Year
2016
Authors
DION Delphine, MAZZALOVO G.
Abstract
This study investigates the marketing strategies used to revive “sleeping beauties”, that is, brands that are no longer active on the market but which retain potential brand equity that can be conjured up in the minds of consumers by rearticulating the brand’s heritage. Drawing on interviews with professionals in luxury and mass-market goods, we analyze the characteristics of sleeping beauties and provide a typology of reactivation strategies. A primary contribution of our paper is a better understanding of brand revitalization, by introducing the concept of the sleeping beauty and providing a typology of sleeping beauty reactivation strategies. Differentiated reactivation strategies emerge based on the brand’s reputation on the market before revival, its orientation toward the past after revival, and the brand feature used in the reactivation. This study also contributes to the literature on heritage brands by showing how managers can transform a brand into a heritage brand. The findings show that in reviving sleeping beauties, the key factor is the way the brand can resonate with the collective memory.
DION, D. et MAZZALOVO, G. (2016). Reviving Sleeping Beauty Brands by Rearticulating Brand Heritage. Journal of Business Research, 69(12), pp. 5894-5900.