Rebranding is often an effective way to ensure that your franchise, and what it represents, is in line with your customers’ wants and needs.

An example of re-alignment took place within the retail outlets Matchbox. The franchisors trusted the process sufficiently to remove a percentage of product off the shelves following consumer research conducted by BrandsRPeople2’s Jess Logan’s.

The new look Matchbox was teamed with Masterchef star Poh and the search for the best kept secret recipe. Through sponsorship, the brand’s marketing spend has grown, allowing it to further promote itself.

Mr Rental also redid its product offer and back office system, and introduced a wow factor to get its rental offer more swiftly recognised in the market. Areas of concern had been consumer fees, consumer contracts, renting brands not comparable to its competitors, a poor website and core distribution channel.

Consumer research unveiled a lack of education in the higher demographics; people with more cash simply didn’t know about the brand or its benefits. Under its new direction the rental franchise has seen a 74 per cent increase in revenue, in two to four months. “The franchisor did four campaigns in 12 months. General manager Alan Payne really backed it,” explains Logan.

Payne explains “Early in we identified though detailed market research who our target demographics were and that it was essential to lift our brand awareness with our core customer and emerging customer demographics. But it would be some time before we would have the marketing dollars that long established franchise systems, and our major competitor, could access.

“So, while focusing our franchisees on local area marketing (LAM) in the short term; we undertook to develop a cut through strategy that would achieve rapid increases in awareness, which we could then leverage through our well developed LAM systems.

“The outcome was a rebranding strategy and communications strategy that combined to communicate to our target demographics the aspects of our offering that our customers responded favourably to; in a cost effective but radically new way.

“This was the best example I have seen of franchisor, franchisee and external consultants working together in what was a leap of faith and a major commitment to a new strategy and a new way of managing group marketing.”

Ideally franchisors should brand before the system is set but the reality is such a thorough branding exercise is rarely contemplated or funded before a small business has reached a critical stage in its development. Take the mobile waterless car washing business, Ecowash, started by Jim Cornish and Stewart Nicholls.

“Ecowash started out entrepreneur driven, built on our knowledge of the market; we come up with what we think the consumer wants. Not many have the luxury to employ a research group to ask the questions in the beginning,” explains Cornish.

Established five years ago the franchise system has spread its wings to the Middle East, Europe and the US. But as CEO Cornish explains, the time was right for a thorough overhaul. The brand has grown over the five years from three products to 20. It’s a very different business yet the brand positioning remained static.

“Five years on it is time to see what people who love us, or don’t love us, think of it. The business has been driven by Stu and me, now we’ve moved to asking what the consumer wants.”

When the results of consumer research were unveiled, there were some surprises to the franchisors who have always been passionate about the distinctive orange denoting the Ecowash brand. It turns out the citrus shade was not a priority for the customer – in fact some were unaware of the sharp colour as they never saw the cars themselves.

Cornish admits that though Logan was given a free hand, facing the truth about the brand required guts. “I think initially, it’s very personal, it’s like your child going off to school for the first time. But we want this to be the best

possible business.

“We didn’t set any limits, we said tell us what people like and don’t like and, if necessary, we’ll create a new brand. And that what happened.”

What had always been a frustration was that people didn’t fully understand the service without a detailed explanation from franchisees. The re-brand shifts the focus from the car washing to the technical aspect and how the cleaning process works.

“Washing is synonymous with water,” says Cornish, so a complete paradigm shift was required for a waterless car cleaning service: the element mercury was chosen to represent liquid which customers believe essential for damage-free car washing.

Another change was in the delivery of the service. The mobile car wash attending the clientÕs vehicle wherever it was located was not necessarily convenient for customers. So in 2010 there will be some fixed sites, and some commercial opportunities; already the new brand has contract work with Qantas valet in Sydney, Brisbane, Melbourne and Adelaide airports lined up.

The change in mentality was most significant around the technology: a sharp, techno look sums up the new brand and its offer – Nanotek.

But the re-alignment is not just in colour, name and logo, it extends to Ford Focus cars to better match the brand’s positioning, uniform changes, websites, introducing a recruitment agency and more state advertising, Cornish says.

There is yet more brand revision to be done but the new look has gone down well with existing and even incoming franchisees. “We’ve signed four franchisees and part of the process was to tell them about this, and the response has been fantastic,” assures Cornish. “This is long term in terms of financial recovery but I’m confident we’ll recoup our investment in under 12 months.”