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Countering private brands: More work to do

With a firm set of design principles and brands spanning multiple tiers, retailers seem to be on the verge of locking down ownership of more categories across the store with their own brands.

The grocer has adopted a positioning of healthful living as a marketing strategy for its pharmacy department.
The grocer has adopted a positioning of healthful living as a marketing strategy for its pharmacy department.
Not so fast, counters Dennis Furniss, Partner and Executive Vice President at Kaleidoscope Branding. Furniss still sees some fundamental cracks in the armor.

Foremost, he believes, both CPG companies and retailers have overly complicated the national brands vs. store brands issue. National brands on the whole portray themselves as category masters while many retailers continue to focus their own brands primarily as the lower-priced alternative.

Furniss believes both sides should concentrate more on providing both tangible and intangible benefits that are plausible to consumers. "Don't be a brand duplicator or replicator. Is it just on price? Then I'm not buying into value," he says.

One new branding strategy to watch is for A&P's Live Better brand. The grocer has adopted a positioning of healthful living as a marketing strategy for its pharmacy department. Live Better, a new own brand spanning more than 1,000 SKUs across multiple products, ties directly into this marketing concept.

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