Corporate heritage communication strategies of iconic Italian brands: a multiple case study

Abstract

Purpose

The paper aims to explore how companies communicate their heritage by drawing on heritage marketing and corporate communications literature and mapping the corporate heritage communication strategies of iconic Italian brands.

Design/methodology/approach

The study adopts an inductive multiple case study approach, analysing the communication of corporate heritage by nine iconic Italian brands (Pastificio Lucio Garofalo, Barovier & Toso, Pasta Farina, Ducati, Amaro Montenegro, Fiat, Bonomelli, Olivetti and Illy).

Findings

In communicating corporate heritage, companies adopt different strategies that vary along two main dimensions – the subject of the story and the tone of voice of the content. The strategies are: (1) heritage for authenticity; (2) heritage for market leadership; and (3) heritage for continuity.

Practical implications

From a theoretical point of view, the study highlights that heritage marketing strategies vary according to underlying strategic themes and narrative approaches. From a managerial point of view, it offers a preliminary guide for the development of corporate heritage communications, also providing indications for their implementation.

Originality/value

This study is amongst the firsts to investigate the strategic antecedents that can shape corporate heritage communication strategies. It represents an integration of the existing literature, which is limited to the descriptive presentation of heritage marketing principles and tools.

Citation

Sacco, F. and Conz, E. (2023), "Corporate heritage communication strategies of iconic Italian brands: a multiple case study", Corporate Communications: An International Journal, Vol. 28 No. 7, pp. 19-43. https://doi.org/10.1108/CCIJ-12-2021-0136

1. Introduction

Marketing and communication scholars widely recognised the advantages of associating the brand with its past and history to impart value to customers (Montemaggi and Severino, 2007). In the real world context, it is observable how many companies are exploiting their history and cultural heritage as a source of competitive advantage over new-born competitors, especially leveraging the great interest of consumers in positive brands' attributes such as authenticity, trust and uniqueness (Napoli et al., 2014; Balmer, 2013; Misiura, 2006). Heritage in the marketing strategies of organisations evokes vivid and relevant associations for consumers and stakeholders, strengthening the brand-consumer relationship (Balmer, 2013; Hudson and Balmer, 2013; Wiedmann et al., 2011).

Recent studies within the management literature are empirically exploring which marketing tools are exploited by companies to practice heritage marketing, revitalise brands with a heritage, or transform a brand into a heritage brand (Napolitano et al., 2018; Urde et al., 2007; Dion and Borraz, 2015). However, despite increasing interest and acknowledgement of the potential competitive advantage stemming from leveraging heritage both at the corporate and product level, there is a paucity of marketing research that explores through a practice-oriented approach how companies leverage their heritage in their relationship with consumers. It is still underexplored how companies design and project the communication of their corporate heritage to deliver customers unique selling propositions and to strengthen the emotional and symbolic ties between consumer and brand. Framing our work within the interpretive research tradition, the present study aims to contribute to the existing literature by answering the following research question: how do companies communicate their heritage?

Our research question and design stem from the problematization of the nascent literature on heritage marketing (Alvesson and Sandberg, 2011). Problematizing is about critically questioning the existing literature and generating new and improved ways of thinking about specific phenomena (Alvesson and Sandberg, 2011). This approach allowed us to identify three key limitations – and consequently, areas of improvement – in the extant heritage branding and heritage marketing knowledge. First, scholars addressed research questions to introduce and explain key themes that still missed a solid conceptualisation, i.e. the concept of corporate heritage, heritage marketing (Urde et al., 2007), corporate stores (Dion and Borraz, 2015), heritage branding orientation (Santos et al., 2016), corporate heritage identity (Lee and Davies, 2021), corporate heritage communication (Blombäck and Brunninge, 2016). Excluding very few cases, i.e. Burghausen and Balmer (2014a) investigate the activities to implement/manage corporate heritage identity; Bargenda (2015) how companies exploit their heritage for strategic purposes – practice-oriented “how” questions are especially omitted. For instance, how organisations leverage the attributes of their brand identity to build a heritage marketing campaign ? How they communicate their heritage, and through which media and tools?

The second limitation refers to the exploration of heritage marketing-related aspects primarily through an inward perspective, namely focusing on how corporate heritage is managed within the firm. For instance, previous studies investigated how collective corporate heritage mindset guides managers in terms of their stewardship of the corporate heritage identity (Balmer and Burghausen, 2019; Burghausen and Balmer, 2015; Maier and Andersen, 2017), or how managers implement and manage corporate heritage identity, that is how they link past and present identity in meaningful ways (Brunninge and Hartmann, 2019; Pecot et al., 2019). An outward perspective is almost exclusively adopted in the nascent literature on corporate heritage in consumer marketing, exploring what are the effects of corporate heritage elements on consumer behaviour (Swait and Erdem, 2007; Merchant and Rose, 2013; Napoli et al., 2014; Rindell et al., 2015; Rose et al., 2016; Pecot et al., 2018; Rindell and Santos, 2021). However, little is known about how organisations activate and leverage corporate heritage to build competitive advantage (Cooper et al., 2015) and position corporate and product brands in the market (Santos et al., 2016).

Finally, studies on heritage within the broad field of marketing literature operate within the rationalistic research tradition and explore the argument primarily building on a dualistic ontology (Schembri and Sandberg, 2002): the activities and processes of the firms are separated from the individuals involved in carrying out these activities. In our study, we challenge the holistic assumption of rationalistic studies that separate heritage communication into two discrete entities: the set of activities that characterise heritage communication and the individuals involved. Conversely, according to the interpretive research tradition (Latour and Woolgar, 2013), we assume that organisations implement corporate and product heritage strategies based on the different ways marketing managers give meaning to and practice heritage marketing communication. Consequently, the point of departure of our study is the marketing manager: the study assumes that manager and strategies are two inseparable entities and the heritage communication strategies are constituted by the subjective meaning that heritage communication takes for them and their lived experience of it (Latour and Woolgar, 2013).

