Blog 3. Introduction to Branding & the leading brand: Patagonia.

Hello Conscious Consumers,  

Today we are going to discuss Branding and learn what it is, discuss brand identity and will dive into Kapferer's Brand identity prism model and Aaker's personality scale. Throughout this blog post, the focus will be on the leading outdoor brand: Patagonia and like always, links will be provided.

What is Branding? 

Branding is a complex yet popular subject area for academics. Brands are everywhere in every aspect of our life – Economic, social, cultural and religion (Kumar Maurya, 2012). Brands have many definitions and can be vaguely described as a logo (Ridgway and Myers, 2014).  

 

Here is a four minute crash video, discussing what branding is. 

So what does it mean by the term  'Brand identity'? 

 

There have been models and frameworks to establish what a brand identity is such as Kapferes (2012) brand prism model as well as Aaker’s personality model (1996). Brand identity can be described as a unique set of brand associations which conveys promises to customers as well as implying the company’s core values and the examining the company’s extended identity (Alexander et al, 2014). A company’s core identity is known as the heart of the brand and remains constants as the brand moves to new markets and creates new products. The core identity focuses on what the products attributes are, services, user profile, store ambience as well as product performance (Ghodeswar, 2008).

 

Brands need to have a deeper inspiration and not be hallow (Kapferer, 2012). They must also have character and their own values and beliefs to help attract buyers and help consumers identity their own identity as well as the brands. The Brand-Identity prism allows markers to correctly analyse a brand by researching the product, perceived identity sources of products and services as well as looking at relevant communication channels (Kapferer, 2012). To find out more about Kapferer's brand prism click here.

Brand Personality? Made Simple. 

 

Due to the complexity of human personality a comprehensive scale named the big five model was developed to create a simplistic way to understand how personalities traits can be defined as the exhibit a certain kind of response across various brands (Rauch and Frese, 2007). The big 5 models look as the intrinsic organisations of an individual’s mental world therefore diving into the consumer personality.

So with this new branding knowledge, let's look at the leading brand Patagonia. 

Patagonia is an outdoor clothing and gear company known for its commitment to environmental and social responsibility. This company was founded in 1973 and has now become the leading sustainable outdoor brand within the fashion sector. This brand focuses emphasising quality, durability, and sustainability in everything they do (Patagonia , 2020). 

This outdoor brand is in the lead due to their distinctive features it is commitment to sustainability throughout their successful and emotive story telling as well as making sure they have a sustainable supply chain. The company puts the environment at the heart of their business and they do the best to make sure that all their clothing is made from recycled materials, organic cotton and all ensures that all the manufacturing processes are environmental (N Kundu, 2023). 

Actions and Strategies: 

1. 'Worn Wear' Product Repair Scheme : Patagonia has launched a repair scheme in order to encourage customers to buy less and reduce waste. They have also extended this scheme by allowing customers to buy and sell Patagonia items to each other therefore extending their lifestyle as well as encouraging second-hand purchasing which has been seen as a consumer trend in Blog 2. 

2. Transparency and Ethical Sourcing: Patagonia is very transparent about its supply chain, ensuring ethical sourcing of materials and fair labour practices. Click here to find out more about Patagonia supply chain. 

3. Environmental Initiatives '1% for the Planet' Scheme': This scheme has currently raised 89 million pounds for the environmental and global movements and pledges businesses to donate 1% of their annual sales to support the environmental cause. 

If interested in saving the environment please join Patagonia and click here. 

4. Successful story telling: Featuring on Patagonia website the company tells stories about the environment and how it consumers can help save it. This has been seen to be effective and makes consumer think about their purchasing behaviour to buy less and reuse. 

So, where what's Patagonia's brand prism? 

Still not too sure? Click here to find out more information.

See you on the next post 🪴 x

 References - 

 

Alexander, A., Francis, A., Kyire, L. A. and Mohammed, H. (2014) The Effect of Corporate Social Responsibility on Brand Building. International Journal of Marketing Studies. Vol.6 (3).

Ghodeswar, B. M. (2008) Building brand identity in competitive markets: a conceptual model. Journal of Product & Brand Management. Vol.17 (1), pp.4–12.

 

Kapferer, Jean-Noël. (2012) The new strategic brand management : advanced insights and strategic thinking. London: Kogan Page

 

Kumar, U. and Mishra, P. (2012) What is a brand? A Perspective on Brand Meaning [Online]. Available: https://asa.or.th/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/1322-2980-1-SM.pdf.

N Kundu, P. (2023) Patagonia - Balancing Profit and Environmental Responsibility: a case study [Online]. www.linkedin.com. Available: https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/patagonia-balancing-profit-environmental-case-study-kundu/.

Patagonia (2023) Patagonia [Online]. eu.patagonia.com. Available: https://eu.patagonia.com/gb/en/our-footprint/supply-chain-environmental-responsibility-program.html.

Rauch, A. and Frese, M. (2007) Let’s put the person back into entrepreneurship research: A meta-analysis on the relationship between business owners’ personality traits, business creation, and success. European Journal of Work and Organizational Psychology. [Online] Vol.16 (4), pp.353–385. Available: https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/13594320701595438.

Ridgway, J. and Myers, B. (2014) A study on brand personality: Consumers perceptions of colours used in fashion brand logos. International Journal of Fashion Design Technology and Education. Vol.7 (1).