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Abstract
This article aims to analyse the practices of branding adopted in the European pre-modern economy in order to communicate information about the product to the consumer. It examines the nature and function of master’s marks and collective marks and their interaction with processes of imitation and counterfeiting, and takes a stance in the debate on the origins of the modern brand, arguing in favour of the thesis that early forms of brand may be found only in the economic context of the eighteenth century and not before.
Keywords:
Acknowledgments
The author would like to thank Patricio Sàiz, Rafael Castro and two anonymous referees for commenting on and suggesting ideas for this article.
Notes
1. Bently, Davis and Ginsburg, Trade Marks and Brands; Da Silva Lopes and Duguid, Trademarks, Brands and Competitiveness; Da Silva Lopes and Casson, “Brand Protection”; Da Silva Lopes and Guimaraes, “Trademarks and British Dominance”; Higgins, “Forgotten Heroes and Forgotten Issues”; Mercer, “A Mark of Distinction.”
2. Bastos and Levy, “A History of the Concept of Branding”; De Munck, “The Agency of Branding”; Duguid, “Brand in chain”; Epstein, “Craft Guilds in Pre-modern Economy”; Hamilton and Lai, “Consumerism without Capitalism”; Koehn, Brand New; Maitte, “Labels, Brands, and Market Integration”; McKendrick, Brewer and Plumb, The Birth of a Consumer Society; Moore and Reid, “The Birth of Brand”; Richardson, Brand Names; Schwarkopf, “Turning Trademarks into Brands”; Stanziani, “Marques, Marques Collectives”; Wengrow, “Prehistories of Commodity Branding.”
3. Da Silva Lopes and Casson, “Brand Protection”; Da Silva Lopes and Guimaraes, “Trademarks and British Dominance”; Greenhalgh and Rogers, “Trade Marks and Performances”; Higgins, “Forgotten Heroes and Forgotten Issues”; Mendonça, Santos Pereira and Mira Godinho, “Trademark as an Indicator”; Mercer, “A Mark of Distinction.”
4. See the special issue of Historical Social Research on The Economie des conventions. Transdisciplinary Discussions and Perspectives and in particular the following articles: Bessy, ”Institutions and Conventions of Quality”; Thévenot, “Convening the Company of Historians”; De Munck, “Conventions, the Great Transformation.”
5. See Schechter, The Historical Foundations.
6. See McKendrick, Brewer and Plumb, The Birth of a Consumer Society; Spufford, The Great Reclothing of Rural England; Weatherill, Consumer Behaviour and Material Culture; Lemire, Fashion’s Favourite; Brewer and Porter, Consumption and the World of Goods; Berg, Luxury and Pleasure; De Vries, The Industrious Revolution.
7. See, amongst others, Beltran, Chaveau and Galvez-Behar, Des brevets et des marques; Stanziani, “Marques, marques collectives,” 229–238; Richardson, Brand Names; Maitte, “Labels, Brands, and Market Integration,” 1–15; De Munck, “The Agency of Branding,” 1055–1076.
8. Beltran, Chaveau and Galvez-Behar, Des brevets et des marques, 88–90; Stanziani, “Marques, Marque Collectives,” 229–230; De Munck, “The Agency of Branding.”
9. Schechter, The Historical Foundations, 78. On this point see also Hamilton and Lai, “Consumerism Without Capitalism,” 253–279; Wengrow, “Prehistory of Commodity Branding,” 7–34.
10. The best known is Sheilagh Ogilvie: see Ogilvie, “The Economics of Guilds.”
11. See Richardson, “Guilds, Laws and Markets,” 20–23.
12. Ibid., 59–60; Rosa, “Appunti per una storia dell’oreficeria milanese,” 139–146; Beltran, Chauveau. Galvez-Behar, Des brevets et des marques, 88–90; De Munck, “The Agency of Branding,” 1061.
13. Cardon, La draperie au Moyen Age, 594–600.
14. Mainoni, “Il mercato della lana,” 20–43.
15. Lecce, Vicende dell'industria della lana; Borgherini, L'arte della lana in Padova; Malanima, La decadenza di un'economia cittadina; Mozzato, La mariegola dell'Arte della lana.
16. Munro, “Medieval Woollens,” 247–248.
17. Schechter, Historical Foundations, 88–95.
18. Jeggle, Munsterisches Leinen; Jeggle, “Pre-industrial Worlds of Production.”
19. Grenier, “Une économie de l'identification”, 25–53; Minard, “Réputation, normes et qualité”, 69–89.
20. Demo, L’anima della città, 180 and 276; Frangioni, “Sui modi di produzione,” 545.
21. Biscaro, “Due controversie in tema di marchi di fabbrica nel secolo XV,” 337–338; Motta, “Armaioli milanesi,” 187–232.