Given the above-mentioned problematization of the literature on heritage marketing and by adopting the lens of interpretive qualitative research, we focussed on the specific aspect of corporate heritage communication, to explore in practice how companies communicate their corporate heritage to external stakeholders, including consumers. We specifically devoted attention to the corporate heritage communication strategies and activities of nine outstanding and iconic Italian companies characterised by a monolithic house strategy as brand architecture, i.e. how brands are structured within the company's brand portfolio (Tuten, 2020). Organisations with a monolithic house strategy leverage their well-established master brand for each new product offering, see for instance BMW, AUDI, Mc Donalds which new products' names recalled always the master brand (BMW 5 series, AUDI A4, Bacon Big Mac). The result is a family tree of brands in which each new product is labelled with the master brand, reflecting its values and attributes. This choice follows the current increasing shift of companies with a branded house strategy (i.e. each product is brought to the market with its brand, which differs from the corporate one) to move into a monolithic direction, to strongly associate their product brands with the company name (Cornelissen, 2020). One possible explanation of this trend is that monolithic identities represent a valuable asset that positively impacts companies' financial performance. Marketing scholars (Erdem, 1998; Hakenes and Peitz, 2008) also strongly suggested branding the entire organisation under the same umbrella and, consequently, unifying communication and marketing activities, rather than focusing on single products or services brands.

The companies and respective master brands we selected for the study are Pastificio Lucio Garofalo, Barovier & Toso, Pasta Farina, Ducati, Amaro Montenegro, Fiat, Bonomelli, Olivetti and Illy. The research design follows the guidelines and protocols for inductive case study research based on interpretivism (Bryman and Bell, 2015; Stake, 1995). We contribute to the heritage marketing literature by identifying three strategies companies adopt to communicate their corporate heritage. We labelled them (1) heritage for authenticity, (2) heritage for market leadership and (3) heritage for continuity. These strategies vary along two dimensions: the subject of the story (i.e. the product or the company) and the tone of voice of the content (i.e. emotional or functional).

The next sections are organised as follows: we introduce the concepts of heritage, corporate heritage and heritage marketing; we follow by problematizing the literature on corporate heritage and heritage marketing, and then we present the research methodology. Finally, we illustrate the main findings, a discussion of the results, limitations and suggestions for future research.

2. Literature review

2.1 Heritage and corporate heritage: a review of definitions

In its original meaning, heritage is strictly associated with the cultural dimension of society, being defined as “the ways of living developed by a community and passed on from generation to generation, including customs, practices, places, objects, artistic expressions and values” (Icomos, 1999, p. 21). However, the definition of cultural heritage originally included only tangible forms of heritage, e.g. archaeological sites and natural sites (Unesco, 1972), and it was later extended to intangible ones, such as the knowledge and skills needed to produce traditional crafts (Unesco, 2003). In the last decades, heritage additionally developed into a distinctive conceptual category within the management and marketing research fields, as practitioners and academics are showing a growing interest in “past-in-marketing” (Balmer and Burghausen, 2019, p. 220) and “an approach to corporate marketing that involves reference to the past”, i.e. corporate heritage (Hudson and Balmer, 2013, p. 357). Scholars define corporate heritage as “all the traits and aspects of an organisation that link its past, present, and future in a meaningful and relevant way” (Burghausen and Balmer, 2014b, p. 394), overcoming the conceptualisation of corporate history, that is “an interpreted account of the historical trajectory and development of an organisation, representing an attempt in the present to explain, celebrate, justify, or otherwise make sense of changes over time” (Burghausen and Balmer, 2017, p. 140).

Corporate heritage is also recognised as a dimension of a brand's identity, “found in its track record, longevity, core values, use of symbols, and particularly in an organisational belief that its history is important” (Urde et al., 2007, p. 4). It is thus considered a “transtemporal” dimension of the corporate identity, representing the institutional traits that remained meaningful over time (Balmer and Burghausen, 2015). Because of its transtemporal nature, corporate heritage should be carefully managed through a brand stewardship activity (Urde et al., 2007), to minimise its possible negative influences on stakeholders, manage the tension between continuity and change that corporate brands naturally face and leverage it as an asset. Since cultural perceptions can change over time, a corporate heritage trait that was once acceptable in the cultural context of origin can become a burden today (e.g. the employment of slavery in manufacturing) (Balmer, 2013; Sørensen et al., 2021). Moreover, managers are faced with the challenge of maintaining the brand relevant, by remaining true to the brand's authentic core while managing inevitable changes (Cooper et al., 2021). Finally, corporate heritage can be a source of competitive advantage, as it conveys to the consumer a sense of expertise, legitimacy, perceived authenticity, brand trust and responsibility (Pecot et al., 2018) and strengthens the positioning statement of the organisation. Corporate heritage is an asset through which companies can profit, as its communication fosters positive image associations, brand awareness and brand knowledge, ultimately contributing to increasing brand equity (Balmer, 2013).

Furthermore, disruptive events (i.e. environmental shocks, pandemics) provide fertile ground for corporate heritage strategies involving the past of an organisation. For instance, the COVID-19 pandemic pushed consumers to search for stability and strong emotional connections with brands (Hoekstra and Leeflang, 2020), refuging in a past they perceive as “golden” when experiencing a negative present and relying on feelings of authenticity and nostalgia (Goulding, 2001). The former guides the consumer's choice in times of uncertainty or complex interpretation, allowing the individual to rely on a safe and understandable tradition: a brand perceived as authentic is considered a more trustworthy choice (Swait and Erdem, 2007). Besides, brand authenticity has a positive effect on consumer satisfaction (Napoli et al., 2014), strengthening the organisation–consumer relationship and positively affecting consumer loyalty (i.e. purchase intention and willingness to pay a premium price), consumer tolerance of brand mistakes and consumer's intention to recommend the brand (Fritz et al., 2017). The latter, nostalgia, is defined as “a preference (general liking, positive attitude or favourable effect) towards experiences associated with objects (people, places or things) that were more common (popular, fashionable or widely circulated) when one was younger (in early adulthood, in adolescence, in childhood or even before birth)” (Holbrook and Schindler, 2003, p. 108). Nostalgia and heritage are both recognised as foundational past-related marketing concepts: heritage represents the feeling of yearning for the past, while nostalgia represents the past inherited and bequeathed by the organisation (Balmer and Burghausen, 2019). Since corporate heritage strategies can be built on nostalgia, the boundaries between the two concepts are often blurred. However, they can be differentiated according to their focus: nostalgia is an experiential state associated with the consumer, while corporate heritage is an endowment of the firm from a managerial perspective (Pecot et al., 2019).

