Formulating the Brand Strategy for a Product Launch

Chemical Company

Challenge

Challenging a paradigm to command premium pricing

A major global chemical company had branded its polypropylene business under its master corporate brand—as most of its polymer products were considered commodity-like. However, it had recently identified 10 high-performance polymers that stood out from standard polymer products and could command premium pricing. The company felt the level or performance presented an opportunity for creating a product brand separate from the main corporate brand.

The company hired FullSurge to work through three strategic branding questions:

Which, if any, of the new product grades were worthy of branding?
Could a single product brand encompass all of the new product grades?
What unique value proposition would define the new branded products?

Solution

Branding a new portfolio defined by breakthrough technology

The FullSurge team conducted primary qualitative research in the company’s North American, European and Asian markets. The research mostly validated the chemical industry’s practice of not branding individual product lines, as products were generally seen as undifferentiated. However, when customers and prospects were presented with concepts showing the new high-performance polymers, the conversations changed completely. Customers and prospects thought the technological capabilities offered by the new products—and more importantly, the benefits they provided—were truly breakthrough in nature. They agreed that it made sense to brand these innovations separately from the corporate brand and that doing so would reinforce both their higher level of performance and their premium pricing. Through an additional line of customer questioning, we were also able to identify which products would—and would not—qualify under the new brand umbrella.

Customers and prospects thought the technological capabilities offered by the new products—and more importantly, the benefits they provided—were breakthrough in nature.

Impact

Delivering one of the most successful product launches

After the exploratory process, we identified a name for the brand—one inspired by and aligned with the product line’s value proposition. The new product was priced nearly 25% above commodity-grade offerings and was considered one of the business unit’s most successful product launches over the prior decade.

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