Designers faced with the task of developing the next model of a brand must balance several considerations. The design must be novel and express attributes important to the customers, while also recognizable as a representative of the brand. This balancing is left to the intuition of the designers, who must anticipate how all customers will perceive the new design. Oftentimes, the design freedom used to meet a styling attribute such as aggressiveness can compromise the recognition of the product as a member of the brand. In this paper, an experiment is conducted measuring change in ten styling attributes common to both design freedom and brand recognition for automotive designs, using customer responses to vehicle designs created interactively. Results show that, while brand recognition is highly dependent on the particular manufacturer, tradeoffs between design freedom and brand recognition may be measured using predictive models to inform strategic design decisions.
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ASME 2015 International Design Engineering Technical Conferences and Computers and Information in Engineering Conference
August 2–5, 2015
Boston, Massachusetts, USA
Conference Sponsors:
- Design Engineering Division
- Computers and Information in Engineering Division
ISBN:
978-0-7918-5717-5
PROCEEDINGS PAPER
Balancing Design Freedom and Brand Recognition in the Evolution of Automotive Brand Styling Available to Purchase
Alex Burnap,
Alex Burnap
University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, MI
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Jeffrey Hartley,
Jeffrey Hartley
General Motors Corporation, Warren, MI
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Yanxin Pan,
Yanxin Pan
University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, MI
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Richard Gonzalez,
Richard Gonzalez
University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, MI
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Panos Y. Papalambros
Panos Y. Papalambros
University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, MI
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Alex Burnap
University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, MI
Jeffrey Hartley
General Motors Corporation, Warren, MI
Yanxin Pan
University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, MI
Richard Gonzalez
University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, MI
Panos Y. Papalambros
University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, MI
Paper No:
DETC2015-47908, V007T06A047; 12 pages
Published Online:
January 19, 2016
Citation
Burnap, A, Hartley, J, Pan, Y, Gonzalez, R, & Papalambros, PY. "Balancing Design Freedom and Brand Recognition in the Evolution of Automotive Brand Styling." Proceedings of the ASME 2015 International Design Engineering Technical Conferences and Computers and Information in Engineering Conference. Volume 7: 27th International Conference on Design Theory and Methodology. Boston, Massachusetts, USA. August 2–5, 2015. V007T06A047. ASME. https://doi.org/10.1115/DETC2015-47908
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