2.2 Corporate heritage marketing communication and tools

Heritage marketing is “concerned with the ‘marketing’ of history and with brands that evoke and represent a particular era” (Balmer, 2013, p. 294) and it represents the set of activities that companies adopt in building and strengthening relationships amongst organisations and customers, by exploiting the history, the culture and the values of the organisation (Napolitano et al., 2018). The heritage marketing mix is defined as the “reconstruction and management of a narrative concerning the history of an organisation and/or its brands/products” (Martino, 2013, p. 86), and allows showing the authentic past of the organisation focusing on the heritage (Salmon, 2008; Fontana, 2013).

Heritage marketing practices include the development of a corporate heritage communication strategy, i.e. the use of all written, verbally stated, or visually presented components of a company for the strategic enhancement of its brand identity amongst its internal and external audiences (Micelotta and Raynard, 2011). It aims at providing experience and knowledge about the corporate heritage and contributes to building brand image and reputation by leveraging the corporate heritage and strengthening customers' and stakeholders' relationships and engagement with the brand (Balmer, 2013). The aim is to positively influence the corporate image heritage, i.e. “an individual customer's company-related images constructed over time, which can act as a frame of reference for the consumer when interpreting company actions in the present” (Rindell, 2017, p. 276). Corporate heritage communication strategies rely on a “packaged past” (Ooi, 2002, p. 607), a corporate narrative about historical events or allusions to company history in several ways (i.e. packaging or slogans). The packaged past serves different brand purposes: for instance, it develops strong relationships with the consumer (i.e. emotional purpose) and/or it represents a community and its beliefs, by highlighting the connection of the company (or the brand) with its traditions, territory and symbols (i.e. symbolic/aspirational purpose) (Tuten, 2019, p. 353). Because of its pervasive, multi-layered and omni-temporal nature, the strategic exploitation of corporate heritage is especially suitable for monolithic brand architectures, allowing the company to “speak with one voice” (Tuten, 2020). All the touchpoints towards consumers and stakeholders support the brand positioning, integrating heritage elements consistently, and both the corporate and the product brands look, feel, speak, behave and sound, in the same way, stimulating the same memory associations.

2.3 Problematizing heritage marketing: limitations of existing literature

The seminal work by Urde et al. (2007), with its contextualisation of heritage in the corporate branding field, paved the way for foundational studies that shaped our knowledge on the topic. In particular, research on corporate heritage focused on the study of its dimensions (Balmer and Burghausen, 2015), its management (Cooper et al., 2015; Lee and Davies, 2021) and activation (Burghausen and Balmer, 2014a) within the corporate identity context. Nevertheless, there is little evidence concerning the strategic and practical implications of corporate heritage in the heritage marketing context and more broadly in the marketing literature, with few exceptions. Limited empirical research focussed on the communication practises of heritage marketing (Maier and Andersen, 2017), the role of servicescapes in the heritage marketing mix (Bargenda, 2015) and the multi-stakeholder audience of heritage marketing (Blombäck and Brunninge, 2016). The reference to these areas of research, although not comprehensive of the whole body of knowledge, allows to represent the research's fragmentation and identify its limitations. To the best of the authors' knowledge, it is still unknown how companies decide to exploit their heritage, what their drivers are, and how they communicate – outside the company – their heritage. Furthermore, many of the existing studies focus on the management of corporate heritage from an inward perspective, i.e. how companies manage, protect and give value to their past through their heritage. Specifically, scholars devoted attention to heritage marketing practises for corporate heritage identity stewardship (Burghausen and Balmer, 2015) and to the reconciliation of corporate and brand heritage (Santos et al., 2016; Rindell, 2017). The research activity focussed also on corporate heritage implementation and, in particular, how organisations can meaningfully link their past and present in the marketing context. In this stream of research, the past is either intended as an element of corporate identity (Blombäck and Brunninge, 2009; Burghausen and Balmer, 2014b, 2017; Hudson and Balmer, 2013; Balmer and Burghausen, 2019), as having an emotional connotation (Goulding, 2001; Ooi, 2002; Dion and Mazzalovo, 2016), or as being falsifiable (Brunninge and Hartmann, 2019).

However, the investigation of heritage marketing through an outward perspective, i.e. how corporate heritage influences the company's interactions with consumers and stakeholders, is much more limited. Empirical studies of heritage marketing in consumer marketing research have mainly focussed on the assessment of corporate heritage effects on consumers (Wiedmann et al., 2011; Wuestefeld et al., 2012; Balmer and Chen, 2017; Rindell, 2017; Pecot et al., 2018, 2019), with emphasis on purchase intention (Napoli et al., 2014; Rose et al., 2016) and the roles played by nostalgia (Merchant and Rose, 2013; Merchant et al., 2013) and authenticity (Rindell and Santos, 2021). Although it has been recognised that corporate heritage potentially conveys a competitive advantage to organisations (Cooper et al., 2015) and that corporate heritage influences the interplay between products and corporate brands (Santos et al., 2016), existing literature still lacks exploration of how companies exploit their corporate heritage and achieve competitive advantage.

Finally, existing literature is framed within the rationalist school that assumes all organisations approach heritage marketing in the same way (Blombäck and Ramírez-Pasillas, 2012; Cooper et al., 2015; Blombäck and Brunninge, 2016; Napolitano et al., 2018), perpetuating the idea of undiversified heritage marketing practices. According to the constructivist ontology of reality (Alvarez et al., 2014), managerial choices are a consequence of individual interpretations of reality: therefore, heritage marketing strategies could change when considering different organisations and managers. This ontological assumption (Latour and Woolgar, 2013) challenges the idea of explaining heritage marketing within the rationalistic boundaries of a one-size-fits-all strategy.

Figure 1 presents an indication of the literature stream to which we aim to contribute.

3. Methodology

The study is designed within the realm of interpretive research tradition (Moore et al., 2002; O'Dwyer et al., 2009). It adopts a qualitative inductive research design, based on multiple case study methodology (Stake, 1995; Malhotra et al., 2017). We chose this approach as a way to pragmatically present reality, understood as “the ongoing interpretation of meaning produced by individuals engaged in a common project of observation” (Suddaby, 2006, p. 633). It also allowed us to interpret the experience of marketing managers when communicating the company corporate heritage.

We contribute to heritage marketing literature by exploring the corporate heritage communication strategies of Italian brands with a heritage, i.e. brands that communicate the company's heritage but without strategically building the value proposition leveraging the heritage (Urde et al., 2007).

