Abercrombie & Fitch intended to expand the Abercrombie brand to a similar, yet slightly older demographic by creating the new Ruehl 925 concept and stores in 2005. By 2010, poor performance led to Ruhel’s demise and closing. It is apparent that Abercrombie thought this brand extension would favorably impact their business and thus expand the Abercrombie brand to a different audience who has an affinity towards the Abercrombie and Fitch. However, it seems that by expanding the brand they have essentially shrunk it into obliteration, and in turn, did not create an expansion of the Abercrombie brand but actually an entirely different brand. While Abercrombie attempted to create a “sub-brand” distinct from its other brands, Ruehl’s brand experience was perhaps too similar, along with similar product, and environment as the Abercrombie brand and retail environments.
I return to my prior discussion of presentism, the view that only present things exist to show that on this view, Ruhel 925 no longer exists. Yet if Ruehl is a component of the larger Abercrombie brand, then how can it be said that the components of this brand that do exist actually perdure over time? One solution is a claim I proposed earlier; that Ruehl 925 is not associated with Abercrombie and therefore is its own, independent brand. This might be true upon an audience’s perception of Ruehl 925; however even though the brand was intended to be a brand extension of the Abercrombie brand the prior intentions are irrelevant and with a different audience, product and overall experience, Ruehl does come across as a distinct brand that is not related to Abercrombie.
I believe that an analogy can be drawn from Mellor’s account of perdurantism. Perduring entities are events, Mellor argues and those that endure are “things.” In accordance with Mellor’s account, I argued the brand is the “event” that is extended in four-dimensional space and time – and the products along with the various brand conditions are the “things.” In the case of Abercrombie, many brand components changed – yet the name and logo did not. In a way, the logo did not have to change in order for the brand to be considered updated.
A similar case holds for the name; as an outside observer looking at this “re-branding” it appears that Abercrombie wanted to retain some of its identity and obliterate other aspects of its identity. The intentions of the brand change were to target different demographics but also retain some of the brand’s historical essence. Furthermore, in a way, the “Abercrombie brand event” continues as a similar “event” to the brand at Time 1 in more ways than not; even though, to the common consumer it simply appears as a brand being “present” at Time 1. The product has changed along with the audience and overall experience. Moreover, since this brand expresses themselves through retail stores, the brand environment was also changed to reflect the tastes of their new audience.
Another brand that has undergone brand change is Burberry. While both Abercrombie and Burberry have undergone similar changes, Burberry has not attempted to expand the brand by way of introducing other distinct brands, such as Abercrombie’s Hollister and Ruehl that, on the surface are not related to Burberry. I believe that the Abercrombie branding has a greater complexity for this reason. However, Burberry does have a long 155-year history that started making trench coats for wartime, then to clothing for the queen. Yet in 2000 the luxury products were widely counterfeited and viewed as a “second rate” luxury brand (Hass, 2). Also, prior to the Burberry brand change, the company was selling the Burberry license and trademark to vendors in other countries who would simply place the Burberry logo onto a mere product. I believe that this statement requires some attention because I do recognize that it may be used as an objection.
For instance, one might object as follows: “Well, Burberry places their logo on product – why is it any different if the license is sold to outside vendors who produce product with the Burberry Logo?” This is an interesting objection since the prior outside licensing was not necessarily counterfeit – yet did place Burberry brand into the responsibility of those outside of Burberry. I will now address this and wish to draw special attention that the objection places a large degree of emphasis on the product and logo. As I discussed earlier, while the product is a necessary and sufficient condition for a brand the logo is not. Furthermore, selling the license to outside vendors interrupts the brand’s continuity. Also, the consumer may not have a belief that they are getting a genuine branded product. In light of this diminishing brand equity, the strategy was to eliminate the Burberry “checkered” brand-mark from all except 10 percent of the product, thereby preserving its exclusivity. Additionally, the brand expanded into different types of product, in addition to manufacturing their clothes that target a younger, more progressive audience. Moreover, the evolved Burberry uses new means of getting their consumers to have the brand experience through digital media. Burberry is an evolved time-slice of the original brand – while retaining some of the historical essence by injecting it into the contemporary setting.
Conclusion: In this paper I argued that a brand is an entity that persists overtime. This entity persists by perduring over time. I argued that typical colloquial conceptions of a “brand” overlook important considerations such as how time and experience coincide with what a “brand” is commonly attributed as. After defining what a “brand” is, I inquired into what changes will cause the brand to remain the same brand it was at Time 1 or whether this brand is a different brand all together after its brand modifications by applying the identity conditions to two examples of brand change. In both cases I showed how a different audience at T2 can impact the brand’s modifications. Specifically, the Abercrombie and Fitch application showed that the brand’s intentions of a brand extension can actually be a separate brand along with producing unfavorable results for both the new brand and the main brand of which it was “born” from. In the Burberry case, I showed how a brand’s actions can adversely impact its continuity along with the prominent presence of counterfeit product and how modification in identity conditions can successfully evolve the brand.
Jesse de Agustin
@JdeAgustin
Selected Works Cited:
Hass, Nancy. “Earning Her Stripes” The Wall Street Journal Magazine. 10 September 2010. http://magazine.wsj.com/features/the-big- interview/earning-her-strips/tab/print/
Kurtz, Roxanne Marie. “Introduction to Persistence: What’s the problem?” Persistance: Contemporary Readings, ed. Sally Haslanger and Roxanne Marie Kurtz (MA:MIT Press, 2006), 1-27
Mellor, Hugh D. “Selections from Real Time” Cambridge University Press. (1981). Persistance: Contemporary Readings, ed. Sally Haslanger and Roxanne Marie Kurtz (MA:MIT Press, 2006),233-240
Mellor, Hugh D “Real Time” Cambridge University Press: Cambridge. (1981)
Muiez, Albert M. O’Guinn, Thomas C. “Brand Community”
The Journal of Consumer Research. 27.4 (2001): 412-432.
Zimbalist, Kristina “Style & Design: Mike Jeffries, 61, CEO Abercrombie & Fitch” Time Magazine Online Edition. Fall 2005. http://www.time.com/time/2005/style/091305/mike_jeffries_61__ceo__27a. html
Like this:
Like Loading...
