Shell’s Consolidation Strengthens World’s Most Valuable Oil & Gas Brand
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- Shell maintains status as the world’s most valuable Oil & Gas brand with a value of US$36.8bn
- Strategic divestment and marketing communications help to strengthen brand
- Brand value growth rates of >40% mean Sinopec and PetroChina could overtake Shell this year
Every year, Brand Finance values the brands of thousands of the world’s biggest companies. Brands are first evaluated to determine their power / strength (based on factors such as marketing investment, familiarity, loyalty, staff satisfaction and corporate reputation) and given a corresponding letter grade up to AAA+. Brand strength is used to determine what proportion of a business’s revenue is contributed by the brand, which is projected into perpetuity to determine the brand’s value. The world’s most valuable oil & gas brands are ranked and included in the Brand Finance Oil & Gas 50 2017.
In brand value terms, the last year has been successful for oil & gas brands. Just seven of the top 50 have lost brand value, with dozens of major brands seeing double digit growth. Oil prices saw a fairly steady increase across 2016 as supply became slightly more constrained, helping to improve revenues. After a drop at the beginning of the year, Brent Crude nearly doubled in value from early January to the end of December.
Shell remains the world’s most valuable oil and gas brand with a brand value of US$37 billion, up from US$31.6 billion last year. Shell’s asset disposal program and geographic pullback have helped it to consolidate the strength of its brand, which has been upgraded from AA+ to AAA-. Its long-standing partnership with Ferrari continues to deliver returns, with a demonstrable price premium attributable to the association with the world’s most powerful auto brand. As part of its ‘Make the Future’ initiative, Shell enlisted the help of six popstars from around the world for its ‘Best Day of My Life’ video, which became one of the most viral ads of 2016. David Haigh continues, “The enhanced strength of Shell’s brand will enable it to maintain or improve margins, even as revenues fall.”
2nd and 3rd place are Sinopec and PetroChina are growing rapidly. As in so many other of Brand Finance’s brand value league tables, Chinese brands are just on the cusp of taking the number one spot. Sinopec and PetroChina’s brands are worth US$29.6 billion and US$29 billion respectively and even with far lower rates of growth than this year (47% and 43%), both could easily overtake Shell in 2018.
Brand Finance CEO David Haigh continues, “Sinopec is planning a US$10 billion IPO of its retail business which includes over 30,000 sites. A clear understanding of brand value drivers will be a useful tool in extracting maximum value from the listing and, post-sale brand management will become even more critical as shareholders demand accountability.”
