Hello Kitty Branding an idea and selling it to different segments

As Hello Kitty is featuring strongly in our Great Asian Brands survey, let's have a closer look at how strong this brand has become - proof that you can brand anything.

Hello Kitty is an idea based on a cartoon character of a small cat that looks kind and cute, with a button nose, two black dot-yes, six whiskers, and a ribbon or flower in her hair. The cat has no mouth, and this represents a major source of emotional association for buyers, as they can project many different feelings onto the little cat. The owner and the cat can be happy, sad, thoughtful or any other feeling they want to be together.

Hello Kitty is actually 25 years old but has perpetual youth. For Japanese company Sanrio Co, a stationery producer, she has become a major brand success, multiplying profits in the financial year ended March 31, 1998 by thirteen times-during a recession! Adored by many demographic segments of the market, Hello Kitty's main target audience, as expected, is children, but Sanrio says it has now successfully extended the brand to teenage women from above 20 years. Hello Kitty has become an icon with global appeal. As the girls, who first bought her when they were young, grow older, they nostalgically buy Hello Kitty products as adults. There are Hello Kitty tea sets, toasters, mobile telephone cases, erasers, motorcycles, mouse pads, spectacles, and other products. For bedtime, there are Hello Kitty pajamas and bedsheets. The company apparently adds 600 new products a month to the 15,000 items or so already available. Hello Kitty has taken Asia by storm, and has over 40 stores in the U.S. with subsidiaries in Brazil and Germany.

Sanrio runs Hello Kitty cafés in Japan, and has started to franchise theme restaurants, the first of which is Maxim's Caterers Ltd in Hong Kong, with more to follow. Franchises in Seoul and Taipei are also on the horizon. Apart from these brand extensions, Sanrio intends to introduce new cartoon characters including a hamster and a rabbit.

Financially, the brand has been phenomenally profitable, even during the recession. Recently the brand has become a target for co-branding, but in some cases - such as the co-branding exercise with McDonalds in Singapore - Hello Kitty eclipsed the brand partner, with thousands of people buying burgers and then throwing them away but keeping the Hello Kitty promotional items.

Brand strengths: clear understanding of segment needs, application of these to brand extensions, brand consistency

Excerpted from Branding in Asia by Paul Temporal. Click on the book title to order from Amazon.

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