What makes for a successful brand extension?

Did you ever wonder why so many marketers think that the way to succeed with a new product is to add an established brand name to the front of it? Actually, there are some very curious examples of major brands spending millions of dollars researching, testing and rolling out products with massive advertising support that fail miserably. This is because having a brand name added to a new product is not an automatic guarantee for success.

I recently came across a list of heavily promoted new products that lasted on the shelves for about 15-seconds before they were sent to the bad-idea-for-a-new-product graveyard. Here are just a few of them:

• Ben Gay® Aspirin
• BIC® Disposable Women's Underwear
• Clairol® Touch-of-Yogurt Shampoo
• Colgate® Kitchen Entrees
• Coor's® Rocky Mountain Spring Water
• Cosmopolitan® Yogurt

There is a dramatic difference between the new product winners and losers using established brand names. To a large extent, the losers are products that do not have an expected connection to the brand name.

The winners are NATURAL product extensions of a recognized and successful brand. Here is a short list of very successfully new products launched as extensions of existing brand names from January 1, 2008 – December 31, 2009:

• Arnold® Select Sandwich Thins
• Bud Light® Lime
• Bush's® Grillin' Beans
• Campbell’s® Select Harvest Soups

If you would like to download a longer list of the new product "winners" and "losers", you can down load more ideas at www.betterretailadvertising.com.