Co-Branding: You bring you. I’ll bring myself.
The Big Idea: Kanye and Gap break up: that’s okay.
Co-Branding is when two brands come together to reach entirely different audiences. The brands bring their own attributes to the combined partnership to create something greater than the two alone.
For Gap and Kanye, going their own ways will come at no real cost to their brands.
The Big Positive: Co-Branding that doesn’t work, typically still only has positives because you’ve hit a new audience that you might not have reached.
When the connection ends, it is possible to go your separate ways with no negative impact.
In this case, Kanye’s brand will have gained access to a younger audience that dresses conservatively that may not have found him from his music or other gigs.
The Gap will have the halo effect of Kanye’s music, design, and other jobs.
Downsides: Likely overstated.
Customers of The Gap won’t think less of the store because of the partnership with Kanye.
Fans of Kanye won’t think less of him because he had a partnership with The Gap.
Dig Deeper: Wikipedia lays kickstart for Co-Branding thinking.