Niche brands
The second strategy is to create a niche brand by aiming to keep the numbers of buyers relatively low but at the same time increasing the average amount bought by these buyers. This could be achieved by reducing the distribution coverage of the brand and using the money saved to better support/promote the brand to current customers. This strategy implies a higher proportion of behaviorally‐loyal and committed buyers (CBCs) for the level of market share than predicted by the DJ effect. In its early years, the Body Shop was a successful niche brand.
The third strategy is for a big brand to become a “super‐loyalty brand”. These are brands that exhibit signs of strong commitment and that have higher than expected (using the DJ model) repeat‐purchase (Fader and Schmittlein, 1993) (i.e. an above‐average number of CBCs at a high level of market share). During the early 1990s, icon‐status Nike appeared to be such a super loyalty brand.