3.1 Context of analysis

Our study is contextualised in Italy, a country with a long-standing tradition in several manufacturing sectors, such as clothing, furniture, food processing and automation (Fortis, 2005). The “Made in Italy” value of the brand identity is exploited by Italian companies as a positive differentiating feature for brand positioning, especially in foreign markets as the “Made in Italy” evokes culture, history, design, tourism, wellness and the “Italian way of life” (Aiello, 2013). Therefore, the Italian market is a fertile context in which companies are encouraged to implement heritage communication strategies by exploiting the long-existing tradition of Italian craftsmanship and manufacturing.

3.2 Data sample

Case studies are Italian companies and their respective corporate brands, selected according to the following purposeful sampling criteria (Patton, 2014):

1. The corporate brand is a “brand with a heritage” (Urde et al., 2007);

2. The company brand architecture is monolithic (Tuten, 2020);

3. The corporate brand fulfils the “tri-generational/50-year corporate heritage requisite” (Balmer, 2013, p. 308), i.e. its key identity traits endured for a minimum of three generations, or 50 years, equivalently;

4. The company systematically practises heritage marketing activities;

5. The corporate brand is an iconic brand, i.e. brands that are culturally dominant and distinctive (Balmer, 2013).

Moreover, to minimise the industry bias we selected companies operating in different industries. The database “Le radici del futuro” by Unioncamere Museimpresa Associates and the personal network of the authors helped in selecting cases consistently with the sampling criteria. Among the selected 25 companies, nine agreed to be interviewed and participated in the research project: Pastificio Lucio Garofalo, Barovier & Toso, Pasta Farina, Ducati, Amaro Montenegro, Fiat, Bonomelli, Olivetti and Illy. One of the selected companies – renamed Pasta Farina – preferred to stay anonymous.

3.3 Data sources

The empirical analysis relied on both primary and secondary data. We collected primary data through semi-structured interviews with managers in charge of – or directly involved in – strategic choices related to heritage marketing activities in each organisation. Semi-structured interviews consisted of 13 open-ended questions related to heritage marketing strategies, objectives and tools. The interview questions are reported in Appendix. We emailed all the informants, providing an overview of the research project and participant informative concerning data treatment. Whenever requested, questions were shared beforehand. Table 1 presents key information about the companies and the informants that took part in the data collection.

The nine in-depth interviews took place from March to October 2019 either in person or through VoIP technology. We audiotaped and transcribed within 24 h from the interview. All interviews were double-checked by the authors and sent back to managers for feedback and integrations, where necessary. We collected 524 min – approximately 9 h – of digital recordings and 87 pages of single spaces transcripts. All interviews were conducted in Italian and the transcription was translated in English after the approval of the managers.

We retrieved secondary data from proprietary websites, companies' monographies, newspaper articles and the authors' personal notes stemming from visits to the companies. Moreover, significant tools of the companies' marketing mix, such as packaging (when applicable) and social network profiles were considered as data sources. Table 2 presents in detail all the data sources, categorised as primary or secondary.

Secondary data supported data triangulation, allowing to corroborate data from multiple perspectives, and to confirm primary data interpretation (Singh, 2014). Moreover, triangulation allowed cross-checking of primary data and the identification of potential misalignments between the companies' intentions (i.e. the strategic choices that emerged from the informants' perspective) and the actual implementation (i.e. marketing mix tools) (Stavros and Westberg, 2009).

3.4 Data analysis

In our data analysis we aimed at understanding how the heritage marketing strategy of each case was developed, i.e. the underlying themes and how the company implemented them. Since the study is designed to rely on individual interpretations of reality, we carried out a thematic analysis on the interview transcripts, which allowed us to detect latent meanings, assumptions and ideas from the interviews (Braun and Clarke, 2012).

Thematic analysis is a systematic process of analysis that consists of content and text categorisation and identification of relationships among the categories (Berg, 1995; Boyatzis, 1998). The thematic analysis was carried out in six steps (Braun and Clarke, 2006): (1) we familiarised ourselves with the data by critically reading interview transcripts; (2) we generated first order-codes by identifying phrases that represent the most basic elements of the raw data; (3) we grouped the first-order codes into theoretical categories (patterns found in the first-order codes), which were then grouped in aggregate theoretical dimensions, i.e. themes with the highest level of abstraction; (4) the potential themes were reviewed and refined to the point where each theme was internally coherent and there were identifiable distinctions between themes; (5) we named the themes and defined them; (6) we created a representation of the data outlining the conceptual ordering.

To ensure reliability and validity, we carried out the coding process separately and subsequently compared and integrated respective results. This analysis resulted in the identification of three main aggregate theoretical dimensions, which are the underlying key strategic themes that shaped the companies' heritage marketing approach: authenticity, leadership and continuity.

Table 3 presents an overview of the thematic analysis.

While reviewing the findings of the thematic analysis, we noticed that each company was exclusively associated with one theme, i.e. no company was associated with multiple themes: the main theme of the corporate heritage communication of each case was clearly identifiable as authenticity, leadership or continuity, thus creating three mutually independent and self-determined groups.

Moreover, the familiarisation with the interview transcripts that was carried out during the first step of the thematic analysis allowed us to notice that the interviews adopted a strong narrative stance in addressing the interview questions. Therefore, we decided to conduct a storytelling analysis on the interviews transcripts of each group to identify symbolism and profound meaning present in texts and/or discourse by analysing elements of the story told and how the story is formed (Gabriel, 2017). In particular, in our analysis we focussed on the content, form and context of the storytelling, i.e. the story told, how it is told and the conditions in which it is told (Chautard and Collin-Lachaud, 2019).

‘The storytelling analysis allowed to identify two dimensions according to which corporate heritage communications strategies can be differentiated: (1) the tone of voice of the storytelling, i.e. how a brand, through a story, presents itself and connects with its target audience (Woodside, 2010), which can be either emotional or functional; (2) the subject of the story, i.e. the product or the company.

The outcome of the data analysis process has been confirmed through an activity of data triangulation, carried out with two different approaches: first, the use of secondary data to compare manager's statements and company's activities; second, the back-and-forth interactions with the managers, mostly by email, that took place after the data collection phase. The comparison between the manager’s opinions and the actual implementation of heritage marketing activities was carried out through the evaluation of secondary data to acknowledge any potential researcher and respondent bias (Jonsen and Jehn, 2009).

