Brands and expanding offerings

August 13, 2007 / Filed under: Branding, Consumerism

From Kevin Keating:

The best restaurants have the smallest menus. ... Whatever the chef wants to cook is what they eat.

Kevin is referring to restaurants (more distinguishably, brands) that constantly expand their menu items in an effort to increase sales, or attract new customers. His theory is that by getting away from their true "bread and butter," they are somehow damaging the brand image itself.

... then we have Dunkin Donuts offering pizza and hot dogs and selling Sobe and Gatorade and Snapple, Subway introducing their own version of pizza-to-order ...

If you're not careful, Kevin warns:

... you'll turn your business into a convenience store.

He even goes on to say:

Add value, not menu items.

I'm gonna stop here because I'm in full disagreement. In fact, I can't be more adamant.

Brands have to expand their product line - in this case, their menu items. How else can they compete? Nobody can survive forever selling the same product. Eventually change must happen.

There's nothing wrong with expanding your product offerings. In fact, a good brand adapts to your products and services - not the other way around. Your brand consists of your products and services. Your products and services don't consist of your brand.

It doesn't matter if Subway starts selling Apple computers, for example. It's still under the Subway brand. It's their brand and they can mold it how they please. A brand is not going to suffer because it is expanding it's product offerings.

Using Apple as an example - they started out as a hardware company. Now they are in the music industry. How is that not a complete transformation?

Lowes sells groceries, for crying out loud. Groceries at a "home improvement" store.

The point is - neither of these brands are suffering because they began selling other items, different from their "bread and butter."

UPDATE: I meant Menards, not Lowes. I've verified that Menards sells non-perishable goods. Perhaps Lowes does too. I've honestly never been in a Lowes.

Comments/Mentions

# Shell at 8/13/2007 4:37 pm cst

If you look at individual household brands you can see that they have deversified themselves with in the market place. An example is Kellogg's; they have Kashi and Morning Star Farms, both are geared towards the healthy eater. The only difference between the 2 brands is that one uses meat and the other is geared towards the non meat eating public. Maybe the reason why people are noticing the diversification of brands such as Subway and Dunkin Donuts is becuase it is in your face wherever you go. Many of your household brands have diversified themselves to cater to more than just one target demographic. You dont realize that Kelloggs makes some its own competitve products because they dont have Kelloggs on the label. Our world is full of diversified brands and it will continue to grow to meet the on going needs of their consumers. In the case of Subway bring out a pizza it solves a couples issue of where to eat, one wants a sub one wants pizza; now Subway meets the need of both and wins the sale. Wendy's expanded thier menu to soon include breakfast, to meet the needs of their consumers who want to go to Wendy's to eat breakfast. All this is the brands responding to it's consumers.

# Kevin M. Keating at 8/14/2007 6:46 am cst

Hey, thanks for the comment on my post, and your thoughts here. I actually don't think we disagree as much as it seems. I tried to clarify things on a post this morning here.

Very interesting stuff, in any case.

# Amanda at 8/14/2007 8:42 am cst

I was just at a Lowes on Sunday - no groceries there. : )

I'd also like to add that I've noticed Menard's pushing more toward other areas besides home improvement for a while now. Not too sure how that's going to pan out, but you can't blame 'em for tryin'!

# Shell at 8/14/2007 2:57 pm cst

I believe Matt was refering to Menards and now Lowes. As long as I have been going to Menards they have always carried other products other than home improvement. The Menards by my house has recently put in a grocery section! You now can fix your toilet, pick out your paint, buy your bed, and get dinner all in one stop. Don't worry if you need shampoo, conditoner, toothpaste, toothbrush or toilet paper you can get that too. I love going to this store because I am always amazed as to what else they are going to add. Here's a secret, since the other items are not the focal point of the store they will more than likely be lower in price compared to other retail chains. Menards is just like Toys R Us and diapers, they have the lowest mark up on them compared to other chains. Toys R Us knows if you are in the store buying diapers you have a child which means you will more than likely buy more tha just diapers. Those marketers are soo smart.