When you have more than one product or service to name, things can get complicated fast. Do you create separate brands for each offering? Or do you build everything under a single name?
That’s the core question behind house of brands vs branded house—two different ways to organize your brand and communicate with your audience. One gives you focus. The other gives you flexibility. In this post, we’ll walk through what each model looks like, the pros and cons of both, and how to figure out which approach fits your business best.
What Is Brand Architecture—and Why It Matters
Before diving into the specifics, it’s worth stepping back. Brand architecture is the system that organizes your company’s brands, products, and services. It’s how you bring structure to your story and clarity to your audience.
As our CEO, Jed Morley, puts it in his book Building a Brand That Scales, “Defining a brand architecture provides naming guidelines for your company and its offerings.” It gives your team a framework for how to name and position new products, and helps customers understand what you stand for.
Without a clear brand structure, it’s easy to end up with names and messages that compete or confuse. The right architecture brings focus, builds trust, and makes it easier to scale.
Branded House: One Brand, Unified Identity
In a branded house strategy, the master brand is the star. Every product, service, and sub-brand either carries the master brand’s name or closely aligns with it. The idea is simple: when people trust your main brand, that trust extends to everything you offer.
Jed explains it this way: “The goal of a branded house strategy is to transfer the positive perceptions customers have with one product to its sibling products.” It’s about synergy. A win for one is a win for all.
Branded House Examples
- Google → Gmail, Google Docs, Google Maps
- FedEx → FedEx Ground, FedEx Freight, FedEx Express
- Apple → iPhone, iMac, iCloud
A branded house creates consistency and efficiency. It’s ideal when your offerings serve the same audience and share similar values.
House of Brands: Independent Brands, Unique Positions
A house of brands, on the other hand, is made up of individual brands that operate under a single corporate owner, but with little or no visible connection. Each sub-brand stands on its own, with its own positioning, audience, and identity.
Luxottica is a perfect example. Its portfolio includes over 150 eyewear brands, from Chanel to Oakley, each appealing to distinct customers. Customers may never know those brands share an owner, and that’s intentional.
House of Brands Examples
- Unilever → Dove, Axe, Ben & Jerry’s, Hellmann’s
- Procter & Gamble → Tide, Gillette, Olay, Pampers
- Luxottica → Ray-Ban, Oakley, Vogue Eyewear, Pearle Vision
This model is all about flexibility. It lets you tailor messaging and brand expression to different audiences, without one brand’s reputation affecting another.
House of Brands vs Branded House: The Pros and Cons
There’s no one-size-fits-all answer. Each approach offers clear benefits and some trade-offs worth considering.
Branded House – Pros
- Cost-effective brand building
You only have to build and promote one brand, which saves time and money.
- Unified brand equity and trust
Success in one product can help boost trust in your other offerings.
- Easier internal alignment and governance
With one brand to manage, it’s easier to keep teams and messaging on the same page.
Branded House – Cons
- Reputation risk: A crisis in one area affects the whole brand
If one product fails or causes a problem, it can damage the reputation of everything else.
- Less flexibility in product positioning
All offerings have to fit under the same brand voice and promise, even if they serve different needs.
- Can constrain innovation or expansion into new markets
It’s harder to explore bold or unrelated ideas when everything must stay connected to the main brand.
House of Brands – Pros
- Strategic freedom for each brand
Each brand can have its own look, message, and voice tailored to its audience.
- Market segmentation becomes easier
You can serve different customer types without forcing them under one umbrella.
- Protects the parent brand from reputational risk
If one brand faces criticism, it doesn’t drag down the others—or the parent company.
House of Brands – Cons
- Higher marketing and brand management costs
You need more time, money, and effort to build and support multiple brands.
- Requires more resources to build recognition
Each brand has to earn customer trust on its own, which takes longer.
- No shared equity—each brand must build its own credibility
New brands don’t benefit from the success or reputation of the others—they start from scratch.
Jed frames it clearly: “The question at the heart of brand architecture is how closely associated you want your brands to be with one another.” That decision carries implications for marketing, growth, and risk management.
Branded House vs House of Brands vs Hybrid
Not all companies fit neatly into one category. Many fall somewhere in the middle, using a hybrid brand architecture.
In hybrid models, some offerings carry the master brand, while others stand independently. This is common for companies that grow through acquisition, or that serve both B2B and B2C markets with different needs.
Hybrid Brand Examples
- Marriott → Marriott Courtyard (branded house) and Ritz-Carlton (standalone)
- Alphabet → Google (branded house) and Waymo, Verily, etc. (house of brands)
- Adobe → Adobe Acrobat, Adobe Photoshop (branded house) alongside Behance and Figma (acquisitions)
For example, a company might use a branded house approach for its original line of products, but shift to a house of brands model when acquiring new businesses with their own brand equity.
Real-World Examples
To see these strategies in motion, look at the following companies:
- Costco created Kirkland Signature as a branded house under its retail umbrella. Despite spanning dozens of categories—from vitamins to vodka—it retains customer trust because it’s anchored in Costco’s reputation for value and quality.
- Unilever, by contrast, follows a house of brands strategy. Its portfolio includes distinct, standalone brands like Dove, Axe, and Ben & Jerry’s, each with its own identity and audience. This approach allows Unilever to tailor its messaging and positioning to different market segments without linking everything back to the parent brand.
Each approach supports the company’s business model, growth goals, and audience relationships.
How to Choose the Right Approach
Still unsure which direction to take? Ask yourself these five key questions:
- Do our offerings serve the same audience or different ones?
- Would trust in one offering lift or harm others?
- Is there strategic value in separating our brands?
- Do we want to invest in long-term brand equity or optimize for exits and flexibility?
- What will this look like in five years, not just five months?
When you think this way, brand architecture stops being a reactive decision and becomes a strategic asset.
The Bigger Picture: Why It All Matters
Brand architecture often gets decided reactively—when a new product launches, when an acquisition happens, or when customers start getting confused. But the best time to make this decision is before you need to. When you take the time to get your architecture right, you avoid the mess later.
The point isn’t to follow a trend or match what other companies are doing. It’s to pick a model that supports your strategy and helps people understand what your brand stands for.
Ready to Build a Brand That Scales?
We work with brands daily to clarify structure, strategy, and messaging. If you're weighing a house of brands vs a branded house—or figuring out how to blend both—we’ll help you map a clear path forward.
Need help sorting through it? Book a call with us here or check out our additional resource on brand architecture services.
Frequently Asked Questions
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