On the other hand, the a posteriori interaction with managers allowed two additional insights: (1) a better understanding of the strategies behind heritage communication activities of each company; (2) a real-time check of the evolving nature of the heritage marketing activities of each organisation. In fact, our analysis provides a cross-sectional picture of the corporate heritage communication strategies of selected cases in a specific moment in time (March–October 2019). By confronting our results with the informants, some managers confirmed the proper theorisation of the strategy currently adopted by the company in terms of heritage, while others recognised that their strategy was evolving since we interviewed them, for instance from leadership to authenticity. The evolving nature of the communication strategy is in line with the conceptualisation of strategy as a practice, built up over time in terms of adaptation, combination and transformation (Jarzabkowski and Paul Spee, 2009; Regnér, 2008; Whittington, 1996).

Figure 2 provides more details about motivations, sources and outputs of the data analysis phases.

In the end, we identified three corporate heritage communication strategies – one for each main aggregate theoretical dimension – and differentiated them according to the two dimensions, i.e. the tone of voice and the subject of the story. The strategies are,

1. Heritage for authenticity (Pastificio Lucio Garofalo, Ducati, Amaro Montenegro and Bonomelli): authenticity is the pivotal brand attribute, the storytelling is emotional and draws attention to the excellence and uniqueness of the product's features;

2. Heritage for market leadership (Barovier & Toso, Pasta Farina and Fiat): leadership is the pivotal brand attribute, the storytelling is functional and draws attention to the company's leadership role in the industry;

3. Heritage for continuity (Olivetti, Illy): continuity is the pivotal brand attribute, the storytelling is functional and draws attention to the company's current activities as the natural evolution of past history and actions.

4. Findings

The following paragraphs present the findings for each of the strategies identified.

4.1 Heritage for authenticity (Bonomelli, Ducati, Pastificio Lucio Garofalo and Amaro Montenegro)

Within this group, authenticity emerged as the main theme of an emotional storytelling focussed on product features. The heritage communications strategy of these brands is built on six pillars:

1. Company's craftsmanship, with the description of the production process and its intrinsic craft features;

2. Superior quality of the products as a consequence of the company's experience;

3. Company's know-how and skills and how they have been acquired in the past;

4. Place of origin, i.e. the place historically associated with the specific production of the company (Pattuglia et al., 2015);

5. Transparency, i.e. the conscious attempt to make available all the organisation's legal and releasable information with the purpose of engaging stakeholders (Leitch, 2017);

6. Individual nostalgia, i.e. nostalgia stimulated by positive personal sensory experiences of the past and/or by the association of close social relationships, like family (Holbrook and Schindler, 2003).

The tone of voice of the content is mostly emotional, with the purpose of either leveraging consumers' past positive experiences with the brand (es. Bonomelli, Ducati), or showing the existing overlap amongst consumer values and brand values (es. Amaro Montenegro, Pastificio Lucio Garofalo). Social networks and owned media (i.e. the company's website) are the core media of the heritage communication strategy within this group, coupled with advertising campaigns, conveyed through above-the-line media (e.g. TV, cinemas …).

In the case of Bonomelli, the company evokes consumers' emotional memories of personal experiences associated with the brand – especially through TV advertising – such as drinking Bonomelli chamomile tea in childhood. Amaro Montenegro conveys values that define its brand personality (such as endurance and passion) through the emotional narrative of the life of its founder developed in a video for cinema advertising, whose contents are then adapted for the company website and Facebook page. Three companies (Pastificio Lucio Garofalo, Amaro Montenegro and Bonomelli) assign a pivotal role to the packaging for the communication of authenticity, by reporting in their packaging references to the year of foundation, the story of the company, and the production process. To enhance the authenticity perception, Ducati opened its production site in Borgo Panigale to the public to directly show its superior product quality.

4.2 Heritage for market leadership (Barovier & Toso, Fiat and Pasta Farina)

Within this group, leadership emerged as the main theme of an emotional storytelling focussed on the company's features. The heritage communication strategy is built on four pillars:

1. Company's role of “founders” of a tradition, as the initiators of the production;

2. Collective nostalgia, i.e. a longing for a better past, embedded in a specific socio-economic context (e.g. the splendour of the Republic of Venice for Barovier & Toso or the Italian economic boom in the 1960s for Fiat);

3. The description of the company as a trendsetter, i.e. the entity responsible for the determination of current market practises and trends, because of its activity in the sector. An example is the introduction in the market of the model 600 by Fiat in the 1950s, which started the mass motorisation era and a change of strategic patterns in the automotive sector (ANSA, 2020).

These brands want to be recognised as market leaders, i.e. the foremost market player, having a significant indirect influence on the activities of other actors in the same industry and, in some cases, on society as a whole. The themes they leverage are the collective nostalgia and the “founders” of a tradition. The subject of the story within this group is usually the company, through direct and indirect references to its positive track record (ref. Urde et al., 2007). Communication is factual and focussed on the company's milestones and history. The narrative tone is emotional, celebrating the company's influence on the market and society, by describing the company's key moments concerning events in Italian history.

Furthermore, companies pursuing this strategy create a “heritage” experience for their customers, often investing in the company's museums (Fiat), showrooms (Barovier & Toso) and archives (Pasta Farina) to let consumers live an immersive relationship with the brand. The main tools for corporate heritage communication purposes are social networks and owned media, such as the company's websites or websites dedicated to the heritage experience, i.e. museum, showroom, or archive.

4.3 Heritage for continuity (Olivetti, Illy)

Within this last group, continuity emerged as the main theme of a storytelling focussed on the company's features. The heritage communication strategy is built on three pillars:

1. Consistency of the present company's activities with its historical values, and in particular how the company's purpose is guiding the company's evolution over time;

2. Innovation, i.e. the underlying innovative attitude of the company;

3. Company's glorious past, i.e. a celebration of the past to enhance the current company's reputation.

The choice of this strategy aims to mitigate consumers' perception of disruptive changes in the company activity, and/or current unfavourable results compared to the previous company's positive track record. For instance, in the case of Olivetti, the company switched its core activity from the production of typewriters to the provision of services and infrastructures for Internet of Things (IoT) and Big Data analysis, preserving, however, its innovative attitude in the organisational culture.

In both cases, the subject of the story is the company and the storytelling relies on a functional tone of voice, namely a detached description of past events that does not rely on customers' emotional involvement.

The main communication tools are social media, especially Facebook, semi-annually company reports and physical touchpoints, as the company plant in the case of B2B businesses (such as Olivetti) or branded shops for B2C businesses (such as Illy). Specifically, Illy cafes' have a wall dedicated to the company history, and coffee is served in limited edition cups designed for Illy by outstanding product designers.

