As most of the advertisers may know, ‘branding’ process started and spread all around the world when the making of products increased throughout the Industrial Revolution and therefore companies needed to differentiate their products from the competition by using different colours, signs and symbols on their products.

Almost all of the products we consume in the 21st century are designed to be a brand and have an identity. Brands such as Coca-Cola, McDonald’s, Adidas or Sony are all giant brands of our century which are easily recognised by any society. Customers know what they can buy from all of these brands (such as buying a coke from Coca-Cola, hamburger from McDonald’s or a piece of technology from Sony). However, it does not mean that being a giant brand indicates they were always successful in the past. If we consider the mistakes of these companies in their branding process, we can definitely learn some lessons out of it. In the next couple of articles, I will be sharing the failures of brands in their ‘branding’ processes.

The first brand failure I would like to share in my first series of posts is as can be understood from the title; Harley Davidson’s failure in extending its brand.

As we all may know Harley Davidson is a brand that is mostly loved by wild boys who wear leather jackets, sun glasses, have tattoos and piercings. Harley Davidson’s customers are in love with their motorcycles and attached to the brand with deep emotions. In England or the United States of America, it is even possible to see Harley motorcyclists who have the brand’s logo or slogans as a tattoo on their arms. Even in a middle-east country like Turkey, Harley Davidson fans and owners meet up in groups to ride their Harley Davidson motorcycles together. Harley Davidson has been the leader brand for years in the motorcycle industry. However, about a decade ago, due to the company’s passion to earn greater profits, the brand was extended into other markets and got away from the real target audience which therefore resulted in the brand to cope with some difficulties.

After Harley Davidson brand gained worldwide popularity in the early 90s, the brand’s managers wanted to extend the brand to other markets. The brand was extended into grooming industry with stuff like perfume & after shave lotion but struggled to survive in such new areas. Harley addicted customers accused the Harley Davidson company of expanding the brand to unrelated areas that customers were not interested as well as accusing the company of using cheap tactics for more profitability. I remember my middle school years, where one of my friends had an original Harley Davidson pencil box and pens. He was such a naive & geeky person that when you imagine him standing next to a real Harley Davidson driver, you will get that funny picture. Another example was from my high school years. When I was at high school, almost most of the students, both boys and girls, were wearing a pair of Harley Davidson boots. I am not sure if it is still current trend these days but what I want to say here is that when Harley Davidson was trying to brand itself, it went astray by targeting the wrong people and became a brand that addressed everyone – which in my opinion is a wrong marketing tactic and gave harm to the company, its brand image as well as its loyal customers due to the brand’s magic being lost.

The lessons we can take from the above article can be;
- Focus on brand’s values. If a brand’s values are as strong and wild as Harley Davidson’s values, then extending that brand into soft categories like perfume or pencil industry may not be the right choice.
- Target the right audience. Of course a ‘hard rock’ centric target audience with tattoos, leather jackets, long hair and beard would not want to buy a soft smelly bottle of perfum, an after shave lotion or a pencil box.
- Do what you are good at. Harley Davidson is the best brand that produces big American motorcycles and if a brand goes to another market apart from the markets in which it is best, then we should all be aware that it might be getting into huge trouble.