A Study On Watsons' Strategy To Reinforce Private Brand Equity

With the steady and ongoing development of China's economy and the improving of consumption ability of its people,the modern retailing industry in China has gained immediate and rapid developments,especially that the chain stores have become mainstream with more and more retailing brands being known to the public to provide them necessary products and services.Strategically,it is more advisable for these outstanding retailing brands to create their private brands.These private brands have their own values both for consumers and retailers compared to the brands of those manufacturers.However,there are big challenges for these retailing industries,one of which is how to maintain their private brand equities and reverse the situation where e-commerce and e-brands have picked up great speed and gradually taken up an upper hand in brands competition.A.S.Watson Retail Ltd(Watsons Personal Care Chain Store in Full)as one of the big private brands in China,has for a long time given top priorities to the strategies of creating more private brands of its products and setting up more retail stores.These private brands of Watsons,not only have satisfied the needs of consumers,but have also made great profits in a retailing market of fierce brand competition.But these private brands are being gradually weakened and the ratings of Watsons as the top ones in the retailing industry are clearly unflavored by consumers when competing with the e-commerce supported by and operated on the internet.This paper is to analyses the weakening of the private brands in the retailing industry in China based on the theories of brand equity management and consumer behavior.And then to figure out the conclusion that those private brands should apply the strategies of O2 O to reinforce their brands images.Based on case study,this paper believes that there are multiple reasons of weakening of Watsons' private brands equity,such as the declining of the competitiveness of those private brands,the inadequacy of publicity and propaganda both for online and offline private brands,and the incapability for Watsons to upgrade their images to another level.All of which have resulted into the reality that consumers are not interested in buying products from Watsons,which in turn,has seriously affected the growth of Watsons' private brand equities.Watsons should once again reinforce its private brand equities to develop a more powerful competitive advantage and accomplish better development.