A Recipe for Creating New Products†

Take two completely separate categories. Combine

Wall Street Journal, October 27, 2007 — When it comes to brand extension, the conventional wisdom is simple: Don't overextend. The idea is that companies should stay within established product lines to avoid dilution of the brand identity. After all, it makes intuitive sense not to diversify into categories that are remote to core products.

To rejuvenate established product families, brand managers thus typically combine features of one product with those of others in the same family. Think of a cellphone-cum-organizer-cum-computer-etc

The problem with the don't-overextend mind-set is that managers can easily fall into the trap of inbreeding: They overwhelm customers with additional features taken from related product lines.