Stretch Marks

A few weeks ago I wrote about a branding difference between the UK and the USA, identifying the relatively low presence of Celebrity Chef food brands here.

Last week I read that while Chefs might be missing a trick, other appeals to a higher branding authority clearly weren’t.
Martha Stewart, fresh from stamping her name on new housing communities and home renovation products, is planning her first line of food products.
That seemed like a pretty wide portfolio for any brand, Housing to DIY to Food, and did raise for me the question of what constitutes a brand stretch too far.

Barb Stuckey recently wrote in The Morning Cup about Shell selling energy drinks and I’ve seen their brand on Ice Creams in Holland. At first sight, two completely crazy brand stretches, but given that Shell is also a retailer with thousands of gas station shops, perhaps the intention was just to launch own label foods. Retailer brands do have powerful stretch capabilities.

It’s frequently stated that 9 out of 10 new product launches fail. What’s rather less well known is that 1 out of 2 brand stretch launches fail also!!! The odds are better but you might as well bet on heads or tails – clearly brand stretch is not the low investment, low risk idea that many companies seem to believe. The key, as always, is simply stated and yet terribly difficult to achieve.

We really need to understand our brands and our consumers with searchlight clarity, and most important of all we need to be honest with ourselves about their real strengths and weaknesses.

Brand Stretch development is no place for the corporate over optimism so often used as a substitute for true brand insight. Failure here can damage the parent brand as well as kill the extension.

Me, I’m thinking of stretching my consultancy from innovation to climate control. After all, with a name like Rapid Ice, we must be OK on global warming.