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Many of the world's most valuable brands are global in scope. They benefit from shared meanings, systems, and stories across markets, and much of their allure for consumers lies in their "global-ness." Creating value from global brands requires successfully managing many issues related to the demand side and supply side economics of global branding, the management of global brands, and the mobilization of organizations around global brands. This note explores these issues and highlight key opportunities and challenges in the future of global branding. It will outline the conditions under which a global branding strategy is preferred to a local branding strategy and those under which glocalization (global brands that have some level of local customization) are warranted.

In December 2020, White House Industries (White House), a manufacturer of aerosol aluminum cans for deodorants and other consumer products, including sanitizers and pain relief sprays, received customer order forecasts of 30 per cent more than its maximum production capacity. Unless White House invested in a third production line, which represented a significant capital investment and required almost a year’s lead time, it would be unable to fulfil several customer orders with its existing manufacturing lines. Some customers had long-term relationships with White House, some were newly acquired, and some had a global-level tie-up with White House’s parent company. In addition, the demand from some customers was already large, while others had immense future potential. White House’s board and management team had different views regarding which customers the company should retain and which it should decline. This customer selection issue was a pressing and challenging problem that needed to be solved immediately. How should White House resolve its customer selection conundrum?

By June 2020, the entrepreneurial, client-focused funeral home company Families First Funeral Homes & Tribute Centre (Families First) had expanded to four branches in the Windsor-Essex region of Ontario, Canada. Families First had served families across the region for nearly 25 years as it manoeuvred through the information era and dealt with changing dynamics in the funeral services industry; changing regional demographics; cultural elements; and the needs of its different stakeholders, including people planning their own future funerals and bereaved family and friends planning final goodbyes for their loved ones. The company recognized the need to enhance its technology, particularly in light of the changes brought about by the COVID-19 pandemic, which had heightened the need for greater technological features in the funeral services industry. Now, Families First had to consider how to continue providing value to customers and develop a strong customer management and communication plan with the use of technology, incorporating advanced technological features into its customer relationship and growth strategy.

Trans Neuron Technologies (TNT) is a learn-to-launch (L2L) company, which aims to transform job-seekers into industry-ready professionals by providing them with adequate backing to undertake that journey. TNT is an innovative company with immense faith in the power of the youth. The company offers eKaushal, a unified platform for various stakeholders in the skilling ecosystem, including candidates, training providers, employers, and assessment agencies. Hundreds of youth visit the eKaushal platform every day to undergo various forms of professional training. These candidates belong to various demographics, education level, income brackets, etc. It was found that some of the candidates could not leverage the training for employment opportunities. The business goal is clearly defined for TNT - they want to enable efficiencies in the entire skilling ecosystem, thus helping youth with employment opportunities. For Shivaam Sharma, the Chief Executive Officer of TNT, the objective is to recommend relevant training to the candidates to increase their employability chances. Sharma wants to use the collected data to achieve the following: 1. Recommend suitable trainings to candidates, so that dropouts are reduced and placement chances for candidates are increased. 2. Compare efficiencies of the training providers (TP) and understand if some of the TPs are underperforming and therefore leading to fewer training completions.

In May 2019, project managers with the Bihar Rural Livelihoods Promotion Society (Jeevika) in Patna, India, met to consider their role in creating farmer producer companies (FPCs) that helped poor agricultural producers access markets and receive fair prices for their produce, mainly litchi fruit. The creation of such producer companies was not a spontaneous process but often required a catalyst to harness community-based networks. While Jeevika, a project supported by the Government of Bihar and the World Bank, had been successful in alleviating poverty among those at the base of the economic pyramid, the project managers were now reflecting on the way forward for the producer company. Their overarching aim was a comprehensive understanding of the effects of their efforts on the community and the key variables affecting the sustainability of their efforts. They were aware that they could not support the community indefinitely, and they needed to consider how best to empower the producers to do this work on their own once Jeevika was no longer available. What new capabilities would farmers need to develop over time? How would the relationships between farmers and other stakeholders change when support from Jeevika was reduced or removed?

