Abstract:

It is exactly twenty years since the publication of Professor Ted Levitt's Harvard Business Review paper on the globalisation of markets.Levitt's main thesis was that cultural differences were eroding so fast, especially in the developed world, that global brands were likely to dominate more and more markets in the near future. To some extent his predictions have proved to be accurate as the ubiquity of global brands is a frequently observed phenomenon. But there is now increasing evidence that although the logic of global brands remains as powerful as ever for multi-national companies it is increasingly rejected by consumers, especially in smaller countries. This paper describes a number of case histories from the Irish market in an attempt to draw some conclusions about the most effective marketing communications strategies for indigenous brands faced with multi-national competition.