Advertising heightens as top brand attribute - personal care appliances at discount stores - Top Brands, Part 1: Store Manager Survey

Discount Store News, Oct 1, 1990

Advertising Heightens as Top Brand Attribute

The long-standing emphasis on good, low-priced products in the personal care appliance category seems to be abating.

In DSN's 1990 Top Brands Survey, store managers still report that price is the most important attribute of a personal care appliance brand, but not with the same degree of emphasis as in previous years.

The current survey revealed that advertising, product performance and brand recognition have become more important contributors to a brand's success. This year, price just edged out advertising as the No. 1 attribute, followed closely by product performance and brand recognition which were tied as the third key attributes.

Price wasn't always the No. 1 consideration. When specific brands on the Top 10 list were evaluated individually, price often took a back seat to the other three attributes.

For Remington and Vidal Sassoon-brand personal care appliance products, price was not even mentioned as an attribute, and for Clairol products price was a low priority. Price was a major attribute for No. 1 Conair and No. 6 Windmere, however.

Price was an issue for over half the managers who named Conair a best performer. Product performance was second with one-third of the responses followed by brand recognition. Advertising was fifth behind product presentation.

Perhaps this unique combination of attributes keeps Conair at the top of the brand list, now for the fifth consecutive year.

Despite Conair's success in this category, its hold on the No. 1 spot has been weakening for the past four years.

This year, four in 10 store managers named Conair a top performing brand, down four percentage points from 1989 and off 14 percentage points from 1986. In addition, the margin separating Conair from the No. 2 brand, this year Norelco, has narrowed. A year ago, Conair led No.2 Clairol by a 3-to-1 ratio. This year, Conair outpaced the No.2 Norelco by a less than 2-to-1 rate.

Norelco showed great strength this year, doubling its number of manager mentions from its 1989 level. Norelco was sixth on the top brands list last year.

Similarly, Remington rose from 2% of mentions in 1987 to nearly one-quarter of managers this year, moved up two notches this year to the No. 3 spot on the list.

Clairol, at No. 4, maintained the same level of mentions this year--16%--but fell from the No. 2 spot. Other personal care appliance brands probably attracted the attention of a larger group of store managers than the previous year.

Vidal Sassoon, in the No. 5 spot this year, dropped from second on the 1989 list but received the same level of mentions from store managers. The brand's best showing was at Target where four in 10 managers named it a top performer.

Among upscalers in general, Vidal Sassoon was named by more than one-third of the respondents, triple the number of mentions it received from conventional discount store managers. Conventional discounters did not mention Vidal Sassoon as often as they did a year ago.

The reason for Vidal Sassoon's success among upscalers appears to boil down to price. None of the store managers surveyed said price was a reason Vidal Sassoon performed well. Upscale discounters by their nature sell higher priced goods than conventional chains and are therefore more likely to choose a brand that sacrifices price in favor of aggressive advertising. Advertising was said to be more of a driving factor for Vidal Sassoon's performance than with any other brand.

Close behind Vidal Sassoon was Windmere, down from fourth a year ago, but with the same number of manager mentions. Behind Windmere was Jerri Redding, up two spots from 1989 and with more mentions.

Black & Decker fell one spot to seventh, with a small mention decline.

New to the top 10 list this year are Sunbeam, which tied Black & Decker for eight place, and Braun (No.10).

Gone from the Top 10 list this year are Epilady, which held the No. 10 spot a year ago, and General Electric, which was tied with Jerri Redding for eighth.

GE fell to 11th, the first time it didn't make the Top 10. GE no longer produces personal care appliances under its label.

Personal care appliances was among the categories store managers said they had the least sway over in terms of their ability to tailor the assortment to their individual market demands.

Subtle changes took place among the leading four discounters in terms of the brands they named.

Conair was mentioned less often by three of the top four discounters; K mart was the only chain whose managers mentioned Conair as often this year as last. Roughly 10% fewer store managers from Wal-Mart, Ames and Target named Conair a top performer.

In contrast, Remington was mentioned dramatically more by each of the top four chains except Ames. Over 10% more store managers at K mart, Wal-Mart and Target said Remington was a top performer than last year.

Conair and Norelco did not make a clean sweep of the top two positions at the chains.

In fact, Conair was tied for third at Target with Remington behind Vidal Sassoon and Norelco. Clairol was in fifth.