A Newborn 'Brand'

A loud vexatious tone hammering the eardrums in the sound sleep, leaving no other option but to pick up the Apple iphone and snooze the bloody alarm off. This nettlesome task lasts for another 10 minutes when one finally gets up from his comfy Serta and slips his lazy feet into pair of Nike and put up pair of Tommy Hilfiger to enlighten his journey towards bathroom, precluding any chance of stumbling over anything.

After using some Charmin, one picks up his Colgate brush and applies morsel of Sensodyne over it and starts cogitating whether to wear black Van Heusen or navy blue Louis Philippe. After getting ready and having a bowl of Kellogg's and some orange Tropicana, one takes off in his blue BMW for office.

This is how most of us spends our every morning. We come across around 50 odd brands since coming out of our dreams to driving off to our office only. If we count the number of brand exposures a single person experiences on a single day, it pile up to 600-625 exposures.


Despite being surrounded by hundreds of brands daily, have you ever taken a break and contemplated about how these brands came into existence and reached this level?

Well..!! no worries, let me explain it to you in the simplest possible way.
A brand can be seen as a human being who is brought in this world as a baby after deep evaluation of their needs by a couple. A company is just like a couple, which decides to launch a new brand to satisfy their goals.

A new born baby refreshes the life of its parents and give them a new goal in their life, and a new brand revamps the company and gives it a new direction to work on. Parents shape the future of their child by giving their love, time, resources and company invests its resources time and money on its brand to make it successful. Giving a birth to a baby is no child's play and requires meticulous attention and care and so is the case with launching a new brand.

Just like both parents have to be involved in giving birth and take its responsibility, every department of the company has to work for the new brand be prepared for it. There are 5 stages in a brand life,

Stage 1- Embryo Stage: The most critical stage both in human life and in life of brand building.
In humans, at this stage, male sperm fuses in the female egg, union of both results in fertilization of egg and inception of baby life, after which the small egg develops to an embryo till end of 8 weeks.

In a company, every department has to unite and fuse with each other to understand each others' requirements and complications. Most brand birth fails at this stage due to inter departmental clashes within the company. This stage involves plantation of idea of new brand to every department and examination of company financial condition, the condition of its plants, the market reputation and the distribution channel strength. This requires an extensive and rigorous study about company, market and its needs.

Stage 2- Fetal stage: This stage is safe for both human and brand baby.

In humans, the embryo which was developed in last stage grows to a mature baby till the end of 38 weeks, as the organs and body parts grow.

In company, once the initial phase of complicated negotiations and retaliations get over, the idea of new brand is welcomed by every department and they start working on the idea. Finance department to give the funds to each department, the operations department to start manufacturing the new product under new brand, marketing department to plan its branding and advertising, sales department to plan its distribution network to make product available to the customers.

Stage 3 - Delivery Stage: In humans, the full grown baby is delivered and the first time when baby breathe in fresh air. In a company, it is the first time when world will know of their brand and will experience it.

Giving it a Name: In humans, most people give their babies new names but many people name their child on their name, like Martin Luther King Jr., Chanakya (son of Chanak), King George II and many more. In a company, while launching a new brand, and giving it a name, it also has following options:

• Naming it as a completely new brand, like Coca Cola, Pepsi, Cadbury
• Naming it as a sub brand of pre-existing or launching as a brand extension, like Diet Coke, Coke zero, Cadbury Oreo

Giving for Adoption: sometimes situations do not favor human and company to keep baby with them.
Many human babies are born out of mistakes and so is the case with brands. Some brands are born haphazardly due to faulty decisions of managers which conduce unmanageable situations in the company and they have to get rid off the brand by selling it off to another company which is more capable of handling the brand. When a baby is born and couple is not ready for it, they have to give it to other couple who are better equipped to give that baby a good life ahead.

Stage 4 - Growth Stage: At this stage, parents take care of the needs of their children and support them by every possible way to make them independent, A company supports its brand to become super brand and does not require any further diligence of company.

Stage 5- New Family: When the children are grown up adults, they are ready to take responsibilities of themselves and others also. At this stage they are ready to start their own family. Similarly, when a brand is matured and has turned to a super brand, it can support other brands launched under its umbrella. Many brands have turned to umbrella brands and resulting in the family of brands.

For example maggi was launched as a noodles brand of nestle and now there are number of products lines including ketchup, pasta, soups & spices launched as babies of maggi brand which together has taken a shape of maggi family and not anymore requires support of nestle.

So next time you see any baby, see it as a newborn brand and when you see any brand try to find out a baby in it, because every brand is or was a baby. Then you will realize the importance of that baby with which you are chatting with your girl friend or which is under your feet and giving you comfortable walk or which you are wearing and giving you your style or which is protecting your eyes from sunlight or the one which is inside your mouth giving you a good taste.