5. Discussion

This study aims at providing a comprehensive understanding of how companies communicate their corporate heritage contributing to the heritage marketing literature. A graphical representation of our contribution is presented in Figure 3.

While marketing research focussed primarily on defining corporate heritage (Urde et al., 2007; Blombäck and Brunninge, 2009; Burghausen and Balmer, 2014, 2017; Balmer and Burghausen, 2019; Maier and Andersen, 2017) and how consumers perceive it (Merchant and Rose, 2013; Merchant et al., 2013; Pecot et al., 2018, 2019; Rindell and Santos, 2021), to the best of our knowledge there is still a lack of recognition on how-related an outward aspects, for instance how companies communicate in practice their corporate heritage to external stakeholders. Specifically, our findings provide five main contributions.

First, corporate heritage communication strategies vary amongst companies and can evolve, counterpointing existing research that conceptualises heritage marketing strategies through a “one-size-fits-all” perspective (Balmer, 2013; Napolitano et al., 2018). Since the present study contends this mainstream positivistic assumption by adopting a constructivist approach, it provides evidence supporting the diversified and dynamic nature of heritage marketing strategies, as well as themes, objectives and tools for the communication of corporate heritage from company to company (Martino, 2013). While the nature of corporate heritage is transtemporal (Balmer and Burghausen, 2015), heritage communication strategies are dynamic and progress consistent with the marketing objectives of the company.

Second, heritage communication strategies differ along two main dimensions, namely the subject of the story and the tone of voice of the content. The subject of the story, the “main character” of the storytelling, is either the company (for market leadership and continuity) or the product (for authenticity). The tone of the content can either leverage the customer's emotional involvement (i.e. emotional tone), or strictly convey information about the company (i.e. functional tone). These findings are consistent with the emotional connotation of the past already acknowledged in the literature on corporate heritage (Goulding, 2001; Ooi, 2002; Dion and Mazzalovo, 2016). From the point of view of corporate heritage communications, findings allow advancing the notion of “packaged past” (Ooi, 2002) within the heritage marketing field, identifying the dimensions that shape the corporate narrative of the corporate heritage. Moreover, this study provides further empirical evidence of the emotional purpose of heritage marketing communications (Tuten, 2019).

Third, heritage marketing communication strategies address authenticity, leadership, or continuity. Our findings are consistent with the existing literature, bringing evidence to support both authenticity (Napoli et al., 2014; Fritz et al., 2017) and continuity (Urde et al., 2007; Balmer, 2013) as key themes in heritage marketing. However, our findings unequivocally connect the persistent tension between tradition and innovation observed in the continuity group with the “corporate heritage paradox” addressed by Cooper et al. (2021). Moreover, the present study also identified leadership as an additional theme, defined as the recognition of the company's historical primacy in the industry. This last theme can be seen as a reflection of the authoritarian attitude of the custodianship awareness dimension of corporate heritage stewardship (Burghausen and Balmer, 2014a, 2015). The present study also contributes to the idea of heterogeneity of corporate communication strategies by showing the existence of three main themes that can be leveraged separately and with different strategic approaches. Companies practising heritage marketing focus their communication strategy on either authenticity, continuity, or leadership, depending on whether they want to endow their brand with authentic quality, show the consumer the consistency of their actions with their historical core values of the company or be identified as the leader of the industry. Consequently, each theme is leveraged with a different strategic approach.

Fourth, while findings support existing literature in identifying nostalgia as a recurring theme for heritage marketing strategies (Balmer and Burghausen, 2019; Pecot et al., 2019), they also provide a new distinction: companies leveraging authenticity exploit individual nostalgia stemming from consumer's personal experience, while companies leveraging leadership build their corporate narrative on collective nostalgia, i.e. a longing for a better past associated with a specific community (e.g. the Italian population during the economic boom of the 1960s).

Finally, the analysis of the heritage mix confirms the multi-modality nature of corporate heritage communications (Burghausen and Balmer, 2014a; Santos et al., 2016). At the same time, the study shows that corporate heritage communications permeate several touchpoints with the consumers, from the packaging to the company museum. Moreover, communications must be extremely coordinated and consistent, through both place and time, to coherently sustain the corporate image heritage (Rindell, 2017). Therefore, since a monolithic brand structure allows the brand to speak with one voice and conveys a unanimous message, this brand structure could efficiently support the design of a heritage marketing strategy.

6. Limitations and suggestions for further research

The present research opens the debate and future lines of enquiry on heritage marketing strategies, but it also serves as a managerial tool for companies to exploit their corporate heritage.

From a practitioner's point of view, we offer a preliminary guide about how to strategize and develop corporate heritage communications. The interpretative approach adopted allowed us to gain strategic insight and the findings constitute the basis for potential new models for marketing management (Moisander et al., 2020). In particular, the results of this study can support marketing managers in designing the appropriate heritage communication strategy and in describing the dimensions to be taken into account, such as the choice of the communications theme according to the objective (i.e. authenticity, leadership, or continuity), the identification of the most suitable elements of the corporate narrative (i.e. the subject of the story, the tone of voice of the content) and the composition of the appropriate marketing mix. Consequently, the present study can help practitioners in recognising what is the most suitable approach for a heritage marketing strategy and create specific and more impactful marketing campaigns.

However, because of the wide scope of the research question, this study presents some limitations.

First, the framework cannot be applied to service companies, because the cases are firms with a product offering. Second, despite three of the cases being family businesses, the research does not take into consideration the features proper of family brands, for instance, if and how managers leverage the family attribute when communicating the heritage. Especially, if there is a strategy that is more adopted by family firms compared to non-family ones. This limitation is particularly significant if we consider the prominent role played by the story of the family and the family itself in defying the communication and marketing strategies of family companies (Blombäck and Craig, 2014; Lude and Prügl, 2018; Astrachan et al., 2019).

