Sterling very slowly changed Kay's merchandise through their "pull" method of merchandising. While Zale "pushed" higher quality and trendier jewelry on all of their customers in all of their stores, Sterling gradually tested merchandise and responded to consumer demand. It's much slower and less dramatic than "push" merchandising, and won't have the amazing results a successful push might cause in regards to sales, but it's much safer. Zale was overconfident as their "push" merchandising pulled Gordon's from low-end to middle market (just above Zales in pricing) and boosted the chain's average ticket much higher; they hadn't realized how consumers would react to "The Diamond Store" suddenly changing. Of course Sterling also built up Kay through intense marketing and store refurbishment...and by combining the strength of the original Sterling regional brands. When I think about re-branding, I think about Target, a place I used to hate shopping at because it was always cluttered and understocked. Now I am much more likely to shop at Target and no longer dislike going there. But it has taken me years and years of not shopping at Target to finally go back. "Upping" a brand is a lot of hard work, and will often cause a lot of pain in the short term, but it is sometimes possible if you go slowly.

Honestly, I haven't been out of college *that* long, and I've still lost count of the number of times I've seen vendors do things that were hitherto considered impossible. Ten years ago, people would have told you it was impossible to sell diamonds over the internet because customers needed the hand-holding and the diamonds right in front of them. Then Blue Nile, Pricescope, et al. turned the whole industry upside down almost overnight. The post is correct that moving is hard, but impossible? Come on, nowadays, I'm firmly convinced that NOTHING is impossible in marketing; it's just about finding the right approach. MJB has an excellent example with Kay. They're not Tiffany, but they've successfully pulled a "Target" on Zale's Wal-Mart approach.

A brand has to be willing to commit to the strategy for the long term--decades, even--and be willing to endure the short-term pain. If not, it ends up schizophrenic, standing for nothing, and failing all its customers. I offer as an example the late Strawbridge & Clothier, one of Philadelphia's strongest homegrown department stores. A better-middle brand (competing roughly in the Macy's-level space), the retailer decided to move upscale. But upscale customers didn't associate the Strawbridge & CLothier name with upscale shopping, and thus didn't respond quickly. Meanwhile, the retailer's pricey new merchandise alienated its solid middle-class customer base. After a few years of caroming back and forth with different messages, the family ultimately sold out to the May Co., which rechristened the store as just "Strawbridge's," tried to promote value. But by then the loyal value-driven base had gone elsewhere. The strategy failed, and the name disappeared into the great retail graveyard.