WORK – IN – PROGRESS

of brands Branding theory has been largely developed in the context of consumer products where it found its origin. Traditionally, the brand is presented as a market signal mostly targeted to the end consumers and enabling them to save time by guaranteeing a certain level of quality, simplifying their choices (easily identifying products and attributes); and answering to specific needs – hedonistic, ethical, or individual (Kapferer, 1992 [2004]). The brand enables the producer to position its offering relative to competition and to emphasize its distinctive qualities and benefits for the consumers. More recently, the brand also has been found to have a federating power (Dacin & Brown, 2006; Handelman, 2006) between individual customers (Arvidsson, 2005). Little research has been done to investigate the relevance and the role of brands in industrial markets and in particular in project business. Some authors have started to emphasize the importance of branding in industrial markets (Webster & Keller, 2004; Lynch & de Chernatony, 2004) but their contributions do not address the case of project exchanges. Project activities are characterized by the discontinuity of transactions (low frequency of purchase)