Third, our study is embedded within the Italian context and therefore the analysis is limited to the Italian competitive environment. Fourth, our sampling does not consider different brand architectures, since the case selection was based on companies with a monolithic structure (Tuten, 2020). Fifth, data analysis did not detect a corporate heritage communication strategy that has a functional tone of voice of the content and focuses on the product. Based on these limitations, we suggest that future research could analyse whether service companies are equally prone to the implementation of heritage marketing communication strategies leveraging themes such as authenticity, nostalgia and leadership. Second, future studies could extend the debate on how the “family nature” of a brand could be leveraged as a source of competitive advantage while promoting the heritage (Micelotta and Raynard, 2011). Third, it could be interesting to replicate this study in different countries, to understand how our findings relate to a different national context and how national cultures can influence corporate heritage communications. It also could be tested if the years of experience of the managers in the company influence the choice of a corporate heritage communication strategy. Excluding the communication manager of Barovier & Toso that has 15 years of experience, all the other cases present managers with relatively little experience (from 1 to 6 years) who have different approaches to heritage communication. So, from our results, experience seems not to be connected to a specific strategy. Nevertheless, quantitative research could confirm or disconfirm this preliminary finding. Further research could also explore how heritage marketing is practised by companies with a different brand structure, i.e. branded or endorsed. Finally, further studies might investigate whether there are brands that leverage product characteristics to communicate their heritage and if and why this strategy is adopted, compared to the three we illustrated.

Figures

Figure 1

Our study in the literature heritage marketing literature: previous research perspectives on corporate heritage

Figure 2

Data analysis process

Figure 3

Corporate heritage communication strategies

Table 1

Selected case studies. Key facts and informant description

Company	Foundation YEAR	Core business	Ownership	Turnover (2021; mil/$)	Employees	informant	Role	Gender	Years of experience in the role
Pastificio Lucio Garofalo	1789	Pasta	Non-family firm	224	216	Emidio Mansi	Global Marketing Director	M	6
Barovier & Toso	1295	Glass lighting	Non-family firm	14.1	69	Massimo Bovi	Communication Manager	M	15
Pasta Farina	End 1800s	Food	Family firm	3.310	4.251	Anonymous	External Communications	N/A	6
Ducati	1926	Motorcycles	Non-family firm	735 (2020 last available)	1.384	Monica Passerini	Corporate and CSR Marketing Manager	F	6
Amaro Montenegro	1885	Spirits	Non-family firm	287	383	Daniele De Angelis	Senior Brand Manager, Amaro Montenegro	M	4
Stellantis (Fiat)	1899	Automobiles	Family firm	169.000	292.434	Gianfranco G. M. Gentile	Marketing and Communication Manager EMEA Heritage	M	5
Bonomelli	1908	Teas and infusions	Non-family firm	137	140	Matteo Borghesi	Senior Brand Manager	M	4
Olivetti	1908	Internet of Things and Big Data	Non-family firm	239 (2020 last available)	283	Gaetano Di Tondo	Vice-President, Institutional and External Relations Director	M	1
Illy	1933	Coffee	Family firm	581	1.298	Ilaria Presotto	Global marketing – Product Director	F	2

Source(s): ORBIS (foundation year, core business, ownership, turnover, employees); Informants (role, gender, years of experience in the role); LinkedIn (years of experience)

Table 2

Primary and secondary data

Company	Interview			Secondary data
	Number of interviews	Duration (minutes)	Transcript length (pages)1	Secondary sources
Pastificio Lucio Garofalo	1	49	8	Company website “Consorzio Gragnano Città della pasta” website Product portfolio Packaging Company's social media profiles (Facebook and Instagram) 1 article published in Italian newspaper
Barovier & Toso	1	52	8	1 article published in Italian newspaper “Consorzio Promovetro Murano” website “Fondazione Musei Civici di Venezia” website Authors' personal notes stemming from the visit to production site, company's museum and company's showroom Product portfolio Company's website Pamphlet edited by the company: “Enlightening Uniqueness” Company's social media profiles (Facebook and Instagram)
Pasta Farina	1	54	9	Company's website Company's archive website Packaging Product portfolio Company's social media profiles (Facebook, Instagram, Twitter and LinkedIn) “Museimpresa” website 1 article published in Italian newspaper TV commercials
Ducati	1	69	12	2 articles published in Italian newspapers Company's website Authors' personal notes stemming from the visit to company's production site and museum Product portfolio Company's social media profiles (Facebook, Instagram, Twitter and LinkedIn) Monograph edited by the company: Fondazione Ducati (2019), “Ducati. Il racconto di un mito.” “Museimpresa” website Advertising posters for events in which the company participated (e.g. Motor Valley)
Amaro Montenegro	1	57	8	Company's website Report on new brand visual identity project for internal use Report on new product story for internal use Shooting list for “La scoperta del Sapore Vero”, for internal use Packaging Company's social media profiles (Facebook, Instagram and YouTube) 1 article published in Italian newspapers Advertising posters for events organised by the company (e.g The Vero Bartender)
FCA (Fiat)	1	81	14	1 article published in Italian newspaper Authors' personal notes stemming from the visit to company's heritage hub Pamphlet edited by the company: “Heritage. Passione senza tempo” Company's website Heritage hub website Product portfolio Webpages of company's museums (“Centro Storico FIAT”) Advertising posters for events in which the company participated (e.g. “Mille Miglia”, “Targa Florio”) Company's social media profiles on Facebook, Instagram and LinkedIn TV commercials
Bonomelli	1	56	9	Company's website Packaging Company's social media profiles (Facebook and Instagram) TV commercials
Olivetti	1	59	11	Company's website “Archivio Storico Olivetti” website “Fondazione Adriano Olivetti” website 1 article published in Italian newspaper Company's social media profiles (Facebook, Instagram and LinkedIn) Advertising posters for events organised by the company (e.g “Olivetti Design Contest” exhibition)
Illy	1	50	8	Company's website 2 articles published in Italian newspapers Merchandising “Università del Caffè” webpage

