by Jeff Stankard, Babcox Tech Group Publisher, and Jon Owens, AAP, Babcox Group Publisher

You’ve heard the term, “feed the dogs the dog food,” right? Well, only if it’s not tainted with rat poison. Sadly, pets across America were at risk recently of being exposed to tainted dog and cat food that killed many, and made many others terribly sick. But, the ironic twist of fate is, not only were the powerless pets exposed to the toxic treats, so too were the brand managers and marketing executives whose supposedly “different” products were produced from this one, single manufacturing source.

AdAge.com recently ran an article on the national pet-food recall with the title "Recall Sheds Light on Pet-Food Industry’s Little Secret" with the sub-title "Consumers See That Premium, Private Label Products Can Come From (the) Same Place."

You can imagine there are some anxious marketing executives of these "premium" brands who are trying to quickly update their packaging to incorporate some extra fine print to help differentiate their products. Meanwhile, they are probably pounding on their ad agencies to come up with a new look and new packaging while checking their inventory position to calculate just when the new stuff will hit the streets.

Single source manufacturing for multiple brands is nothing new, and is a common practice employed daily by a multitude of aftermarket parts suppliers. Manufacturing “rationalization” is a necessary strategy in a world of compounding SKU proliferation, year after year. Thus, differentiating premium product from private label is a challenge at every level of our industry, from the executives at the manufacturer, through all of distribution, to the shop owner and technician who throws away the boxes these parts are packaged in. How to differentiate one “brand” (or, price level) from another is something that must be continuously scrutinized and considered.

Is there enough difference to justify the price? Is the difference being communicated well enough to your customers and their customers? Do shop owners and/or technicians place value in the feature/benefit that is the point of differentiation? What about consumers? Do they place any value whatsoever in your brand or differentiating features? If so, is our industry capable of clearly and concisely communicating those features to the vehicle owner?

In the case of the dog and cat food, the pet owner is making the purchasing decision for the pet as he or she stands in front of the shelves at the grocery or pet store, much in the same way that automotive repair shops decide which parts to use to fix consumers vehicles. However, unlike repair shops, pet owners probably don’t have much information to go by when deciding which product is best for their pets.

Conscientious pet owners will do some research and investigate, or do some trial and error testing before settling in on the brand that works best for their pets. However, much of this can be influenced by savvy marketing and getting point of sale materials in front of consumer’s eyes at the very point they’re researching or investigating which brand to choose.

In the sad reality of the pet food recall, the pet owners unknowingly filled their pets’ food bowls with tainted food to consume, and no amount of prior information or marketing could change that. Luckily for the motoring public, most of the automotive aftermarket’s products are sold by educated, trained and competent parts professionals, or by skilled technicians and/or service advisors. In our world, we have qualified people who can explain the difference between high quality, high performance products and those of lesser quality and lower performance. Or, do we? Hopefully the explanation of the difference isn’t just "10 bucks." If it is, we’re all in trouble, even more so than the pet food industry.

There are thousands upon thousands of parts out there to be sold on to vehicles. Marketing in the automotive aftermarket requires that we clearly, broadly and frequently communicate how these products are different from one another, and what level of performance can be expected from one price point versus another. If we aren’t doing this on a consistent basis, and backing it up with the appropriate level of product performance, then we risk being “exposed” much like the pet industry, offering generic products at high-end prices, or higher quality products at generic level pricing. Either way, our failure to communicate properly and thoroughly and/or apply the appropriate level of both category and product management will erode our already razor thin margins, and leave our industry exposed in ways we can ill afford. It’s not necessarily a “pet” peeve of ours, but certainly a topic worthy of more dialogue and action.