The difficulties of finding space for new consumer goods products on.
crowded supermarket shelves and the spiralling costs of introducing new.
brands - up to $80 million in some categories (Tauber, 1988) - have.
underscored for most firms the importance of established brands. Brands.
have become highly valued assets as evidenced by the sale of Kraft for $13.
billion or over 600 per cent of book value (Aaker, 1990), leading to renewed.
attempts to understand the function they perform for consumers. It is.
conjectured that brands add value to consumer goods by supplying meaning.
(McCracken, 1993), and this appears to be borne out by a recent study which.
found that consumers throughout the world saw less differentiation between.
products which advertised using performance appeals than those that used.
image appeals (BBDO Worldwide, 1988).
Several aspects of consumers" reactions to brands that may contribute to.
brand equity have been identified, including brand image, brand personality,.
brand affinity, brand relationships, brand charisma, brand attitude, and the.
like, but there is no generally accepted model relating these constructs to.
purchase processes. However, if brand equity is regarded as a set of assets.
and liabilities connected with the brand (Aaker, 1991, p. 15), brand image -.
defined as ".that cluster of attributes and associations that consumers.
connect to the brand name" (Biel, 1993) - must be of central interest to.
researchers as a key determinant of brand equity. In this context, we propose.
the concept of brand origin, which we believe has the potential to contribute.
to our understanding of how consumers perceive brands.
The rest of this paper is organized as follows: first, we consider the concept.
of brand origin, and its distinction from existing concepts such as country of.
origin. Second, we consider the strategic uses made of brand origin in the.
marketplace, including implicit and explicit uses, and reconsider the concept.
