Brand Failures

80 MicroPro
Remember MicroPro In the 1980s, and even at the beginning of the 1990s,
MicroPro made leading word processing software product, WordStar. The
program was even heralded as ‘one of the greatest single software efforts in
the history of computing’ by the widely respected technology expert, John
C Dvorak.
Because of the popularity of the WordStar product, MicroPro rebranded
themselves WordStar International. This move proved to be a major mistake.
‘The new brand identity proved immediately self-limiting,’ explains advertising
copywriter John Kuraoka, in a white paper on branding. ‘As WordStar
International, the company was poorly positioned to keep up with changes
in the computer industry – such as the rise of integrated software bundles that
were the predecessors to today’s Microsoft Office. Note that Microsoft never
became ‘Windows International’.’ The WordStar name had quickly become
an albatross around the company’s neck. Between 1988 and 1993 the
company struggled to find new ways to continue selling variations of the
WordStar product. The rise of competitors such as Word Perfect and, later,
Microsoft Word, led to WordStar’s corresponding and rapid decline.