22. Rapp, “The Unmaking of the Mediterranean Trade Hegemony,” 508 and 510.
23. Caracausi, “Information Asymmetries,” 22.
24. Higgins and Tweedale, “Asset or Liability”; Maitte, “Labels, Brands, and Market Integration”; Guenzi, Cutlery Trade.
25. Maitte, “Labels, Brands, and Market Integration,” 9–11.
26. Higgins and Tweedale, “Asset or Liability,” 5.
27. Maitte, “Labels, Brands, and Market Integration,” 11.
28. Higgins and Tweedale, “Asset or Liability.”
29. According to De Munck at the beginning of the 1500s in the metal wares sector the master’s marks of the single craftsmen were subordinate to collective marks in the cities of the Southern Low Countries and in Nuremberg: these situations would therefore be included in the general tendency to substitute individual master’s marks with collective marks (city or guild) (De Munck, “The Agency of Branding,” 1057–1060).
30. According to De Munck the common feature was the ‘intrinsic value’ (De Munck, “Product Quality and Intrinsic Value,” 110–113).
31. Bastos and Levy, “A History of the Concept of Branding,” 350–352.
32. De Munck, “The Agency of Branding.”
33. Eymard-Duvernay, ”Conventions de qualité.” See also Stanziani, Histoire de la qualité alimentaire, 23–36; De Munck, ”Guilds, Product Quality and Intrinsic Value.”
34. De Munck, “The Agency of Branding,” 1064–1067; Ogilvie, “The Economics of Guilds,” 171; Caracausi, “Information Asymmetries and Craft Guilds.”
35. Botero, Della ragion di stato, 377–378. On this point see also Richardson, Brand Names, 20–27.
36. Grenier, ”Une économie de l’identification,” 34–35.
37. Salais and Storper, Les mondes de production.
38. ‘Generally speaking, economics of convention … recognises that beyond institutional codified rules which organise the “markets” there is a place for more informal or implicit rules that we can call “conventions”. They facilitate the coordination of economic agents under the conditions of uncertainty and incomplete rules, in particular by stabilising commune designation or qualification of product’ (Bessy. “Institutions and Conventions of Quality,” 15).
39. Belfanti, “Guilds, Patents and the Circulation of Technical Knowledge,” 569–589; Belfanti, “Between Mercantilism and Market,” 319–338; Maitte, “Imiitation, copie, contrefaçon.,” 23–25.
40. Frangioni, “Preposizioni semplici,” 614.
41. Favero, “Privilegi d’industria e diritti di proprietà,” 2; Favero, “Old and New Ceramics”, 306–310.
42. Mainoni, “Il mercato della lana.” For more examples see, among others, Panciera, L’arte matrice, 98–113.
43. Molà, The Silk Industry, 160.
44. Heers, “La mode et les marchés des draps de laine,” 199–200.
45. Poni, La seta in Italia, 507.
46. Poni, La seta in Italia, 536.
47. Caracausi, Small Innovation, Big Transformation.
48. Savary de Bruslons, Dictionnaire universel de commerce, vol. 4, 3. See also Maitte, “Imitation, copie, contrefaçon, faux,” 13–14.
49. Berg, “From Imitation to Invention”; Caracausi, “Information Asymmetries”; Coquery, “The Language of Success”; Maitte, “Imitation, copie, contrefaçon, faux”; Styles, “Product Innovation in Early Modern London.”
50. Eymard-Duvernay, “Conventions de qualité,” 338–344.
51. Ogilvie, “The Economics of Guilds,” 179.
52. De Munck, “The Agency of Branding,” 1065. See also De Munck, “Product Quality and Intrinsic Value,” 112; Maitte, “Labels, Brands and Market Integration,” 3–4. Marsilio Landriani, who visited the most important European manufactures during the second half of the eighteenth century, wrote: ‘The fashion … demands an apparent solidity. For, in fact, what would be the use of real solidity if the instability of fashion condemns as absurd today that which it hailed as excellent yesterday?’ (Belfanti, “Guilds, Patents and the Circulation of Technical Knowledge,” 589).
53. Bently, “The Making of the Modern Trade Mark Law”, 3.
54. Bently, Davis and Ginsburg, Trade Marks and Brands; Da Silva Lopes and Duguid, Trademarks, Brands and Competitiveness.
55. Bastos and Levy, “A History of the Concept of Branding”; Hamilton and Lai, “Consumerism without Capitalism”; Moore and Reid, “The Birth of Brand”; Wengrow, “Prehistories of Commodity Branding.”
