The Role of the Brand in the Industrial Purchase

Since the end of the 1980s, brand management1 has been of growing interest to companies and has received increasing attention in marketing literature. The research on brand management goes further than brand image and strategy by studying the concepts of brand equity and extension2. But the literature essentially deals with consumer product brands, bought by individuals and households for personal use. Industrial brand management involves studying the role of the brand in inter-company trade relationships. This means taking the brand into account when analyzing the buyer’s behavior within an industrial context