“Deep” and “Surface” Cues: Brand Extension Evaluations by Children and Adults

We present a conceptual as well as empirical analysis showing that 11–12-year-old children, relative to adults, evaluate brand extensions by relying more on surface cues (e.g., brand name characteristics used to launch the extension) and less on deep cues (e.g., category similarity between the parent brand and the extension category). In experiment 1, children gave equivalent evaluations of brand extensions regardless of category similarity (e.g., Coca-Cola extending to iced tea vs. toffee), whereas adults rated near extensions (e.g., iced tea) more favorably than far extensions (e.g., toffee). In experiment 2, children evaluated near extensions more favorably than far extensions when they were cued to make similarity judgments prior to evaluation but rated near and far extensions equivalently when they were not cued prior to evaluation. In experiment 3, children based their evaluations on the extension name’s linguistic characteristics regardless of category similarity, whereas adults based their evaluations on category similarity regardless of name characteristics. Children rated extensions with a rhyming name (e.g., “Coca-Cola Gola” iced tea; “Wrigley’s Higley” toffee) more positively than extensions with a nonrhyming name (e.g., “Coca-Cola Higley” iced tea; “Wrigley’s Gola” toffee), whereas adults rated them similarly. Theoretical implications on branding and categorization research as well as managerial implications are discussed.