Special Report: WA’s top brands

Western Australia’s dominant health insurance player HBF has shot up the ranks from fifth position last year to capture the prized number one spot in the WA Business News list of our state’s most recognised brands.

A rugby club and a brewery may have some obvious synergies from a social viewpoint, but what do they both have in common with an energy utility?

It is one thing to develop an emerging brand in a booming economy but another altogether to maintain the brand into the long term.

Brands with distant owners have come under the spotlight as poor performers in WA Business News’ fifth annual branding survey, with BankWest highlighted for its lack of local focus.

The departure of Michael Chaney last year has done little to halt the Wesfarmers juggernaut, with the industry giant named as the top Western Australian corporate brand in this year’s WA Business News survey, ahead of Woodside and Alinta.

Competition among advertising agencies in the design market and the failure of local resource companies to invest in design services were two of the many hurdles facing the sector in Western Australia, according to John Emery, principal creative director

Expressing a clear brand personality and a top-down acceptance of the importance of branding are key issues that need to be addressed, according to many of those who responded to the WA Business News survey.