Note(s): Times New Roman, font size 12, single-spaced text

Source(s): Personal elaboration of the authors

Table 3

Thematic analysis

First-order codes	Theoretical categories	Aggregate theoretical dimensions
“The basis of our communication is the confidence of being a pasta with an artisan philosophy, which has a history in the culture of Gragnano pasta”. (Pastificio Lucio Garofalo)	Craftmanship	Authenticity
“Thus was born the ‘product story’ project, with the aim of integrating all the information relating to the brand and product: from the history to the recipe and the production process, up to the drink strategy.” (Amaro Montenegro)
“Our experience and expertise start from the selection of chamomile soils, up to the selection, cultivation, harvesting, drying, processing and packaging. So the supply chain is complete: from the field to the cup.” (Bonomelli)
“The values of the heritage are the same as the brand, that is ‘style’, ‘sophistication’ and ‘performance’. ‘Style’ is the equivalent of design: Ducati motorcycles are recognised, especially abroad, as a strongly Italian design. ‘Sophistication’' for us is craftsmanship, dexterity: our bikes are still built in a very handcrafted and manual way, and this is a value for the product […].” (Ducati)
The PGI (protected geographical indication, ed.) trademark is generated from the history of Gragnano pasta, so when we communicate the Gragnano PGI we are actually telling a story.” (Pastificio Lucio Garofalo) “We are part of Motor Valley, an association with a strong tourist vocation wanted by the Emilia-Romagna region: the goal is to promote tourism related to motors, since this region is home to the most important and best known worldwide companies in this industry” (Ducati)	Relationship with the place of origin, renowned for the core product
“It is necessary to tell what Amaro Montenegro is, where it comes from and therefore to create that charm that only products with a great history and with a long-standing experience can have.” (Amaro Montenegro)	Charm of the past
Transparency is to narrate the product through its values, to tell exactly how we are, not through an attempt to be reverent towards the consumer, to want to please everyone.” (Pastificio Lucio Garofalo)	Downplay commercial motives
“A consumer who buys FiltroFiore is willing to spend more compared to other chamomile teas, knowing that he is buying a unique product on the market” (Bonomelli)	Superior product quality
“Historically, Italian pasta makers have not been those who have used Italian wheat but they had the ability to go and look for the best grains in the world.” (Pastificio Lucio Garofalo)	Historically acquired know how
“The management, […], tried to relaunch the company from a marketing point of view by leveraging its very strong racing identity and its deeply rooted history and tradition, which made Ducati recognisable.” (Ducati)
“Surely the main value that we communicate through heritage marketing is that of authenticity, one of the values that has always distinguished Amaro Montenegro. It is a value that we convey through all the campaigns, through everything we do, and we also convey through our historical pay-off: ‘Sapore Vero’ (‘true flavour’, ed.). Let's say that behind that ‘truth’ there is a whole dimension of authenticity whose roots go back to 1885 with the foundation and then reach today.” (Amaro Montenegro)
“Bonomelli has all that positive heritage about chamomile, a herbal expertise gained in over 100 years, and we translate the same herbal expertise into the choice of the best raw materials and the development of the best and most functional products possible even in the herbal tea and infusions market.” (Bonomelli)
“Consumers respond to us with emotional, affective memories. For example, people who remember drinking it in childhood and who now drink it with their children. Bonomelli is basically a family friend, who grew up with them.” (Bonomelli)	Individual nostalgia
“Buying something from Barovier & Toso means buying something that comes ‘from the dawn of the glass age’. It is in some way the transposition of what was done in 1,295 into the present. But glass is always made the same way. We need to be different from others, and how are we different? In history. This is the main goal: to give the market we target a motivation to understand why our products cost so much, why we are so important, why we are THE history of glass.” (Barovier & Toso)	Founder of a tradition	Leadership
“It is more a storytelling linked to the salient moments, to what we call milestones, connected to the events of the history of Italy and then of the history of the world. Hence the external events closely linked to the evolution of Pasta Farina.” (Pasta Farina)	Collective nostalgia
“The quantitative and typological richness of the preserved heritage also allows us to take a look at a broad cross-section of Italian society, allowing us to trace back fashions, styles, attitudes, habits and emotions of an Italy in constant evolution.” (Pasta Farina)
“There is also a ‘sentimental, nostalgic’ dynamic that makes users a lot more engaged.” (Fiat)
“Angelo il Vecchio [Barovier, ed.] (1,450) invented crystalline glass which was a huge invention in the glass market. And that's what we want to keep doing: we have the tradition, we carry it on, but we are not bound by the tradition itself.” (Barovier & Toso)	Company as a trend setter
“What [our founder] was looking for overseas are the answers to the nagging problems of the Italian market: product quality, packaging, advertising. [The product] was aimed directly at the private consumer, with the novelty of being packaged […]. Already in the 1930s, therefore, our company was characterised as a modern food industry with quality products and strongly market-oriented.” (Pasta Farina)
“With the presentation of the 600 at the 1955 Geneva Motor Show, the work of mass motorisation that Fiat carried out with its small cars throughout the 1950 and 1960s begins.” (Fiat)
“Months ago, we invented the hashtag, ‘history of innovation’, which is the common thread of everything we do.” (Olivetti)	Consistency with historical values	Continuity
“Illy communicates its heritage and it is the basis on which the company has continued to develop. […] In our long history we aimed to perfecting ‘extraordinary products and experiences’. Perfecting who we are is our story and the message of our heritage.” (Illy)
“From the point of view of both coffee and coffee-makers, the company has developed a great history of heritage dedicated to innovation thanks to a great chemist who was the father of Andrea Illy, who is the president of Illy.” (Illy)	Innovation
“For Illy, heritage has a dual meaning: to be the bearer of values and profound ethics and at the same time to push the company towards the continuous search for innovation and refinement.” (Illy)
“The Olivetti of the past, that is, those that were the products, the printers, the cash registers and so on, obviously still exist but the difference is that there is no longer production. […] Traditional products have been renewed in the cloud, big data and so on” (Olivetti)
“Olivetti was a leader in innovation once, we ride the motivations and values of the past to try to maintain this type of positioning.” (Olivetti)	Company's golden past
“For the company it is necessary to manage its heritage to prevent the history of the brand from overshadowing its current business”. (Olivetti)

Source(s): Personal elaboration of the authors

Appendix Interview questions

1. When did the need to create a heritage strategy arise?

2. What medium and long-term objectives does the company want to achieve through its heritage marketing strategy?

3. What was the strategic process that led to the current setting of the company's heritage marketing?

4. How were the traces of the organisation's experience collected? Was it necessary to involve a specialist?

5. On what symbolic values is the company's heritage marketing approach built?

6. In a spectrum in which at one extreme the heritage is an essential component of the identity and at the other the heritage is functional for the achievement of specific objectives, where is the company located?

7. What is the relationship between heritage and internal stakeholders?

8. How is the communication concerning the heritage managed?

9. What are the direct and indirect marketing mix tools used for communication regarding heritage?

10. Is the target and objective the same for all tools? If not, how do they differ?

11. How and by whom are the results of heritage marketing monitored?

12. In the company's experience, what were the results obtained through the heritage marketing campaign?

13. Have there been occasions when you have encountered unexpected results?