Brands that spend heavily on advertising, and do so over time, will be far more likely to maintain their premium sales positions than those that do not. In fact, brands that do not spend to defend usually lose market share to their competitive own label rivals. Whilst seemingly simplistic, these are the major conclusions from this new review of big brands and private label from WARC.

To reinforce his views, Dr Buck draws on a wealth of in-depth TNS Superpanel data, tracking 50 brands across all major grocery types. This analysis goes back over 25 years of brand data for complete research rigour. The findings indicate that only 19 of the monitored brands leaders were still dominant in 1999. Of these, half had actually succeeded in increasing their sales in spite of vigorous private label competition. The advertising data for these survivors’ spend links their longevity to their generous promotional budgets.

Dr Buck develops his theme of brand success with share of voice in the report. He also explores the possible future of brand advertising in terms of the share taken by private label, and against the impact of his concept of Every Day Low Pricing. The report is available from WARC priced £75 plus p&p.