Publications
Publications
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- All HBS Web
(997)
- Faculty Publications (229)
- August 2010 (Revised October 2014)
- Case
Herborist
By: John Deighton, Leora Kornfeld, Yanqun He and Qingyun Jiang
Global brands such as L'Oreal and Oil of Olay dominate China's skin care market. A Chinese domestic brand, after some success in partnership with Sephora in Europe, aspires to challenge the French and U.S. brands' hold on the China market. It must decide how to segment... View Details
- May 2010
- Case
Flare Fragrances Company, Inc: Analyzing Growth Opportunities
By: John A. Quelch and Lisa D. Donovan
Flare Fragrances, a manufacturer of perfumes for women, faces a growth challenge in a difficult economic environment. CEO Joely Patterson outlines two growth opportunities for her marketing staff to evaluate. One involves launching a new scent -- and possibly... View Details
- March 2010
- Case
Target: Responding to the Recession
By: Ranjay Gulati, Rajiv Lal and Cathy Ross
Within 10 months of Gregg Steinhafel's taking over as CEO at Target, the U.S. was mired in the most significant economic downturn in 50 years. Top competitor Wal-Mart had positioned itself well for the crisis, while Target's same store sales began to slide. While... View Details
- February 2010 (Revised June 2022)
- Case
Dollarama Inc.
By: Andre F. Perold
Dollarama is the leading operator of dollar stores in Canada. The firm performed extraordinarily well after a leveraged buyout in 2004 and recently executed a highly successful IPO. The company sources its goods primarily from Asia. It has strong brand recognition and... View Details
- Article
The Counterfeit Self: The Deceptive Costs of Faking It
By: Francesca Gino, Michael I. Norton and Dan Ariely
Although people buy counterfeit products to signal positive traits, we show that wearing counterfeit products makes individuals feel less authentic and increases their likelihood of both behaving dishonestly and judging others as unethical. In four experiments,... View Details
- 2010
- Article
The Strategic Use of Brand Biographies
By: Jill Avery, Neeru Paharia, Anat Keinan and Juliet Schor
We introduce the concept of a brand biography to describe an emerging trend in branding in which firms author a dynamic, historical account of the events that have shaped the brand over time. Using a particular type of brand biography, "the underdog," we empirically... View Details
Keywords: Marketing; Brands; Brand Management; Brand Building; Brand Positioning; Competitive Positioning; Marketing Strategy; Brands and Branding; Managerial Roles; Strategy; Product Positioning; Consumer Behavior; Biography; Success; Perception; Markets; Power and Influence; Consumer Products Industry; Beauty and Cosmetics Industry; Apparel and Accessories Industry; Auto Industry; Fashion Industry; Food and Beverage Industry
- November 2009 (Revised December 2009)
- Case
DaChan Food (Asia) in China
By: Ray A. Goldberg and David Lane
DaChan Food in China is providing leadership in the quality, health, and environmental needs of the Chinese consumer as poultry consumption increases there. Continuing to provide that leadership as global and national competition increase becomes more and more... View Details
- September 2009
- Case
Culinarian Cookware: Pondering Price Promotion
By: John A. Quelch and Heather Beckham
In November of 2006, senior executives at Culinarian Cookware were debating the merits of price promotions for the company's premium cookware products. The VP of Marketing, Donald Janus, and Senior Sales Manager, Victoria Brown, had different views. Janus felt price... View Details
- June 2009 (Revised November 2010)
- Case
HTC Corp. in 2009
By: David B. Yoffie and Renee Kim
Taiwan-based HTC Corp. had emerged as the world's fourth largest smartphone manufacturer by 2009. CEO Peter Chou was extremely proud of the remarkable achievements his company had made over the last 12 years since starting off as an unknown manufacturer of PDAs for... View Details
- February 5, 2009
- Comment
In Praise of Marketing
By: John A. Quelch
Many dismiss marketing as manipulative, deceptive, and intrusive. Marketing, they argue, focuses too much of our attention on material consumption. More recently, Benjamin Barber, in his 2007 book Consumed, claims that marketing is "sucking up the air from every other... View Details
