When a great brand retreats to “caveat emptor”
Paul Paetz provides a ground-level, first person account of how the famed Maytag brand became a shell of its former self. It’s a sad story of how a distinguished company, a great product line, and devoted customers were undermined by mismanagement.
Paul calls the Maytag decline and fall “brandicide.” That’s as good a term as any. Most brands are not killed by competitors. They’re done in by their own companies.
The danger of lowering the brand bar
There’s a lesson here for other manufacturers, too. Once you lower the brand bar for your offerings to caveat emptor, you signal your own customers to find brand value elsewhere. And you invite competitors to provide it.
October 22nd, 2006 at 2:20 pm
Thanks for the shout out. It’s sad when brands go from great to grotty, especially when it means thousands of average people lose their jobs because of exec management stupidity.
Maybe if enough people see stories like this, the news will eventually trickle up to the people with the power to do something about it, but I have a notion that they have insulated themselves from the outside world reality, and have simply decided to not pay attention to the bad news.
Too bad for Maytag.
Postscript to my story: I went out a replaced my Maytag with a top of the line Korean model (which seems to work beautifully), and visited every major retailer within 10 miles of my home while I looked at my options. I made a point of telling salespeople why Maytag and Whirlpool should both be avoided if they want happy customers, and spoke to anyone I saw inspecting a Maytag or Whirlpool, steering at least three grateful prospects away from making a mistake. I’ve also told at least 10 other people directly about my experience, and referred them to the blog for more detail if they were interested. Too bad dumb brand managers don’t realize the real cost of their idiotic short term decisions to save a few bucks rather than help a customer they’ve hurt — the way they treated me has already cost them several sales.
Enjoyed reading the rest of your blog too.
October 26th, 2006 at 2:28 pm
Paul,
Thanks for the comment. When companies treat their brands as window dressing they really do open the doors for competitors to step in and walk away with customers. It takes focused incompetence to trash a great brand, but we see it happen again and again.
PS – I also liked your earlier posts on DRM and Boeing. I’ve always felt that aircraft makers would have a closer connection with airline flyers than the airlines themselves. But, if you’re Boeing, the airlines pretty much tell you what you can and can’t do inside the cabin.