The Irish language in branding: An evaluation of current practices in Irish business Karen Campbell September 2008 This dissertation is submitted in partial fulfilment of the requirements for the Degree of MSc in Marketing Practice Presented to: Billy Bennett School of Business Letterkenny Institute of Technology Disclaimer 1 I hereby certify that this material, which I now submit in partial fulfilment of the requirements of the Degree of Master of Science in Marketing Practice, is entirely my own work and has not been obtained from the work of any other, except any work that has been cited and acknowledged within the text of my work. Signed: Disclaimer 2 I agree that this thesis may be used by Letterkenny Institute of Technology for teaching purposes on future Masters Programmes. Signed: Abstract This research was undertaken in order to examine the current practices in relation to the use of the Irish language in manufacturing and internationally traded services. The research focuses specifically on company and brand names in Irish. The aim of the research was to identify the motivations for the use of Irish as well as the benefits and limitations associated with its use. The research also examined the use of Irish in marketing communications and its effectiveness in this area of business. A survey was used to examine the views of the companies in relation to their use of the Irish language. Depth interviews were then used to further explore the key issues with a number of companies and industry experts. The research highlighted the companies’ wish to support the use of the Irish language and also identified customer loyalty and awareness as key benefits. The fact that companies believe customers do not often use Irish was identified in the research however they do believe that customers value companies using Irish. The research also identified that companies associate major difficulties with the use of Irish in marketing communications, specifically the effectiveness of Irish in marketing communications and the ease of running a full marketing campaign in Irish. The government needs to increase the level of support for businesses in their use of Irish as well as developing further measures to increase the use of the language within the country as a whole. Companies seem to be unaware of the benefits that Irish can bring them and increased levels of market research within companies may help to improve their perceptions of Irish within business. i Acknowledgements Firstly I would like to thank my son, Jack, who put up with his mum sitting at the computer all summer. He showed great patience and consideration and never complained. I would like to thank my research supervisor, Billy Bennett, whose help and guidance was invaluable. Thank you for the pep talks that kept me going. Sometimes they were badly needed. I would like to thank my family and friends who helped so much by simply offering support and a listening ear. I would also like to thank all the companies who took part in the research whether in the form of answering questionnaires or taking part in the depth interviews, obviously without your help this research would not have been possible. I would like to thank all of my lecturers and classmates who made taking part in the Masters programme worthwhile and enjoyable. I would also like to thank my employers, Declan and Brendan Ward, their support and understanding is greatly appreciated. Finally, I would like to thank the library staff of Letterkenny Institute of Technology and in particular Isobel who was always so helpful. ii Table of Contents Abstract.....................................................................................................................i Acknowledgements ..................................................................................................ii Table of Contents....................................................................................................iii List of Figures and Tables .......................................................................................v Chapter 1 Introduction............................................................................................1 Chapter 2 Literature Review...................................................................................2 2.1 Introduction......................................................................................................2 2.2 Benefits of branding.........................................................................................3 2.2.1 Competitive advantage ..............................................................................3 2.2.2 Premium pricing........................................................................................3 2.2.3 Effective and efficient marketing communications ....................................4 2.3 Brand equity.....................................................................................................5 2.3.1 Brand awareness........................................................................................6 2.3.2 Brand loyalty.............................................................................................7 2.3.3 Brand associations.....................................................................................8 2.3.4 Perceived quality.......................................................................................9 2.3.5 Other proprietary assets e.g. patents, trademarks, channel relationships .....9 2.4 Minority Languages and their use in branding ..................................................9 2.4.1 Language in marketing communications..................................................11 2.4.2 Minority languages: the role they play in branding ..................................11 2.5 The Irish language..........................................................................................14 Chapter 3 Research Methodology.........................................................................17 3.1 Introduction....................................................................................................17 3.2 Research objectives........................................................................................17 3.3 Phase 1 - Frame development.........................................................................18 3.4 Phase 2 - Survey research...............................................................................19 3.4.1 Data collection ........................................................................................19 3.4.2 Measurement...........................................................................................20 3.4.3 Sampling.................................................................................................21 3.4.4 Analysis ..................................................................................................21 iii 3.5 Phase 3 – Depth Interviews ............................................................................22 3.6 Limitations.....................................................................................................23 Chapter 4 Findings and Analysis ..........................................................................24 4.1 Introduction....................................................................................................24 4.2 Respondent profile .........................................................................................24 4.3 Current practices in relation to Irish language branding ..................................26 4.4 The benefits associated with using Irish company/brand names......................30 4.5 The limitations associated with the use of Irish...............................................35 4.6 Promotional tools and the use of Irish.............................................................38 Chapter 5 Conclusions and Recommendations ....................................................45 5.1 Conclusions....................................................................................................45 5.2 Recommendations..........................................................................................47 5.3 Research reflections .......................................................................................48 References ..............................................................................................................49 Appendices .............................................................................................................56 Appendix A – Research objectives.......................................................................56 Appendix B – List of companies using the Irish language.....................................58 Appendix C – Cover letter included with postal questionnaire..............................67 Appendix D – Postal questionnaire.......................................................................69 Appendix E – Theme sheets.................................................................................77 Appendix F – List of companies involved in depth interviews..............................80 Appendix G – Summary of transcripts of depth interviews by theme....................81 Appendix H – Additional Figure and Tables ......................................................105 iv List of Figures and Tables Figure 4.1: The nature of business of respondents 24 Figure 4.2: Length of time in business 25 Figure 4.3: Length of time Irish has been in use 25 Figure 4.4: How Irish is used