RSSThe new branding strategy for Acer, Packard Bell, and Gateway
by Tim Conneally
In Budapest, Hungary on Friday, the Acer group unveiled its strategy for marketing and identity-branding for all of its consumer computer labels.
TBR analyst John Spooner remarked to us earlier this year that Acer looked to be arranging itself at the top of its brand pyramid, ahead of Gateway and Packard Bell, and eMachines. In the new conglomerate, it looked like all the brands would retain their identities. On Friday, Acer announced the relative markets where these products would be aimed, and there doesn't appear to be a change in course.
In its transition to Acer ownership, Gateway sold its professional divisions to MPC, and ended its famous direct sales model, moving into pre-made consumer machines. Acer hopes the brand will maintain a reputation for being simple and easy to use.
Though in the last 20 years of personal computing, Packard Bell has not typically been associated with style or glamour, the brand's roots actually reach all the way back to the 1920's as a cutting-edge tube radio company. While time and acquisitions have all but removed Packard Bell from the US, the brand remains strong in Europe, with its Easynote line of notebooks, that take an atypical approach to design.
Recently, Packard Bell announced a full line of new products, using such descriptors as "hedonism...minimalistic design...intense good looks."
The group's announcement on Friday noted that only Acer, Gateway, and Packard Bell would retain "three distinct identities," glossing over eMachines. Since the latter brand was already a subdivision of Gateway when it was acquired by Acer, it will likely remain a subset. As Acer's group marketing now says, eMachines makes products for those with a "pragmatic approach to technology." The brand has long been associated with the lowest-priced systems on the market, and likewise isn't known for its power or style (with the exception of certain reconditioned units sold by TigerDirect three years ago with surprisingly souped-up buildouts), so pragmatism could be a fair call.
Finally, the Acer brand, which this year has pulled up behind HP and Dell into the position of third largest PC seller in the US, will seek to "simplify my life through technology." This will no doubt be the company's marketing campaign in the coming months as it attempts to grab and hold onto the position of the second largest computer manufacturer in the world.
9 Comments
Packard Bell - I had to read that twice - I remember all the Packard Bell computers at Sears (I think) that ran the 8088 processor and 5 1/4 floppy. Long Time in Business.
I can't believe they are still around.
I have an Acer running linux which I bought at BJ's - Love it. $499 and runs terrific.
http://afewtips.com
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Say what you want, but I love my Gateway computers. Their support is great. My sisters screen in her laptop had a loose connection and when I called Gateway I was only on hold for about a minute and the person I talked to was an American that I could understand not someone in India. This has been my first incident with a Gateway computer since the first one I had in 1994 or so.
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Packard Bell their premium brand? They'll have to do some work to overcome the stigma attached to the 'Packard Hell' name first. Maybe the name held some prestige in the past but before it all but disappeared it had the reputation of being cheap, junky, Mega-Mart fodder. Why start off by having to dig your way out of a hole?
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Wait...
Acer, who and who? ;)
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Next they will be buying the Tandy name and releasing a NEW box called the TRS-80.
Except for Acer, all of the names harken back 15-20 years...so much for connoting innovation!
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The name hasn't been seen much for a while in the US, but the world is a much bigger place than just one country. They've been doing just fine in Europe.
"Except for Acer, all of the names harken back 15-20 years...so much for connoting innovation!"
So do the names Microsoft and Apple. As far as I know they're still doing ok.
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So Gateway and Packard Bell have been doing fine in Europe?
Considering that Packard Bell was slightly 'unavailable' for quite a few years, and that Gateway has had a few significant problems of their own...that's a bit surprising.
And MS and Apple have continued as viable available brands...oh...
And those business issues, not to mention name recognition and association issues, have occurred regardless of what continent or planet you have been on.
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Acer did basically take over the Tandy computer product lines a long time ago.
Acer name in the US was licensed by Beny Alagem, the same one that 'took over' the Packard Bell name. But Acer took that back.
Packard Bell has been going pretty well in Europe and other countries as they were able to rework the systems for their locales before PB 'bought' Zenith Data Systems and then NEC 'bought' PB.
Acer has been around for a long time too.
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And whose on 3rd?
Sounds like a brilliant play to confuse folks even further - almost as customer friendly to those without a scorecard as the "new" more meaningful CPU and graphics card names.
Most people in the industry can't decipher them!
LOL!
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