Impact of Branding on Social Class

BRANDING AND ITS IMPACT ON MIDDLE CLASS
Introduction
1.1 BRAND
What is a brand? The Oxford American Dictionary (1980) contains the following definition:
Brand (noun): a trade mark, goods of a particular make: a mark of identification made with a hot iron, the iron used for this: a piece of burning or charred wood, (verb): to mark with a hot iron, or to label with a trade mark.
A short history of brand
The word ‘brand’ comes from the Old Norse ‘brandr’, meaning to burn. In pre-historic times when the initial phases of trade was coming to existence, it was by burning that early man stamped ownership on his commodity, and with the development of advanced trade of goods; buyers would use such marks (brands) as a means of distinguishing between the goods being transacted. For example a farmer with a particularly good reputation for the quality of his animals would find his brand much sought after, while the brands of farmers with a lesser reputation were to be avoided or treated with caution. Thus the utility of brands as a guide to choice was established, a role that has remained unchanged to the present day.

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With rapid and gradual advancement in the acknowledgement of brand for particular goods and commodity, people started vying for goods with a good reputation i.e. brand. With the elapse of time goods and brands have changed but the basic concept remains unchanged and it is ultimately brand that persuades a buyer to go for that product. And with the advanced and developed market situation, brand has become an identity not only for the company it represents but also of its customers. Brand itself has developed into a niche and people vie for that segregated population associated to that brand. Brand today holds a very specific position and top brands have today become a sense of class amongst the top notch people. People associated to a brand don’t go for the product but rather to the brand itself. And brand has set a platform to the people specially the elite class people as a way of differentiating themselves from others.
But today with the financial strength of the overall population brand has become a favorite among the middle class population as well. Middle class population that focused on reliable and durable products in the past have started becoming brand conscious and the major factor for this can be the realization in part of the companies in better understanding of the market scenario of the middle class population and diversifying itself in catering to that segment of people. And in parts of the customers they have started realizing in the concept of quality over quantity. Brand established companies nowadays have started manufacturing goods and services as per the demand of these middle class people with quality goods on reasonable prices. And this has played a major role in attracting more and more people into its circle.
But a major hindrance for these products and services has become cheap imitation and delicacy. From the time of establishment of brand, imitation has been found along time, so it can be justified that the practice of unlawful imitation lurked close behind, a practice that remains common till this day, even in the presence of highly developed legal systems.
1.2 SOCIAL CLASS
Social class refers to a group of people with similar levels of wealth, influence, and status. Sociologists typically use three methods to determine social class. Humans have evolved living in a closed community and have thus been categorized according to their surrounding and their social identity and circle. Social class is that segmentation which varies the people according to this social status and financial stronghold. Accordingly they can be differentiated as follows:

Upper class people
Upper-middle class people
Middle-class people
Lower-middle Class People
Lower Class People

This segmentation according to their financial situation has been the center of attraction for marketers around the globe. Marketers focus on individual segment of people according to the product and services they serve. Some serve the niche market while many serve other general segments. But with financial increment of other class especially of the middle class, more companies serving the top class have started putting their focus on middle class people.
1.3 Objectives:
General Objectives

To find the importance of brand amongst general public.
To identify the market scenario of branded products.

Specific Objectives

To analyze the trend of brand influence among the middle class population.
To study the stronghold of middle class people in the space of branded goods.

1.4 SIGNIFICANCE OF STUDY
Brand has come a long way with the advancement of market and the people associated to the market. Brand nowadays cannot sustain itself only by serving the elite class so the focus has been made relying on the trend and demand of the market, and accordingly their focus has been more directed towards middle class people and their demands. Another aspect of analyzing the situation can be the possibility of threat to the companies itself in trying to penetrate such a volatile segment that are still price conscious in some regards. And identifying the challenges for the brands itself and the consumers is also an important part of this study.
1.5 RESEARCH QUESTIONS
Has brand become so strong that it can easily influence the price sensitive population or is it the cheap imitation that has taken over their market?
1.6 RESEARCH STATEMENT
The present middle class population feels more connected to the brand they are attached to than the traditional people/ family. With more and more brands being made available at reasonable price, this segment of population has become the magnetic pull for companies that carry its significant brand. So have the companies really succeeded in luring this class of people towards itself or is it just an unsung tale of what they are yet to achieve.
1.7 LIMITATIONS OF THE STUDY
Although this study has tried uncovering the areas related to brand and its impact on middle class population, total evaluation may be lagging, and the limitation for this has been mentioned below:

As the cause of lack of adequate time and required information, some aspect of this study may do injustice to the overall scenario of the market.
Limited number of people of this segment will be interviewed and the questionnaires filled accordingly.
Some of the filled questionnaires may have doubtful results so proper information may be absent.