56. The trademark is a sign, a name, a symbol or a combination of the aforementioned elements, protected by law on intellectual property, where it exists, by which a business represents itself to the consumers. The brand, while basing itself on the trademark for legal protection, incorporates a personality and an identity, inspires the consumer with feelings, memories, behaviour and fidelity. The image of the brand is constructed through, more or less advanced strategies of communication, aimed at defining its identity and character (see Bently, Davis and Ginsburg, Trade Marks and Brands; Da Silva Lopes and Duguid, Trademarks, Brands and Competitiveness; Da Silva Lopes and Guimaraes, “Trademarks and British Dominance”; Mercer, “A Mark of Distinction”).
57. De Munck, “The Agency of Branding,” 1064–1067; Belfanti, “Guilds, Patents and the Circulation of Technical Knowledge,” 586–589.
58. Costantini, Elementi di commerzio, 113, emphasis added.
59. Archivio di Stato di Venezia, Censori, b. 47, Marche delli negozianti dell’arte dei perleri, 1782.
60. Cella, “Storia di un marchio contraffatto,” 19–30, emphasis added.
61. Cella, “Storia di un marchio contraffatto,” 19–30.
62. Favero, “Old and New Ceramics”.
63. Andreozzi, “Per vestiario o per addobbi o per lusso”.
64. Giusberti, Impresa e avventura, 80, emphasis added.
65. Trademark laws were duly enacted by the modern state for the whole community of the citizens, while Privileges were an institutional solution provided by the feudal system to meet the needs of an individual.
66. Belfanti, “Guilds, Patents and the Circulation of Technical Knowledge”; Belfanti, “Between Mercantilism and Market”; Favero, “Privilegi d’industria e diritti di proprietà”; Maitte, “Imitation, copie, contrefaçon, faux,” 23–25.
67. Minard, “Réputations, normes et qualité, » 79–89; Grenier, “Une économie de l’identification,” 28–42.
68. Maitte, “Labels, Brands and Market Integration,” 5.
69. Coquery, “The Language of Success.”
70. ‘The privilege presents a twofold dimension, namely a license to carry out an economic activity and the accompanying advantages. For the entrepreneur, the privilege means a guarantee that covers business risk. Without the assurance that he will benefit some advantages able to reduce an uncertain profitability in an emerging market, he was not inclined to involve his fortune and is reputation. … From the point of view of the State, the privilege is an incentive as far as the beneficial owner might promote economic growth, enrichment for the nation and public welfare’ (Conchon and Lemaigre-Gaffier, The Economic Privilege in Old Regime France). See also: Hilaire-Pérez, L’invention technique; Maitte, “Imitation, copie, contrefaçon, faux,” 23–25.
71. McKendrick, Brewer and Plumb, The Birth of a Consumer Society.
72. Walker, “Advertising in London Newspapers,” 112–131; McKendrick, “The Commercialization of Fashion,” 84–94; Berg, Luxury and Pleasure, 271–277.
73. Berg, Luxury and Pleasure, 182–188.
74. Styles, “Product Innovation in Early Modern London,” 148–158; Wallis, Commercial Innovation in Early Modern England. ‘However, since in the late-seventeenth and early-eighteenth century the dividing line between medicaments, foodstuffs and beverages was fine, the concept of branded goods sold at fixed prices, often imposed nation-wide, spread into the grocery and confectionary trades’ (Cox, The Complete Tradesman, 103).
75. Wallis, Commercial Innovations.
76. McKendrick, “Josiah Wedgwood,” 100–145; Koehn, Brand New, 11–42.
77. McKendrick, “Josiah Wedgwood,” 124.
78. Koehn, Brand New, 4.
79. Demo, “Dall’auge al declino,” 279–280.
80. Beltran, Chaveau, Galvez-Behar, Des brevets des marques, 89; Pulsoni, “I classici italiani di Aldo Manuzio,” 477–487. See also Duguid, “Brands in chain”, 141–147.
81. See Garner, Die Ökonomie des Privilegs.
82. Koehn, Brand New, 5, 326–328.
83. ‘Privilege in Modern Europe played the part of an institution which reduced uncertainty and was suited to inspire confidence in the potential partners of those businesses it underpinned. … Privilege at the same time provided security for the property of the inventor or the entrepreneur, encouraged investment, stimulated and regulated competition, and provided an edge in recruiting a workforce or in technical diffusion’ (Garner, Hilaire-Pérez, Maitte, Margairaz, Revisiting Economic Privileges).
84. ‘[The trademark] is the tangible item of intellectual property – the logo, name, design or image – on which the brand rests. But brand also incorporates intangibles such as identity, association and personality’ (Mercer, “A Mark of Distinction,” 18).