He disagreed and told me it was off of Main Street by Cosmo’s Pizza.
“You mean Burger King?”, I asked.
“Oh right”, he said, “that’s what you call it here”.
Turns out that when Burger King was expanding into Australia, they ran into a slight issue. There was already a fast food joint that had trademarked the name “Burger King”. Burger King was a small take-out restaurant based in Adelaide but a big problem to the Burger King franchise. In order to solve this problem, the U.S.-based Burger King allowed the Australian franchisee, named Jack Cowin, to select a name from a list of pre-existing trademarked names that they already had.
Jack then decided on the name of a pancake mix brand, Hungry Jack, but made it possessive. With that, the new Australia Burger King was born as Hungry Jack’s.
For more information about Hungry Jack’s and its legal process, check out this article.
As we discussed in class and according to Strategy New Media, brand names are important because they promote recognition. With the example of Hungry Jack’s, if I were to go to Australia without knowing its actually Burger King, I would have no recognition of this brand. I would not know I have had previous positive experiences with it or view it as a familiar brand.
Therefore, on one hand, I would say that having to change the name of Burger King to Hungry Jack’s hurt Burger King’s overall brand and recognition.
On the other hand, from listening to my housemates speak of Hungry Jack’s, I have realized that the unique name for Australia has also made them feel more connected to the brand. They feel that Burger King tailored their product just for them and then feel more loyal to it.
That leaves me to question whether or not brands should have globally-recognized names or if they should tailor their brand names to a particular region.
What do you think: In what situations or products do you think it is better to have regional brand names or globally recognized brand names?
Hello Carlee! Interesting blog and I like how your engaging readers with a question at the end. I think that having a regional brand name has its benefits for cornering the 'local' market. There are some foods in stores all over the country that have a really strong significance to the region which they are from. For example; take Tillamook dairy in this part of the country versus Monroe dairy on the East coast. Customers want to feel close to their products and the association of connecting to the area which they are from is important.
ReplyDeleteOn another note, having a global name also implies 'comfort' for the consumer. Having a familiar name such as Walmart or McDonald's in a foreign place can be beneficial.
Thanks!