Page 21 - Branding Yourself and Your Business

9

KEEP IT SIMPLE

Keep focused on keeping your brand special and limited. The
easiest way to devastate a brand is to broaden the product
line too far. More and more manufacturers are
extending their product line and weakening their brands. However,
not only does this weaken their brands but it takes power away
from the manufacturers and gives it to retailers. This is because
retailers have a limited amount of shelf space and with many
manufacturers extending their product line retailers can charge
more money to the manufacturers for that space.

For a prime example of this visit your local supermarket and
go to the aisle that sells beer. Is there really enough demand on
the planet to have over five variations of Miller Beer? You would
think that regular and light would do the trick. Having more
varieties of the same brand of beer does not increase sales or
consumption it just leads to more production and distribution
costs. How many times have you as a consumer been in front of
a shelf looking for a specific product where there were so many
choices that it was difficult to make up your mind? This is the
whole point about keeping your brand focused and specialized.

When consumers see over five varieties of a product line of one