Procter & Gamble is based in the USA and is one of the world's largest consumer package goods companies selling products such as Tide laundry detergent, Pampers disposable diapers, and Head & Shoulders shampoo. When P&G entered the Japanese market in the 1970s, its corporate name and reputation were virtually unknown there. Several of its brands had been sold by an importer, and they had some consumer recognition. P&G did not, at that time, emphasize its corporate name on its products in the belief that each brand should stand on its own. The two biggest Japanese competitors (Kao and Lion), however, made extensive use of their corporate names, going so far as to identify each new product or improvement to an exiting product in their advertising and prominently on the package as coming from the parent company.

If you were managing P&Gs new Japanese subsidiary, would you stick with the P&G philosophy of letting the brands stand on their own, or work to associate them with P&G? Why? Regardless of your first answer, if you were asked to associate every P&G brand with the parent company, how would you make that identification an asset for your business?