Brand/Talk

Hmmm. How does Brand = Americanization play with Apellation controlee? We have wine names going back to the Romans, at least (pass me a glass of the old Falernian, boy!), but I don't know when governments got into the game. --MichaelTinkler

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It's a good question, I think. I'm sure you are right that there has always been product names and therefore potentially product loyalty. The term "branding" however, as a term for developing product identity is itself very recent. Here is the short form of the OED as it pertains to this word:

c. A trade-mark, whether made by burning or otherwise. (Applied to trade-marks on casks of wines or liquors, timber, metals, and any description of goods except textile fabrics.)

• 1827 Motley v. Downman 3 Mylne & Craig Law Rep. 4 The proprietors have added the brand mark `Margam' on each box.

6. (transf. from 4 c.) A particular sort or class of goods, as indicated by the trade-marks on them.

• 1883 Harper's Mag. Aug. 451/1 There are special brands of steel wire for the shrouds and stays.

9. attrib. (sense 6) and Comb., as brand-image, the impression of a product in the minds of potential users or consumers; also transf. and fig., the general or popular conception of some person or thing; brand-name, a trade or proprietary name; also transf.

• 1958 M. Mayer Madison Avenue U.S.A. iii. 59 David Ogilvy, of Ogilvy, Benson & Mather, apostle of the `brand image';
• 1958 M. Mayer Madison Avenue U.S.A. iii. 63 Ogilvy's brand-image advertising..works essentially on the consumer's conscious mind in an effort to convince him that brand A, technically identical with brand B, is somehow a better product.

I think here it relies heavily on the early fire implications of the word. The idea as it develops is of burning an image on the mind of the public. This is especially true when we get to the 1950s and brand is used in an almost religious context, where branding is a kind of psychological attack. So, certainly there was product naming previous to branding, and probably that should be included in the entry, but I wonder if the character of American or at least modern "branding" as it is used in that sense isn't somehow different from previous concepts of product identification. This is, again, one of those terms or concepts which rests heavily on characterization and interpretation rather than on empirical fact. We can say what the modern definition is, and we can talk somewhat about the etymology of the word, and about the history of the concept, but... well, I'll stop there. -trimalchio

Interesting! Im not sure if the official government monopoly given to regional nomenclature (the Champagne, Bordeaux, Harris Tweed, etc.) is the same thing. I look forward to someone who knows about the history of marketing taking this on! --MichaelTinkler