Development of Brand Aston Martin - Essay Example

Aston Martin has a unique advantage: it has been related to the popular film ‘James Bond’ at such a level that for many people ‘a James Bond cannot drive another car, except Aston Martin’ (Tyreman 2009, p.94), a view that indicates the success of the marketing plan used for the promotion of the particular brand. However, the viability of the brand in the long term is depended on the potential of its marketers to alternate the brand’s existing marketing so that the competitiveness of the brand towards its rivals is kept at high levels. Such effort would include the elimination of the brand’s weaknesses and the enforcement of its advantages as they are analytically explained below.

To understand the development of brand Aston Martin through the decades it would be necessary to refer primarily to the characteristics of brands in the context of the international market. Then, the advantages and disadvantages of brand Aston Martin would be evaluated more effectively.

Commonly, brands in all markets are evaluated by referring to their attributes. These attributes can be classified into two main categories: symbolic and functional (Sinkovics & Ghauri, 2009, p.186). Symbolic attributes refer to the intangible benefits that a brand can offer to consumers; for example, a mobile phone of a particular brand can be related to the specific social status of the owner (Sinkovics & Ghauri, 2009, p.186). Functional attributes refer to the technical/ practical benefits of a brand, meaning the functional benefits that a brand can offer to consumers (Sinkovics & Ghauri, 2009, p.186); the increased functionality of a mobile phone of a brand compared to a similar device of another brand is a common example of the functional attribute (Sinkovics & Ghauri, 2009, p.186). Emotional attributes have also become an important category of brand attributes.

Emotional attributes reflect ‘the feelings of consumers about a retail brand’ (Floor 2006, p.222). These feelings can be influenced by the functional attributes of the brand (Floor 2006, p.222); still, emotional attributes are depended on all aspects of a brand, as included in the brand personality (Floor 2006, p.222). Functional, emotional, and symbolic attributes are often used for describing a brand’s personality (Floor 2006, p.222). The functional and emotional attributes of brand Aston Martin can be characterized as quite significant. These attributes could be described as follows: in terms of their performance, Aston Martin cars have been classified as of exceptional value. Aston Martin is often described using the term ‘supercar’, meeting all criteria of top performance: excellence in quality and unique speed potentials (Tyreman 2009, p.94). Moreover, the brand Aston Martin exists for quite a long in the international market and has been related to power, strong personality, and excellent performance (Tyreman 2009, p.94). For this reason, the brand Aston Martin has increased power in influencing consumers’ emotions. In the context of the issues discussed above, the brand Aston Martin can be characterized as quite successful, at least in terms of its functional and emotional attributes.

At the next level, reference should be made to the elements that could most contribute to brand equity, on the basis that strong brand equity can secure the long-term success of the brand in its market. In practice, a brand is considered as having strong brand equity in the following case: when consumers ‘tend to react more favorably to the product, price, promotion or distribution of the brand than doing to the unnamed version of the brand’ (Glynn 2009, p.125). This means that a brand can affect consumers by its logo or other visible characteristics that make the identification of the brand possible, among other brands or unnamed brands (Glynn 2009, p.125). Andrews (2008) also refers to brand equity as related to ‘the brand familiarity in the market’ (Andrews 2008, p.15). Regarding its brand equity, the value of brand Aston Martin can be characterized as high. The brand Aston Martin is quite popular worldwide, possibly also because of the James Bond series (Wilson & Gilligan 2012). In this context, if a consumer sees the logo of Aston Martin, his reaction is expected to be quite favorable than towards other brands of similar characteristics.

Despite its long history and its popularity worldwide, the brand Aston Martin should be also evaluated by referring to its weaknesses, as compared to its advantages. At the first level, Aston Martin cars are manufactured in the UK, at least for their main components (McLaney & Atrill 2007, p.315). However, the power of the British market has declined under the pressure of the global financial crisis (McLaney & Atrill 2007, p.315). The transfer of part of the manufacturing process to other countries has caused severe turbulences in the production line, without supporting the increase in sales (McLaney & Atrill 2007, p.315). Read More