What brand extensions need to fully benefit from their parental heritage

It is well established that consumer acceptance of a brand extension depends on how strongly it fits with its parental origins. Less appreciated is how this acceptance also depends on the mental association created in consumers’ minds between the extension and its parent brand. Our investigation considers the gateway role played by this association’s mental accessibility in allowing extensions to fully benefit from their parental heritage. Six studies examine the effect of reinstating an extension’s association with its parent brand on extension evaluations. When reinstatement enhances the parental association’s accessibility, it strengthens the parent brand’s influence, leading to more or less favorable extension evaluations contingent upon the extension’s fit with its parental origins. These reinstatement effects carry important implications for brand-extension managers and researchers.