This is the final installment of Isaac Arthur and Cody Fague of CODO Design’s new book on Brand Architecture, The Beyond Beer Handbook. Read parts 1 and 2 here and here.
Part book, part quiz, and part choose-your-own-adventure-style novel, The Beyond Beer Handbook is a purpose-built tool for helping expand your brewery’s portfolio and build a more resilient business.
The Beyond Beer Handbook will quickly get your team oriented and outfitted with the info and concepts to confidently position, brand, and launch any extension, beer or beyond.
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The Beverage Brand Architecture Continuum
We’ve helped dozens of breweries and beverage companies launch extensions over the last few years. And through all that work — all the research, trial and error, and practical application — we’ve arrived at the following overarching framework for guiding this process. These strategies are the basic building blocks for any growing brand.
We call it the The Beverage Brand Architecture Continuum and it comprises three core Brand Architecture approaches: the Branded House, Sub/Endorsed Brands, and a House of Brands. Each of these strategies have their own sub-strategies, tactics, pros, cons, nuances and quirks.
There’s a fourth overarching Architecture approach as well, the Hybrid Brand, but this is simply a blending of any of these other strategies as needed.
Click here to view this on the Beyond Beer Handbook site.
Note the red color in the above infographic — that’s your parent brand. On the left side of this illustration, on the Branded House and Sub Brand side, you’ll see that the parent brand is the most prominent element on the packaging. In both of these cases, your parent brand is the main purchasing driver (why people buy that product).
As you make your way further to the right on this continuum, into the Endorsed Brand and House of Brands territory, the parent brand’s role diminishes to nothing.
This is where the product brand itself takes center stage with the parent brand either acting as a subtle endorser (a guarantee of quality or a shared set of values, etc.) in the case of an Endorsed Brand) and falling away entirely in the case of a new brand.
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Now let’s take a closer look at these four core strategies.
Brand Extensions
A Brand Extension is when you use your brewery’s name on any product in a non-beer category.
When launching a new non-beer product within a Branded House architecture model, you are creating a Brand Extension.
A Brand Extension is when you use your brand equity — visual equity as well as all of the goodwill, recognition and trust your customers have with your brand—to create a new product outside of your main category.
This usually manifests as the parent brand identity along with a simple category description.
Example: A brewery opens a distillery under the same (or similarly themed) name — Dogfish Head Brewing > Dogfish Head Distilling. Here, you’re leveraging the weight of your parent brand itself to lend credibility to the new product line.
The more established or respected your company, the more effective this will be.
Sub Brands
A Sub Brand is a brand within your parent brand. It carries the same overall values that intuitively link it to the parent brand, but targets a specific audience with further defined attributes and benefits that might not be offered by the parent brand alone.
A Sub Brand strategy is similar to the Branded House approach in that each offering is represented under a single parent brand. The difference here is each SKU will have further attributes — name, identity and characteristics — both visually and conceptually, that position each individual product as a “brand within the brand.”
A Sub Brand is connected closely to your parent brand — think of it as a little extra spice given to separate each product from one another within your overall portfolio. A Sub Brand still carries the same overall values that intuitively link it to the parent brand, but targets a specific audience with further defined attributes and benefits that might not be offered by the parent brand alone. This allows you to build stronger bonds with your existing customers while expanding your overall footprint by dipping your toes into new categories and audiences.
If your parent brand is well-known for a particular beer or style, you can lend your overall brand promise credibly to the new brand while allowing the extension explore new territory — perhaps a new style or product offering that differs from what your parent brand is presently known for. In this way, Sub Brands can be a flexible way to bring new products to market.
Endorsed Brands
An Endorsed Brand features the new brand first and foremost, with a logo, icon or text that represents an “endorsement” from your parent brand.
An Endorsed Brand is built to stand mostly on its own, but with some sort of endorsement — or, assurance of quality, trust and credibility — from the established parent brand. An Endorsed Brand leverages the mind share and reputation of the parent brand while insulating it to varying degrees.
If this new extension fails, it won’t bring as much blow back upon the parent brand as would the failure of a Sub Brand or Brand Extension. On the other hand, if the new extension goes gangbusters, it won’t work against your parent brand by confusing customers with your presence in a new category, or dramatically shifting your overall positioning and perception.
This approach cleaves closer to the House of Brands model in that you may have many different products in your portfolio — each with their own distinctive brand — yet these offerings are still supported in a secondary way by the parent brand.
This can be via a “stamp of quality” or in a more meaningful alignment (think a similar naming element or thematic relationship).
Under an Endorsed Brand approach, the newly developed brand itself acts as the main purchasing driver for customers, while die-hard fans of your parent brand will appreciate the added legitimacy from the endorser.
Endorsed Brands are a great strategy when you want to reach different audiences and market segments while continuing to leverage the parent brand’s equity.
House of Brands (aka Creating a new Brand)
A House of Brands architecture is a collection of completely disparate, independent brands with little-to-no ties between each other or to a corporate brand.
In this approach, each brand has its own value proposition, messaging, and positioning, and is completely independent as far as the consumer is concerned. We say “corporate” in this case because “parent” denotes some manner of a relationship with an extension. In a House of Brands model, there is no parent brand connection whatsoever.
This approach allows corporate brands to target different consumers and segments with niche brands and products that are tailored to their specific needs and values without competing with other brands in the portfolio. This makes for a more robust overall business.
Traditionally the stock and trade of mega corporations like Procter and Gamble and Unilever, this can be a valuable concept for craft breweries to employ depending on their product mix, volume and sales goals as well.
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Beverage Extension Assessment Tool
Let’s put this all together and see which approach makes the most sense for your next product
The Beverage Extension Assessment Tool (B.E.A.T.) is made up of 14 questions to guide you to the correct brand strategy prescription for your next release. Some of these questions are straight forward. Some take more time and consideration. Answer them to the best of your ability and see where you land.
After the Assessment, you’ll have one or two possible strategy prescriptions. At this point, you can think of The Beyond Beer Handbook as a “choose your own adventure” novel.
Skip ahead to learn about the pros and cons of a particular strategy. Once you understand the ins and outs of that approach, you can continue on with positioning, naming and branding your new product in confidence.