Keywords: Marketing; Consumer Loyalty; Local Vs. Global Branding; Multi-national Brands; Misleading and Fraudulent Advertising; Customer Value and Value Chain; Customer Satisfaction; Globalized Economies and Regions; Cross-Cultural and Cross-Border Issues; Multinational Firms and Management; Globalized Markets and Industries; Brands and Branding; Marketing Communications; Marketing Strategy; Product Positioning
- January 2009 (Revised June 2010)
- Case
Cisco Systems (2001): Building and Sustaining a Customer-Centric Culture
By: Ranjay Gulati
Customer centricity has been an important part of the culture at Cisco Systems since its inception. While part of this is attributable to values put in place by the founders and retained by subsequent management, it is also closely interwoven with its organizational... View Details
- September 2008 (Revised June 2010)
- Case
Hearts On Fire - Brand Development Manager
By: Frank V. Cespedes and Benson P. Shapiro
Hearts On Fire, a successful branded diamond producer, established the position of Brand Development Manager (BDM) to build the company's presence, sales, and relationships with its retail customers. After one year, the CEO, CFO and President must evaluate the impact... View Details
- September 2008 (Revised October 2008)
- Case
Marc Abrahams: Annals of an Improbable Entrepreneur
By: Boris Groysberg and Michael Slind
Marc Abrahams was a media entrepreneur who specialized in science humor. In 2008, he sought to boost the scale and monetization potential of his business. That business, called Improbable Research, encompassed a magazine (Annals of Improbable Research), a high-profile... View Details
- September 2008 (Revised October 2012)
- Case
Tong Lung Metal Industry Co., Ltd.
By: Willy C. Shih, Chintay Shih, Chen-Fu Chien, Ho Howard Yu and Yu-Shian Chiang
Develop its own branded line, or continue as an original design manufacturer (ODM)? Tung Lung Metal Industries Co. Ltd. is a Taiwanese maker of door lock hardware that is faced with the question of whether to continue to focus on its ODM business or start placing more... View Details
- August 2008 (Revised June 2010)
- Case
Concha y Toro
By: Rohit Deshpande, Gustavo A. Herrero and Ezequiel Reficco
Chile's largest wine producer faces a price versus value positioning problem. Its highest quality wines are not priced competitively at retail because "Made in Chile" connotes great value and low price. View Details
- August 2008 (Revised July 2009)
- Case
Repositioning CARE USA
By: V. Kasturi Rangan and Katharine Lee
CARE USA, a large ($600 million) international nonprofit/NGO, had recently revamped its external branding and positioning in support of its international development work. The case lays out the challenges facing its new CEO, Helene Gayle, as she manages through the... View Details
- June 2008 (Revised April 2013)
- Case
Bernd Beetz: Creating the New Coty
By: Geoffrey Jones and David Kiron
Considers the creation of the world's largest fragrance company by Bernd Beetz, appointed chief executive of Coty Inc. in 2001. In 1990 the German consumer goods company Benkiser began acquiring fragrance and cosmetics brands with the intent of developing a beauty... View Details
- November 2007 (Revised April 2008)
- Case
Russian Standard
By: Rohit Deshpande and Seth Schulman
In September 2006, Russian billionaire Roustam Tariko, founder and owner of Russian Standard, needed to develop a strategy for introducing Russia's most popular brand of premium vodka (RSO) to American consumers. In the past year, he had introduced Imperia, the firm's... View Details
- August 2007 (Revised March 2008)
- Case
Fiyta - The Case of a Chinese Watch Company
By: Regina M. Abrami, William C. Kirby, F. Warren McFarlan, Luc R. Wathieu, Gao Wang, Fei Li and Tracy Manty
Fiyta had long been on of China's foremost watch brands. However, as China's economy began to improve and the livelihood of many Chinese rose with it, their tastes began to change. Exposed to more luxurious foreign brands, many Chinese strived to purchase a Swiss or... View Details
- January 2007
- Case
AMD: A Customer-Centric Approach to Innovation
By: Elie Ofek and Lauren Barley
AMD's launch of the Opteron microprocessor in 2003 has allowed the company to make inroads into the lucrative server segment. A long-time follower to Intel, AMD management felt it was in a position to lead the microprocessor industry in new directions. However, in 2006... View Details