Branding and relationship marketing within the trifecta of power: Managing simultaneous relationships in consumer goods marketing

Abstract

This article examines the relevance of relationship marketing to consumer goods branding. Relationship marketing has not established a strong presence within this sector of marketing, and has been the subject of pointed criticism. The authors argue that the consumer goods branding literature suffers from an adherence to the notion that brand managers and consumers interact directly, and with minimal interference from third parties. The rise of powerful retail channel captains in almost all consumer goods industries, and in almost all developed economies, has rendered this notion obsolete. If the additional complexities of simultaneous relationships between the brand manager, the retailer and the consumer within a 'trifecta' of balanced power within the consumer goods channel are included, then the discipline of relationship marketing has a role to play. The results of a detailed case study of branding within the dairy products category in New Zealand supermarkets is used to support this argument.