India remains one of the very few economies in the world that has not been severely impacted by the economic crisis that has gripped the world in the past few years. Though the economic growth in India slowed down, the Indian economy has continued to take giant steps (relatively speaking!) in the right direction. This quality of sustenance and robustness of the Indian economy has made it a cynosure for the leading corporations of the world.

Besides China, India is the other major economy that is seen as a prospective big market for the luxury brands. These high-end brands have been gasping for breath as the economic downturn eroded the appetite for purchase of such brands in most parts of the world. This situation has further strengthened the attractiveness of Indian market for the luxury brand makers.

The first paper of the current issue talks about the concept of luxury partner-brand. The authors, Henrik Uggla and Per Åsberg, in their paper titled, “Leveraging the Luxury Partner-Brand: Strategic Portfolio Motives” have attempted to define and elaborate the concept of luxury partner-brand from theoretical sources in luxury and co-branding. The authors claim that though luxury co-branding has been discussed in luxury fashion branding, it has been ignored at large in the brand management research. Their paper attempts to touch this aspect of the present lacuna by focusing on the characteristics of luxury partner-brands and rationale for using them, from the viewpoint of an outside brand. The authors discuss six potential portfolio motives for the luxury partner-brand for the benefit of any brand considering capitalizing on the brand equity inherent in a luxury partner-brand.

The second paper in this issue talks about the consumer profiling aspect for effective brand management. In the paper titled “Effective Brand Management Through Consumer Profiling Using Clustering”, the authors, Nidhi Sinha, Vandana Ahuja and Y Medury attempt to study the ability of individual consumers to associate a product or service brand with the corporate associated with the same. Hence, the paper investigates the extent to which the brand association is coherent with corporate brand identity. The authors claim that their study clearly shows that companies following a combination (hybrid) or family brand name strategies have greater brand association, than companies following an individual product brand name strategy. According to the authors, non-inclusion of the parent brand name in the product brand name reduces the consumer’s ability to associate the product with the parent organization, thereby resulting in sizeable losses to the product brand equity.

The next paper in the issue titled “The Inter-Organizational Dynamics of Brand Alliances”, attempts to identify the business-to-business interactions within brand alliances through the governance adaptations that occur during a period of time. In this paper, the authors, Loïc Sauvée and Mantiaba Coulibaly observe that the level of stability in the long run of brand alliances can be linked to organizational factors. They attempt to show that the governance adaptations result from external forces (competitive pressure, value perception by consumers and customers) as well as internal forces (objectives and expectations of the partners, network positions, resources of the partners).

This issue of the journal also includes a case title “Branding a Commodity: Pista House’s Hyderabadi Haleem” by Syed Abdul Samad. This case deals with branding of a traditional product, concentrated in a particular region and experiencing a cyclical demand. The case highlights how a generic commodity has been branded and sold as a distinct brand globally.

- Nitin Gupta
Consulting Editor