Samenvatting

Borre Leesclub has functioned as a strong company for over a decade. Borre has been successful and has grown into a strong competitor within the specific and small-scaled field. In the Netherlands there are few competitors in the educational children’s book market. Though Borre Leesclub is well known as an academic product by parents with children starting at primary school, the company has not seen increasing numbers in the amount of consumers as would be preferred. Based on pre-discussions and insights within Borre Leesclub and the target audience of the company it can be established that the problem lies within the projected identity and perceived image of the brand. By obtaining more information about the image the Borre Leesclub has based on the projected identity the image can be improved. The lack of information about the identity and image of the brand is the justification for a qualitative research into the identity and image of Borre Leesclub. The German corporate design specialists Birkigt and Stadler (1986) proposed one of the first models of corporate image management. This conceptual model and theory has been chosen as the anchor to which this thesis and research has been chained. “Whilst the original notion of corporate identity grew out of a fixation in the design and communication sections with the ways in which organizations present themselves to external stakeholders. At first the expression was restricted to logos and other elements of visual design, but it moderately came to embody all forms of communication and all forms of outward-facing behaviour in the market (Albert & Whetten, 1985)”. Through three attributes organizations communicate and project an image of themselves to their stakeholders. These three attributes according to Birkigt and Stadler (1986) are: symbolism, communication and behaviour. Birkigt and Stadler argue that the image an organization projects through the three elements is the way that an organization is perceived by the stakeholders of the company. The main research question for this research is: How can Borre Leesclub communicate the identity of the organization in such a way that the corporate image becomes more attractive for their target audience?
The aim of this research was to acquire information about the identity of the researched company and how this identity is projected and the perceived image by the target audience. This research probes three hypotheses, all based on the theory of Birkigt and Stalder.