Vitamin C? som i Choklad?
En studie av inkongruenta varumärkesutvidgningars inverkan på produktkategorin
The purpose of the study is to explain whether the introduction of a new and different brand by means of a brand extension affects consumers? perceptions of the product category that the brand is launched in. An experiment was carried out to study the following aspects: associations and constellations of associations to the product category, interest, perceived variation, and the perceived similarity with the category from which the brands were extended. In the study, brand breadth in the original product category was used as moderating variable. Aspects found to be affected by the brand extensions were associations to the product category, the constellations of these associations and the perceived similarity with the category from which the brands were extended. However, the associations and their constellations to the category were only affected by the brand extension of the narrow brand, while perceived similarity was affected by both the broad and the narrow brand. One possible explanation for the findings is that the broad brand to a greater extent activated associations to the original category, which were not considered relevant in the new category, while the brand associations to the narrow brand more easily could be transferred to the new category.