Stephen P Smith
Publisher
Chairman:
The American Brands Council

When we published the first edition of America’s Greatest Brands in 2001, we had no idea how successful the concept would be. Just about everyone in advertising, marketing, brand management, and the media industry wanted a copy. Even consumers with no direct involvement in branding issues were fascinated by the information provided, and they bought thousands of copies of America’s Greatest Brands. This should not have been a surprise, because the brands featured in our publication were, and are, an integral part of all of our lives.

Publication of the second edition of America’s Greatest Brands was a challenge in ways we never could have anticipated. Between editions, the American landscape changed — emotionally, economically, fiscally, and from a marketing perspective. Thrust into world events in a most unexpected and cataclysmic manner, Americans and American brands faced a scenario that few long-range corporate strategists would ever have considered. Because of the events of one late summer morning in 2001, marketing campaigns changed, business plans were overhauled or discarded, movies shelved, and concepts deemed taboo, at least for a time.

In such an environment, American citizens — indeed, people the world over — look for comfort. Everyone finds comfort in the familiar, and for Americans, few images and concepts are as comfortable and familiar as those represented by the brands on the following pages. Whether it’s the shape of a bottle or the forlorn look in a hound-dog’s eyes, continuity and safety take on added importance in times like these.

The companies and the brands featured in the second edition of America’s Greatest Brands are indeed an integral part of our lives, sources of comfort and strength, signifiers that the American way of life persists. More than a maker’s mark, a great brand is almost an heraldic symbol, carrying with it a whole web of positive associations — and at certain times, positive associations are just what people need.

Leading companies have long recognized that their brands are powerful assets. Recent surveys indicate that brands may account for 50 to 70 percent of a company’s total value, perhaps worth billions of dollars. Studying the way these brands began, developed, and grew into trusted household names is not only vital for anyone interested in the way the modern marketplace functions; it is also fascinating and often fun.

This book contains many informative brand stories and offers some fascinating insights into the creation and development of many of America’s brand icons. Worldwide, our organization has researched and presented over 1,200 of the strongest brands in 20 countries. 

In the following pages, we present comments from members of The American Brands Council — some of the United States’ most eminent media and communications executives — about the importance and influence of brands. As you read this book, please consider along with them: What makes a brand one of America’s Greatest Brands? What creates the awareness, desirability and power that a great brand has? With the help of the Council and the companies themselves, we have compiled for you the stories of some of America’s, and the world’s, greatest brands and attempted to capture the innovation and prestige that surround them.

Gene Bartley
President, FCB Worldwide
Rather than give you some dry, precise definition of a brand in terms only an adman or woman would love, let's have some fun with this. Let's play a game that gets at the heart of what great brands are really about. I'll mention three things sequentially; you try and guess the brand they bring to mind.
Adventure, the great outdoors, and an all- terrain vehicle. You guessed it: Jeep. Fantasy, fun, and big ears. Did I hear Disney? If so, you're right on the money. And finally, Coney Island, cotton candy, and hot dogs. That's right: Nathan's hot dogs. (How could we talk about American brands without touching on hot dogs?)
When a brand delivers, like the three knockouts above, you don't have to spend a lot of time figuring out how or why. They mean something very specific to anyone who has ever encountered them. They elicit feelings of warmth and confidence, a comfort level that's usually reserved for family or friends. That's what great brands and successful advertising are all about.

Jonathan Bond
Co-Chairman,Kirshenbaum Bond & Partners
Brands used to be all about finding that one unique rational product attribute and hammering away at it. Today the great brands have meaningful relationships with their customers that go far beyond a single attribute.
Great brands are complex matrices of attributes, features, experiences, values, and emotions that bind the customer to them on a variety of levels. However, each strand of the brand is weak and easily broken by a competitive offer. That's why uni-dimensional brands are vulnerable. Look at each "connection" to the consumer as a single weak and fragile thread. Taken together, though, all of these threads can weave a strong fabric, binding the brand to the customer in a way that is all but unbreakable.
The great brands of today are diverse, yet consistent. Like a great actor who can take on many roles while maintaining the essence of who he or she is, a great brand is consistent, yet extendable; complex, yet universally understandable. A brand that does all of these things - a mega-brand - is the ultimate business weapon in today's world.

Keith Newton
Branding Manager, Young and Rubicam Advertising
A brand is a set of differentiating promises that link a product to its customers.
The brand assures the customer of consistent quality plus a superior value (both functional and emotional) for which the customer is willing to give loyalty and pay a price that brings a reasonable return to the brand.
Great brands that retain their vitality have one more important ingredient: owners who acknowledge that their brands are their business, not just a marketing mark. These owners' brands always have a clear and enduring belief: a common belief that finds its way into the minds of many groups.
All good brands support their owners on the everyday battleground for revenue and profit. But great brands truly transcend this, and create powerful, intangible value on the balance sheet.

Keith Reinhard
Chairman, DDB Worldwide
The twentieth-century Spanish philosopher Jose Ortega y Gasset counseled, "The first act of any society is the selection of a point of view." And so it is for brands. A great brand is distinguished by a passionately held point of view, from which evolves a relevant and compelling promise - the combination of which is conveyed with a distinctive style and personality.
McDonald's point of view is that eating out is about more than food. It therefore promises a good time every time, always with a style that is warm and human. Volkswagen's point of view is that automotive excellence should be available to everyone. It is therefore expanding its line in order to promise the unique Volkswagen driving experience to people of all economic classes . . . but always with the same special style that launched the Beetle in 1959.
A well-selected point of view, a compelling promise stated or implied, and a winning personality. These are the key elements of a great brand.

