The New Strategic Brand Management, 5th Edition

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Growth through brand extensions

Brand extension is now a classic of brand management. When they wish to enter product categories from which they have been absent, companies use the name of an existing brand, born in another category, rather than a new brand name created for that purpose. Yet brand extension is not a recent phenomenon (Gamble, 1967). It is inherent in the luxury goods sector: the luxury brands originating in haute couture have extended to accessories, fancy leather goods, jewellery, watch-making, even tableware and cosmetics.

In the same way, the first distributors’ brands (Migros in Switzerland, St Michael in Great Britain) covered several differentiated categories of products. Industrial brands themselves were extended ...