CHAPTER ONE
INTRODUCTION
1.1 Background of the Study
In developing a marketing strategy for biscuit, the manufacturer has to
confront the branding decision. Branding is a major issue in product
strategy and has become a potential marketing tool. An increasing
number of products are sold on self-service basis, and branding must
perform many of these sales tasks. In the past, most products went
unbranded. Producers and middlemen sold their goods out of barrels,
bins, and cases, without any supplier’s identity. The earliest sign of
branding were in the efforts of medieval guilds to require crafts people to
put trade marks on their products to protect themselves and consumers
against inferior quality. Today, branding is such a strong force that
hardly anything goes unbranded. A powerful name is said to have
consumer franchise. (Adirika, E. 0, Ebue, B. C, and Nnolim, D. A,
2001:184).
Moreover, a realization of the fact that branding as a marketing tool
affects other product management decisions, confronts one with the fact
that its impact on marketing activities and consumers cannot be
overemphasized. (1995:100), captures the very essence of branding,
when he opined that apart from the Herculean task that will be
associated with trying to decide what manufacturers product to buy from
all the unbranded products, other product management decisions based
on market segmentation, promotion, product positioning, pricing etc,
would have been practically impossible”. Marketers consider branding as
an integral aspect of the total marketing strategy as well as a vital factor
in product planning and development. Sometimes, the way in which a
product is perceived by the market by merely hearing the brand name is
a good determinant of the product’s success or failure. E.g. Yale cabin
biscuit. From the foregoing importance of branding, marketers and
producers alike are developing increasing interest in this strategy. The
Biscuit Industry in Nigeria is not an exception to this increasing adoption
of branding as a strategy for winning the heart of consumers.
Biscuit have acquired a household recognition, such great awareness is
further manifested in the fact that some people have problem of
controlling their in-take of biscuits on health ground. This is attributed
largely to the popularity, which biscuits like cabin, coaster biscuit, short
cake bread and chocolate biscuits have acquired in recent times. The
most pronounced objective of most business ventures is profit making.
This objective is achieved when the goods and services produced get to
the final consumers at the right form, right place, right time, and right
price. The reason being that firms depend on the consumers for the sale
of products. Marketers are no longer in doubt as to whether consumers
need the products in the marketplace, but are more interested in
knowing why consumers prefer one brand of a product to the other