Hal Riney
Chairman and Chief Executive Officer, Publicis & Hal Riney
A great brand must first and foremost be familiar to a substantial portion of its consumers. But familiarity alone is of little value unless the brand, whether a product or service, has been consistently responsive to consumer interests and needs over a substantial period of time. These two qualities - familiarity and historic satisfaction - are the primary components of brand strength: the ability to survive competitive threats or even to thrive through periods where the brand's actual qualities may not actually be equivalent to those of a competitor. The result of brand strength is brand value: the difference between what the consumer will consistently pay for a brand that is comforting and familiar, and a brand that isn't.

Cheryl Berman
Chairman and Chief Creative Officer, Leo Burnett U.S.A.
Brands live and breathe. They flourish, prosper, stumble, and gasp. Brands get sick and brands get well. Brands grow tired and old, and sometimes a brand dies right before our eyes.
They need love and passion and loyalty to survive. But most of all, to become a great brand, they need belief - a potent, active belief by consumers that their brands are the ones they can trust. Their brands always deliver on promises made. Their brands even reflect the consumer's own self-image, as all of our collective brand choices work together, to inform what I like to think of as a person's own brand.
Great brands know who they are and behave as such, consistently delivering their promise, yet constantly evolving to stay relevant and meaningful to their believers. Grand brands never sit still. They have coverage because they make choices that others hesitate to make. They thrive by embedding themselves in their culture.
So, no matter what we may read or hear, a great brand can never be owned by some company - it is, and always will be, owned by the people.

Rich Hamilton
Chief Executive Officer, Zenith Media Services, Inc.
Great brands have a life of their own. They are immortal; they stand for something.
They are durable, simple, and elegant in design. They inspire loyalty. People pay more to buy them. Why? Because it's worth it!
Who are they in America?
They are brands like Cheerios, M&M'S, Sony, Oreo, Coca-Cola, Ford, Disney, and Kellogg's. There are many more.
The companies that own these brands work to protect and indeed build them through innovation in product development, distribution and sales efforts, and all forms of marketing.
Mars Inc., owner of M&M'S, conducted a sweepstakes which let consumers select the next new color of M&M'S. Consumers picked purple! A great example of leadership and consumer-focused marketing from the owner of a true brand icon.

Rich Jernstedt
Chief Executive Officer, Golin/Harris International
Great brands are distinguished from good ones by the "magic contradiction" - the ability to transform constantly while remaining true to core values. Too often, brands with stellar pedigrees grow stale and dynamic brands flicker out.
But in the contradiction, you must see opportunity. The secret is to develop and maintain trust in your brand.
A great brand is a trusted brand.
A trusted brand meets expectations of excellence, integrity, and fidelity. Customers, employees, investors, and neighbors can count on it. The one constant for every trusted brand is commitment: not just making a promise, but delivering on it. Not just once, but always and in all ways.
The Golin/Harris Trust Survey reveals that approximately 70 percent of Americans are experiencing a crisis of trust in business. They said, "I just don't know whom to trust anymore."
They are sending a message. Great brands get it - and they are doing something about it.

Kevin Roberts
Chief Executive Officer Worldwide, Saatchi & Saatchi
Brands are running out of juice. Even great brands are being squeezed hard by a number of mounting factors: the erosion of premium pricing, the struggle to maintain differentiation, the rapid imitation of innovation, and more and more competition.
Brands were invented for kinder times with growing markets and eager customers. But some brands can still win. Such brands have evolved into something so different they need a new name. We call them Lovemarks.
Quality, performance, and all the rest have become table-stakes. Only Lovemarks know that long-term relationships are based on three human fundamentals: the thrill of mystery, the immediacy of sensuality, and the trust of intimacy.
Lovemarks are the future for America's great brands. Some have made it. The direction is clear. Product to trademark. Trademark to brand. Brand to Lovemark. Lovemarks are super-evolved brands that make deep emotional connections with consumers, great brands that inspire loyalty beyond reason.

Clay Timon
Chairman, President, and Chief Executive Officer, Landor Associates
At Landor, we know through our BrandAssettm Valuator (BAV) research that great brands build on four fundamentals.
- Differentiation. If a brand is not differentiated from its competition, it has no reason for being.
- Relevance. Without relevance, one might build a niche brand, but if the brand is not relevant to a sufficiently large audience, it will not become one of the world's great brands.
- Esteem - The regard customers have for a brand.
- Knowledge - Customers who are able to actually describe what they believe the brand stands for. In the end, customers will look at themselves as BMW drivers, not merely automobile drivers; as a Coke or Pepsi drinker, not a soda drinker.
The brands that achieve the highest levels across all four fundamental building blocks become the world's greatest brands.

Bob Tomei
Chief Marketing Officer, AC Nielsen
A great brand is best defined by the equity and positioning it holds in the marketplace. Brand equity is defined by the price/value relationship it maintains among a specific target audience. Once a brand's equity is established in the market, its positioning and image must reinforce that price/value relationship over and over again. It is critical to maintain a consistent message over time that reinforces those attributes of a brand that consumers value.
A brand should also not extend beyond its defined equity and positioning. A great brand must deliver on its stated commitment to responsibly fulfill a specific consumer need or desire. The brand's packaging, promotion, advertising, and positioning in the market need to support that commitment. While it's relatively easy to "refresh/update" a brand using repackaging or close-in line extensions, the real challenge lies in making it relevant over time to your target consumer.