Multiple Co-Branding

Bachelorarbeit von Inca Beckmann, Kristina Willas

Abstract:

The exchangeability of products has led to the producers’ need to differentiate themselves from other offers. Due to the flood of advertising on TV, on the radio, in magazines or on hoardings, people usually do not perceive all these stimuli anymore. A well-known brand can help a company to attract new customers and to keep customers loyal.

Since there are already many well-established brands for most product categories, some producers have tried to improve their market position by using co-branding. Puma uses Gore Tex material. Ferrari and Fila have developed a sports shoe together and even Coca Cola, one of the world’s most well-known brands, has launched a new co-branded product with the beer producer Diebels called „Dimix”. Already in 1998 co-branding was said to have a 40% annual growth rate in the US.

This paper focuses on a new trend among co-branding companies: multiple co-branding. Co-branding one’s product not only once, but with several well-known brands one after another or simultaneously in independent agreements is a relatively recent marketing strategy.

It has to be said that even for co-branding in general there are only very few empirical studies giving evidence of co-branding’s effects on the consumer, but so far it seems that multiple co-branding has been ignored completely. We could not find any sources, giving special attention on this new, growing phenomenon. Therefore, we decided to do some research of our own in this field. To analyse if multiple co-branding helps companies to strengthen their brands and to defend their market position against competitors, we will examine how consumers evaluate this strategy.

The central questions that we try to answer are the following:

Q1: Do consumers perceive multiple co-branding?

Q2: How does multiple co-branding influence the consumer’s attitude towards the brand that uses this multiple co-branding strategy?

A consumer survey via e-mail was conducted in order to gain insight into consumers’ view of brands using multiple co-branding. The coloured chocolate lenses Smarties and the ice cream Langnese Cremissimo served as examples in our questionnaire since they have created new products together with many other brands. The findings shall give some useful advice to companies concerning aspects, which have to be taken into account when opting for a multiple co-branding strategy.

Disposition The introduction will be followed by the theoretical part, which is divided into three main subchapters. In the first subchapter, this paper explains the basics of consumer perception and attitudes, which are important to understand consumers’ reaction towards multiple co-branding. The second subchapter deals with branding strategies, more precisely with branding, co-branding and multiple co-branding. The last part of the theory surrounds prior research on the impact of co-branding on consumer’s attitude. Thereafter, a concise conclusion of the theoretical part including an outlook on our empirical research can be found. Chapter three deals with the methodology of this thesis and also comprises a brief discussion about the validity and reliability of the study. The subsequent chapter four is dedicated to our empirical study. It starts of with a portrait of the example brands and their respective co-branding alliances. Moreover, the results of the empirical study will be presented and analysed. Chapter five offers a final conclusion regarding our research questions. The final chapter six includes suggestions for companies and areas of further research.

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