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Stanley Black & Decker has reworked their Hand and Power Tool Brand Positioning chart for the first time since at least 2017.
The company, which owns Craftsman, Dewalt, and other popular tool brands, featured the updated chart in their recent May 2023 Investor Presentation.
The chart is not necessarily to be taken at face value, and is more of a rough guide as to how Stanley Black & Decker sees the various tool brands positioned relative to each other.
Keep in mind that the Investor Presentation is a corporate document that’s not created for tool users. Still, I always find these things to be interesting and insightful.
Here, we’ll take a look at the new chart to see what has changed.
The way I interpret these charts, the left of the brand name represents the start of the segment coverage bar.
To start, Stanley Black & Decker expanded the target user segments slightly.
The Consumer segment has become Consumer and DIY, and the Tradesman segment has become Tradesman and Advanced DIY. The Professional and Automotive/Industrial segments remain unchanged.
The OPP (opening price point), MPP (mid price point) and HPP (high price point) tiers also remain unchanged.
Let’s take a look at how Stanley Black & Decker repositioned their tool brands.
Black & Decker – The iconic beginner DIYer and household tool brand hasn’t budged from the consumer segment, with the only change being a refreshed logo.
Craftsman – Whereas the Craftsman brand spanned most of the length of the chart, from consumer to automotive/industrial, it is now centered in the tradesman and advanced DIY segment.
Additionally, the Craftsman brand was bumped down slightly, from slightly above the MPP level to right on it.
Craftsman’s segment range is much tighter than before, suggesting that Stanley Black & Decker has reevaluated their core target audience since first adding the brand to their chart in 2017.
The short segment width is not exactly representative of Craftsman’s full line, as I would argue the Craftsman V-Series tools extend the brand into professional and even automotive/industrial segments.
Dewalt – The bar for Dewalt, Stanley Black & Decker’s premier cordless power tool and jobsite storage brand, has expanded slightly, and now more noticeably reaches into the tradesman segment.
Dewalt’s product catalog does span tradesman, professional, and automotive/industrial segments, making the latest positioning a more accurate representation.
Stanley – Stanley’s bar spans from the tradesman and advanced DIY segment and into the professional space. Curiously, the bar for Stanley pulls back slightly from the professional segment, but not by a lot. They also swapped spots with Craftsman with respect to relative pricing tiers.
Stanley FatMax – Stanley FatMax is no longer included on Stanley Black & Decker’s brand positioning chart.
Bostitch – Bostitch is no longer included on the brand positioning chart, but is still featured on the Tools & Outdoor brand slide in Stanley Black & Decker’s presentation. This is perhaps because, especially compared to their sibling brands’ broader product offerings, Bostitch has become more of a specialized brand, with a focus on air and fastening tools.
Porter Cable – Porter Cable, which announced an exclusive partnership with Tractor Supply in 2021, remains on the chart – surprisingly. The brand previously spanned tradesman and professional segments and now only sits over the tradesman and advanced DIY segment. Additionally, the bar has shifted slightly to the left, a bit towards the consumer and DIY segment.
Irwin – Irwin’s bar has increased and been shifted upwards. Rather than being placed as an entry to mid price point brand, Irwin now sits above the mid price point line, above Craftsman and Stanley, but still below Dewalt.
The bar for Irwin has also shifted to the right, slightly away from tradesman and advanced DIY segment and more towards the professional segment.
Lenox – Lenox has also shifted a bit, and is now centered over the professional user segment. Interestingly, Lenox has moved above Dewalt in the price point scale.
Proto, Mac Tools, Facom – These three brands’ positions are largely unchanged, except for Proto and Facom swapping places with respect to price point.
