Cheap Monday
En kvalitativ studie av konsumenternas åsikter om märket
AbstractTitle: Cheap Monday ? A qualitative study of the consumers? opinions of the brand (Cheap Monday ? En kvalitativ studie av konsumenternas åsikter om märket)Number of pages: 38 (40 including enclosures)Author: Oskar NorlanderTutor: Göran SvenssonCourse: Media and Communication Studies CPeriod: Autumn 2007University: Division of Media and Communication, Department of Information Science, Uppsala UniversityPurpose/Aim: The purpose of this essay is to examine from the customers? perspective how the Swedish jeans-brand Cheap Monday in just three years time could become such a prominent brand on the Swedish market. An additional purpose is to examine whether there is some kind of brand community connected to the brand or not.Material/Method: The main method used in this essay has been qualitative interviews with ten consumers of the brand. The answers from these interviews has then been analysed using two different theories, Keller?s Customer Based Brand Equity and Muniz and O?Guinnn?s Brand Community.Main results: The main results of this essay is that Cheap Monday is a brand that has become successful due to people?s perception of who the users of the brand are. The consumers has already from the start gotten a good impression of the brand, since they?ve seen people who they liked, and people who they thought were cool and well dressed wearing Cheap Monday clothing. This is linked to the fact that Cheap Monday costs so much less than their competitors, since the ?cool people? that use Cheap Monday clothing makes the low price acceptable and a good thing from the customers perspective, instead of it being a indicator that the brand is unfashionable and no good. It has also been proved that there is somewhat of a brand community connected to the brand, even though the respondents in this essay did not feel connected to this community. On the other hand, almost all of the respondents did think that other people who wear Cheap Monday in some way felt some kind of connection to each other, and most of them a reed on that the brand on its own more or less has originated a new style.Keywords: Cheap Monday, CM, Brand Equity, Brand Community, consumer, associations, Keller, Muniz, O?Guinn