In early December 2020, the sales controller for Star Medical Equipment, Brazil, was working on the sales forecast for 2021. Sales in 2020 had been severely affected by the COVID-19 pandemic, but ultimately recovered, and the company had ended the year with about 7 per cent growth over 2019. Predicting the market demand for 2021 was uncertain, as the pandemic was not over and newer strains of the virus were afflicting different parts of the world, again and again. What was certain was that freight costs and transfer prices would increase significantly in 2021. If the sales controller attempted significant sales growth, the organization’s gains could be high; its success was uncertain, while a reduction in profitability was certain. He had to decide whether he should play it safe and follow global business guidelines to increase profitability or gamble with ambitious sales and market share growth plans for 2021.

Moderna, Inc. (Moderna), a US biotech start-up, was a contender in the race to develop a COVID-19 vaccine. On November 23, 2020, Moderna announced success in the third-stage clinical trial of its COVID-19 vaccine, soon after larger rival Pfizer Inc. (Pfizer), partnering with BioNTech SE, had reported the successful clinical trial results of its own vaccine. However, large-scale vaccine production was a challenge for Moderna, and its chief executive officer acknowledged that scaling production would not be easy. The two other leading vaccine developers, Pfizer and AstraZeneca plc (AstraZeneca), had fewer challenges with manufacturing capacity; however, Pfizer’s vaccine required extreme cold storage, and AstraZeneca’s vaccine faced issues with its third-stage clinical trial results. On the consumer front, many Americans were unwilling to be vaccinated for COVID-19, leading to anti-vaccination protests on social media and in public. In November 2020, Moderna was planning to apply to the US Food and Drug Administration for Emergency Use Authorization of its COVID-19 vaccine. Vaccine manufacturers were racing to see whose vaccine was best. Could Moderna produce the most effective COVID-19 vaccine? Given the uncertainty in consumer demand for the vaccine, should Moderna plan its manufacturing capability based on end-consumer demand or focus instead on seeking government contracts?

Camera IQ, a camera marketing software company that empowered brands to create and launch augmented reality experiences (AREs) across social platforms, had just raised an additional $5 million to fund further product development and expand its marketing and sales efforts. In the four years since the company's founding, Camera IQ had worked to "democratize the camera," breaking down the significant technological barriers that prevented companies from easily harnessing the power of AR at scale in their digital marketing campaigns. Now, the business stood at a critical juncture. It was time to accelerate the company's growth. Several issues were on the table for discussion, including how to segment and target their customer base to drive exponential growth. Second, the founders had to decide how to direct their engineering resources to refine their platform to meet the needs of an expanding and diversifying customer base. Some in the company were advocating for the development of a much cheaper product tier with capped features to capture the mass market, while others were arguing that the company should focus on refining a more intricate enterprise solution. Still others were excited about the possibility of launching a two-sided marketplace for AR content and templates. Third, as Camera IQ refined its customer value proposition, they would have to further differentiate AREs from other types of digital content and move beyond traditional notions of advertising toward the achievement of a richer, more immersive and engaging branded experience.

This technical note is designed to introduce students and practitioners to the body of work associated with creativity and its applications for professionals and the organizations they lead. Creativity is often seen as an intangible subject, and a half-century of research remains remarkably unknown. This note describes actions that professionals can immediately implement to accelerate creativity in the work place.

NiPay is a software provider competing in the Nigerian business-to-business payments market. Founded by Idaku Ibrahim nearly 20 years ago, NiPay sells two products to retailers and other merchants, which enable individual shoppers to transact either online or via a mobile device.

