Co-creating Polyphony or Cacophony? A case study of an organization’s current brand co-creation process and the challenge of integrating multiple voices

The latest wave within branding theory suggests a move toward enterprise branding or co-created branding (cf. Hatch and Schultz, 2010; Johansen and Andersen, 2012; Karmark, 2013). This entails that organizations to a large extent involve both external and internal stakeholders in an ongoing, dynamic process of creating and developing the corporate brand. In theory, this approach holds great promise in terms of increasing organizational transparency, creating stakeholder engagement, as well as true stakeholder dialogue. But, a brand co-creation process also exposes the organization to danger, e.g. loss of control, dilution of identity, and potential disharmony between the multiple voices co-creating the brand. Therefore, this paper empirically explores how an organization endeavoring into a brand co-creation process struggles to orchestrate the many voices in practice. Implications focus on the role of the organization as either initiator, facilitator or director of the co-creation process.