BRAND EXTENSIONS

Measuring the Brand Extensions Effects on the Personality of a Brand After and Before Extension through Aakers Personality Scale

Measuring the Brand Extensions Effects on the Personality of a Brand After and Before Extension through Aakers Personality Scale

Introduction

Brand personality supports the identification of the consumer with his/her brand and thus increases the personal meaning of a brand for an individual (Ambler and Styles, 1997). The reason why consumers perceive brands as having personalities is part of a wider process of building or re-affirming their own self-concept (Aaker, 1999). Self-concept is defined as “the totality of the individual's thoughts and feelings having reference to himself as an object” (Rosenberg, 1979, p. 7) and research has suggested that individuals tend to relate brands to self-concepts (Dolich, 1969; de Chernatony and McWilliam, 1989b; Morgan 1993).

Individuals will accept brands with images similar to their perceived self-concept and reject brands with images dissimilar to their self-concept (Sirgy, 1982). Brands, therefore, have a personality that users value beyond functional utility (Landon, 1974; de Chernatony and McWilliam, 1989a) and consumers will use brands as symbolic devices to explain and express their own particular personality (de Chernatony and McWilliam, 1990; de Chernatony and Dall'Olmo Riley, 1998; Aaker, 1999). Porsche, for example, has a personality that is sophisticated and exciting, Nike has a rugged personality, while IBM's personality is one of competence (Keller, 1998).

Aim of Study

In this study, we will use Aaker's (1997) five brand personality dimensions as measures of core brand evaluation following the introduction of an extension. More specifically, we focus on potential changes along these dimensions, i.e. we compare consumers' pre- and post-extension scores on each brand personality dimension to identify any significant shifts attributable to the extension.

Research Hypothesis

Brand personality is an essential component of brand image that helps create brand equity (Batra et al., 1993; Biel, 1993). Plummer (1985) suggested that brand image consisted of three essential features:

1. physical attributes (e.g. green in color);

2. functional characteristics (e.g. cleans teeth more effectively); and

3. characterization (e.g. youthful).

Significance of Study

This latter characterization process was termed brand personality. It is well known that the introduction of brand extensions can have positive or negative effects on a core brand's image and subsequent equity (Romeo, 1991; Loken and John, 1993; Milberg et al., 1997; Swaminathan et al., 2001). Given that brand personality constitutes an essential part of brand image, extending the brand may well impact on the brand's personality dimensions.

A word of caution is warranted at this stage: unlike previous measures of core brand evaluation which enable the detection of “positive” (i.e. core brand enhancement) and “negative” (i.e. core brand dilution) extension effects (see Loken and John, 1993; Milberg et al., 1997; Ahluwalia and Gürhan-Canli, 2000), a monotonic interpretation of brand personality dimensions is neither possible nor appropriate. For instance, an increase in “ruggedness” following the introduction of an extension could be positive or negative, depending on the salience of ruggedness as a dimension in defining the (original) personality of the particular brand in ...