2. Literature Review
Brand itself is not a product nor an identity put forward by an individual or a company, rather it is an instinctive feeling that individual carries about for a product or services. Trust and Gut feeling on any product is a brand. And this trust comes from meeting and beating customer’s expectation, which comes from brand values as:

Price premium
Customer preferences
Replacement cost
Stock Price and
Future Earnings

And the main purpose of branding is to get more people to buy more stuff for more years at a higher price. (Brand Gap: A VISUAL PRESENTATION BY MARTY NEUMEIER)
And brands that catered to the top class people has successfully lured in more and more middle class population into its circle through this trust it has created amongst the total population. The penny pinching population that thrives on price subsidized products has started minimizing their quantitative expenses to focus more on brands they get attracted to.
Different types of companies have different concepts of exactly what it means to be middle class. Using income level as the defining criterion for differentiation of class is reasonable. But simply judging a group by income is far from sufficient for marketers of consumer goods. Such marketers trying to reach the middle class have to know more than their salaries. They must know what makes middle class consumers tick.
Income plays a powerful role in most purchasing decisions for any consumer segment, but other elements play a role that is sometimes greater than income. When products are relatively inexpensive, income has little influence on a consumer’s decision making process. Deciding to buy chocolate, for example, depends significantly more on consumers’ emotion and shopping experience—a store’s ambience, for example—than it does on how much money they make. /’Using income as the only indicator of spending habits allows much information to slip through the cracks. In addition, income is a difficult variable to act upon, in part because the data on income can be either unavailable or unreliable in most cases. Thus, companies must find meaningful alternatives to predict what consumers can afford and what they are willing to pay for certain goods and services.
Zeithaml (1982, 1988) suggests in most purchasing decision customer’s objective is to “Get the best for the money”. This represents the combination of price and value orientation which is the most important consideration for most of the consumers.
Crier and Ross (1997) maintains that the greater the perceived value, the greater that the customers will be interested in purchasing. They (Crier & Ross) explained the term value orientation saying” Consumer trends to select the lowest price alternatives when the options in the choice set are perceived to have the same level of benefit. Consumers are becoming more price conscious does not mean that they always go for the lowest price, rather they will seek for affordable price range among their acceptable quality range.”
Maccilil, (1987), in his study told about the total business and household consumer market that both classes consider price, quality, convenient location as the most powerful influential factors in selecting or buying consumer goods. In the same time Winklin and Duery (1987) conducted a similar study focusing on the two groups of consumers having high income and low income in USA proved the influential forces earlier described by Maccilil.
In the theory of marketing and buyer behavior, the concept of social class is considered the basic determinant of consumption behavior. In fact, among behavioral scientists, there was a consensus that market behavior of individuals is closely related to their social class. In this context, social class was often considered more important than income in affecting buying behavior (Slocum and Mathews, 1970).
Though these mentioned research pave a road map as to how brand influence the market of middle class people and how brand has come a long way from being a niche to being available for all in the developed nation; the basic format or the fundamentals remains the same even for developing nation like ours. And it can be concluded that of the all class of people, middle class population has become the center target for the companies to penetrate and establish itself.
2.2 THEORETICAL FRAMEWORK
The dependent and independent variables are as follows:
Dependent variables

Sales Volume
Customer Loyalty

Independent Variables

Availability of products at affordable prices
Financial Stronghold
Environment
Social Up gradation

3. Research Methodology
3.1 Research Design:
This research can be categorized as descriptive and observational study. This can be explained on the fact that it is based on what the trend persists on the market place and also includes facts and findings based on survey being carried out.
3.2 Population/ Sampling:
Provided the fact of more brand conscious population is on the rise, this report is based only on limited sampling given the limited time period and resources. Not much study has been conducted on this topic; hence it is limited to certain aspect and does not represent the total scenario of the market.
3.3 Nature of data
The source of data is categorized on two fronts:
Primary Source:

Secondary Source:

3.4 Data collection technique

Interview is the best and the most effective method of collecting data, because you get a firsthand knowledge about the present market scenario and the impact of what you’re searching for your study. This helps the interviewers gets to observe the intended market and its population and extract the immediate knowledge of the market.

Questionnaire helps the researcher to find exactly what is to be found and analyzed. A perfectly shaped set of questions gives the intended findings. It also helps to get quick results on a limited time frame.
3.5 Expected Findings
Through this research I expect to understand the real market scenario of the branded products and its impact on the middle class population; their reaction towards branded goods and services and their responsiveness towards the strategies played by the companies.
References:

Understanding China’s Middle Class

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/travel/travel_news/article-2921577/Middle-class-travellers-demanding-300MILLION-upgrades-holiday-homes-luxury-self-catering-trend-takes-hold.html
The Oxford American Dictionary (1980)
Zeithaml (1982, 1988)
Crier and Ross (1997)
Maccilil (1987)
Winklin and Duery (1987)
Slocum and Mathew (1970)
Gantt chart / Work plan

Budget

S.N

Particulars

Budget Head

Amount

Travelling expenses

Travelling and expenses

700

Stationery

Miscellaneous

500

Printing of questionnaires, proposal and final report