One parent company, different brands, same specs?

[Sue_374245836]

Hoping to buy a van this year I bought Practical Caravan for inspiration. The first thing that struck me were four adverts for four different brands, under one parent company. I thought the layouts on the first couple of ads looked very alike then discovered all four ads had exactly the same layouts for each type of van. I investigated further on the web the only differences I could find between the cheapest model & the other three who were all the same price of one specific layout type, was the MRO - a difference of 24KG - & no spare wheel.

Please can someone enlighten me as to why a company should offer four (actually it has more than four but..) different brands with identical specifications at identical RRP for three of them?

 

[ProfJohnL]

Hello Sue,

I do not take PC so I cannot comment on the specific adverts you indicate, but what you are describing is common practice called Badge engineering.

Not so long ago there used to be many different and unrelated caravan manufactures, but through a down turn in the touring caravan market, some of the smaller brands became uneconomic, and they sold up to one of the bigger boys.

It is a well-documented fact that customers often have a strong loyalty towards a particular brand, (not just caravans) so the new owners would wish to try and retain the smaller brands customers by continuing to produce caravans under the brand name.

The bigger company could make one of their 'stock' designs with a few cosmetic variations and market it under the smaller brand name.

As for cost, it is possible to charge more for caravan marketed under one name than another, because of the predisposition of some customer to believe that one brand is better than another.

For those of use with long enough memories, a classic case of badge engineering was the BMC mini, which was sold under the Austin and Morris badges, and with some bodywork modifications as Riley's, Wolsey's, and Vanden Plas. - All mechanically identical and built on the same production line and to the same quality. Differences were just cosmetic.

 

[Lutz]

Even today, badge engineering is common throughout the industry. Vauxhalls are only Vauxhalls in the UK (and one or two minor markets) but they are Opel almost everywhere else.

The Isuzu Trooper has a long list of alias's: Vauxhall Monterey, Opel Monterey, Holden Jackaroo, Isuzu Bighorn, Isuzu Caribe, Honda Horizon, Chevrolet Trooper, Acura SLX.

 

[Hamer_5041128]

Sue,

If you compare Swift and Abbey you will find the main differenece is colour of surfaces and upolsteries. The Abbey Spectrum has Lighter wood and upholesery than the Swift Conquerer. We did not like the Abbey interior but liked the Swift so have just collected a new Conquerer.

Hamer