Читать книгу Financial Information and Brand Value - Yves-Alain Ach - Страница 9

The brand and branding, depending on the period, did not serve the same purpose. We have already pointed out that as far back as Antiquity, potters used to mark their pottery in order to allow a better identification of the pots coming out of their workshop. The basis of this marking was not intended for commercial purposes, but was used to prevent theft of the pots made and stored around the factory. This phenomenon has been perpetuated through the ages. The branding of animals is one of its extensions. In the Middle Ages, brands found another function. Corporations, in turn, used them. There was, on the one hand, the artisan’s individual brand and, on the other hand, the collective brand of the corporation. One was used to individualize the work, the other to delimit the corporation’s territory. The corporation could thus sanction the craftsman who jeopardized their reputation. In the end, the craftsman’s mark was guaranteed by his corporation. The brand had no defined use; it could “reach customers or identify products to protect against theft” (Pollaud-Dulian 2010, p. 721), provided that corporate brands guaranteed a certain quality and the fact that a brand belonging to a corporation had to ensure its own protection and respectability. In addition to this principle, royal decrees already punished counterfeiting.

The revolution of 1789 in France challenged the practices established by corporations, trades and foremen and completely abolished them. Article 44 of the texts enacted on March 2 and 17, 1791 (the Le Chapelier Act) established the principle of freedom, “any person shall be free to engage in such trade or to exercise such profession, art or trade as he shall see fit, but he shall first be required to obtain a patent.” Thus, the first principle of “annuity” was established. The consequence of this principle was the end of the distinctive signs attached to corporations and all individual brands of craftsmen. The acts of competition that followed this period of anarchy caused abuses that led craftsmen and industrialists to demand the implementation of laws that could regulate this situation. The search for equality among citizens led the legislator of the time to enact a law putting an end to acts of unfair competition; the law of 22 Germinal year XI (April 12, 1803), in article 16, went too far by providing for a “hellish” penalty for offenders. Burst and Chavanne (1993, p. 455) compare this position to situations found in sociology and consider that “[…] it is a law of judicial sociology, where the law provides for penalties that are manifestly too severe and disproportionate to the gravity of the offence prosecuted, judges do not apply it in practice.” The replacement of an organized and hierarchical economic system by a system based on freedoms and equality was the real detonator of the use of brands as a commercial instrument. The 18th Century saw the birth of the brand as we know it today.

The Industrial Revolution facilitated a new development for brands. It should be remembered that the term Industrial Revolution refers to three major changes in economic life. These three major changes were highlighted by John Stuart Mill (1965) (originally published in 1848), Karl Marx (1904) (originally published 1867) and Arnold Toynbee (1884). These concern the agricultural revolution, the demographic revolution and, finally, the manufacturing revolution. The latter evokes, in particular, the creation of the steam engine, textile machines and blast furnaces. This period of change led to a fragmentation of tasks, an increase in working time, in the pace of work and in productivity gains. Lévy-Leboyer (1968), in an article on economic growth in the 19th Century, concludes that “the French economy was dominated by the growth of industry, which eventually led to the development of all activities […], industry accounted for a quarter of total output from 1810 to 1840, a third in the intermediate period between 1850 and 1880, and half between 1890 and 1910” (Lévy-Leboyer 1968, p. 800). As the Industrial Revolution allowed for higher production than before, industrialists were faced with the problem of the flow of manufactured goods. They had to think of ways to make it easier for them to sell consumer goods. For them, brands were one of these ways.

This intellectual reflection, in fact, had an ideological foundation that was described by one of the masters of the doctrine of free trade, in his treatise on political economy, Jean-Baptiste Say. In the first book of his treatise on economics, he explains that producers must find what in terms of trade are called “outcomes” (Say 1972, p. 87) (originally published in 1803), means of exchanging the products they have created for those they need. Jean-Baptiste Say puts producers and consumers at the center of his economic description, while considering that the consumer is, depending on the situation, the beneficiary of modernization or the one who loses, if he is subject to a monopoly or to taxes that would raise the price of the product. Indeed, in Chapter X of his treatise on political economy, concerning the different ways in which taxes are based and on which classes of taxpayers they are levied, Jean-Baptiste Say notes that “the government requires a commodity to bear a particular mark, for which it makes a charge, as in the case of the assay-mark of silver, and stamp on newspapers” (Say 1972, p. 244). This is where the essential principles of liberal theory come into play. In the operation of the overall system, the entrepreneur is at the center of the system, since, on the one hand, they receive impetus from the market and, on the other hand, they choose the optimal combination by putting the various factors together. This simply means that the entrepreneur, by distributing profits, pensions and salaries, the amount of which is equal to what they have produced, generates purchasing power.

Liberal capitalism has allowed the remarkable rise of Western societies; in the clarity of its proof, the “liberal” model has long masked imperfections in the real functioning of economic systems, such as the domination of monopolistic firms. But the pressure of facts and social necessities has forged the appearance of a mixed system, in which the action of the State has become increasingly significant. Concretely, all products are not equal; they can be differentiated. The product differentiation strategy aims to introduce a distinction between the products manufactured and sold by the firm and the products of its competitors. Branding helps to highlight this differentiation and the relative advantages, perceived as unique by consumers. The brand makes it possible to distinguish products; this distinction is important in the specification of a product and makes it possible to determine its added value. In this vein, Kapferer and Thoenig (1989) point out that the brand makes it possible to globalize all the information related to the differences between products. The brand indicates the differences between suppliers. Thus, the consumer buys the product according to the specific characteristics conveyed by the brand and pays the corresponding price, which allows the company offering the product to make an additional profit. The usefulness of the product for the consumer is thus defined. Brand value depends on the consumer’s interest in the elements of difference and specificities conveyed by the brand that lead to the purchasing act.