Following VF Corporation's acquisition of cult streetwear brand Supreme, consumers and industry pundits were nervous that becoming part of a large, public corporation would put an end to Supreme's slow and careful growth trajectory as pressure for quarterly results became more prominent. From its humble beginnings as a skate shop in downtown Manhattan, Supreme had become a global cult brand favored by celebrities, key opinion leaders, and socialites. The mere fact that Supreme was losing its independence could jeopardize its brand mystique. VF's chief financial officer reported that Supreme had more than doubled revenues from $200 million in 2017 and foresaw a clear line of sight to a billion dollars, citing opportunities of further e-commerce penetration as well as expanding the global footprint of Supreme's retail stores. Online fan forums lit up on news of the acquisition, with many expressing concern that a brand once described as "nothing short of a religion to its fervent disciples" would lose its street credibility. Could founder James Jebbia maintain the iconic and exclusive image of Supreme while VF pursued its aggressive growth agenda? As Supreme scaled and made itself more accessible to the masses, could it hold onto its countercultural appeal and sense of cool? Looking ahead to 2021, Supreme would continue to grapple with the lost profit opportunity related to entrepreneurial resellers, who purchased and then flipped Supreme merchandise on marketplaces such as eBay at significant profits.

In January 2020, Bombay Shaving Company had established an in-house digital team that was able to achieve the best digital marketing key performance indicators in its industry. BSC’s marketing strategy focused on conversion rates, influencer marketing, heatmaps, A/B testing, keyword cloud analysis, and emailer marketing. In using these tools, BSC was carving out a differentiated strategy for each step of the customer journey, including customer acquisition and customer retention. However, analysis of online purchase data had indicated that out of every thousand customers who visited the company’s website, only 13 ended up making a purchase. BSC had to address its poor conversion rate and determine how to ensure that its conversion rate would meet the industry standard.

After pursuing a career in finance, the case protagonist moved back to his hometown of Toronto in 2016 to pursue his dream of being an entrepreneur. An incident involving his diabetic father during a family vacation was the primary motivation for his decision to help diabetics by offering treats they could enjoy without worrying about the health consequences. Being inexperienced in the baking industry, he invited a food connoisseur to join him in this adventure. She advised him to revise his product strategy from being solely low sugar to being low sugar, vegan, and gluten free in order to stay on top of market trends and target more customers. The entrepreneur’s new business, Bald Baker, began in January 2017, and in April of that year it officially launched three of Bald Baker’s products at the Niagara Food & Wine Expo. Bald Baker’s treats at this and other consumer food shows were receiving very positive reviews.<br><br>The entrepreneur now had to make some decisions about the future of Bald Baker. To ensure the long-term growth and sustainability of the brand, should Bald Baker’s product positioning be low sugar, or vegan/gluten-free/ketogenic-diet friendly? How should he allocate a $50,000 grant toward Bald Baker’s marketing?

Alphabet Inc.’s Google LLC (Google) purchased Fitbit Inc. (Fitbit) in November 2019 for US$2.1 billion, marking its foray into health care, and by January 2021, the US Department of Justice was conducting a probe into the Google–Fitbit merger amid Fitbit users’ skepticism and distrust of the deal with regard to data privacy. Although Google’s senior vice-president of devices and services assured users that the intent of the deal was to “spur innovation in wearables” and not to sell personal information or use Fitbit’s health and wellness data for Google Ads, Fitbit users remained concerned regarding Google’s access to incredible amounts of personal data. While the acquisition would help Google address its hardware failures of the past, gain an edge in software through an instant foothold in the growing smartwatch market, and integrate Fitbit’s smartwatches more deeply with Android, the larger goal was more likely maximizing Fitbit’s business-to-business (B2B) partnerships with “health insurance companies and direct corporate wellness programming.” What strategies should Google use to leverage Fitbit’s hardware strengths, B2B partnerships, and technical expertise? What steps should Google take to assuage data privacy concerns to become a serious contender in the smartwatch and health care markets and to realize its goal of revolutionizing digital health care? Did Fitbit stand to benefit from the deal?

In January 2020, Bombay Shaving Company had established an in-house digital team that was able to achieve the best digital marketing key performance indicators in its industry. BSC's marketing strategy focused on conversion rates, influencer marketing, heatmaps, A/B testing, keyword cloud analysis, and emailer marketing. In using these tools, BSC was carving out a differentiated strategy for each step of the customer journey, including customer acquisition and customer retention. However, analysis of online purchase data had indicated that out of every thousand customers who visited the company's website, only 13 ended up making a purchase. BSC had to address its poor conversion rate and determine how to ensure that its conversion rate would meet the industry standard.

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