The Importance of Ingredient-Branding for German Automotive Consumers and its Effect on Suppliers' Chances Establishing their Brands

Since many years, the automotive industry represents the most important industry in Germany. Its complexity includes that although global players present themselves as the ones who produce cars, most of the work is done by automotive suppliers, which are generally not often known by consumers. The active branding of a supplier of components of the final product is called ingredient-branding, a rather new branding-strategy, with the aim to promote supplier brands to consumers. Ingredient-branding is also done in the automotive industry, but research about its importance for automotive consumers is very old, according to the fast changing industry. Therefore developing new insights about it was chosen as main objective. Research questions which have been formulated were: “What importance does ingredient-branding have in automotive consumers' purchase decisions today?” and “How are the chances for suppliers of new technologies to establish their brands?” To answer these, firstly a literature review of primary data has been done and secondly the empirical research method of a quantitative research with an internet survey of 252 automotive consumers was performed, to close the gap in the literature. Results of empirical research state that chances for suppliers to establish their brand in the German automotive market are generally not good. While from 2005 to 2017 brand awareness increased, the importance of supplier brands decreased significantly, which presents a negative trend. Men and automobile-affine consumers still have the most interest in it and therefore offer the best chances to be triggered by ingredient-branding. Furthermore suppliers of new technologies as electric drive, autonomous systems or driver's assistance systems and car connectivity have moderate chances, as these systems indeed present highest innovativeness, but not a high benefit. Results were developed under various limitations, such as the empirical research design, which was chosen. Further research should most favourably be made with experimental designs and concentrate more on individual components and brands