Purpose? Yes, Only If Genuine

I think the Volkswagen emissions scandal hurt for a reason that goes beyond the technical facts. When a brand becomes part of someone’s life, a broken promise can feel personal.

As humans, we don’t only build relationships with people. We build them with places, songs, traditions… and sometimes with corporations. Without even noticing, we give them personalities. We decide which ones we trust, which ones make us smile and which ones feel as though they have always been part of our lives.

Think about the yellow Punch Buggy game. Children spot the little Beetle, laugh, shout “Punch Buggy!” and punch the person sitting next to them. It is only a game, yet it says something much bigger. We gave that little car a personality. It became cheeky, friendly and familiar. We stopped seeing it as metal and glass and started treating it almost like a character.

I think we do the same with many brands.

Taylor Swift is another example. She is a person, but most of us know the public brand rather than the private individual. Millions of people are not only listening to her music. They are connecting with what the brand represents and with others who share that connection. The brand has a human face, and the following is extraordinary. She has aced that projected human connection.

Social identity theory suggests that people define part of themselves through the groups they belong to (Tajfel & Turner, 1979), while brand community research shows that brands can create genuine social connections between people (Muniz & O’Guinn, 2001).

Perhaps that is why Dieselgate felt so different.

Volkswagen wasn’t just another company that had been caught lying. For generations it had found its way into people’s lives. It was the first car someone learned to drive. The family car that carried children on holiday. The little Beetle people waved at. The Punch Buggy that made children laugh in the back seat. Like an old family friend, it had earned something far more valuable than sales.

It had earned trust.

That helps explain why a scandal like Dieselgate can provoke more than anger about emissions. For people who had welcomed Volkswagen into their lives, it could feel like betrayal: something familiar had turned out not to be the friend they thought it was. The logo could stay the same while the relationship changed completely.

Brand attachment research helps explain why this happens. People can form emotional bonds with brands that become woven into their memories and identity (Park et al., 2010). Once that happens, authenticity is no longer just a marketing strategy. It becomes part of the relationship people believe they have with the brand.

Perhaps that is the real cost of inauthenticity. Trust can take decades to earn, a single moment to lose and, for some brands, there is no encore.

As Taylor Swift would say:

“We are never ever getting back together.”