Strategies of innovation applied to luxury market firms: the case of Montblanc's fountain pens

Abstract

The present research aims to present and discuss the use of strategies of innovation on a firm of luxury market, through a longitudinal case study of Montblanc's fountain pens. The data analysis reveals that Montblanc in its first 50 years concentrated on producing fountain pens like their competitors. From the 1960s, suffering the breakthrough caused by the appearance of the ballpoint pen, Montblanc decided to change their market position in a different way if compared with their competitors, by moving to the luxury market. Montblanc positioned their products as luxury goods or jewels, introducing luxury appeals to them as well as new production process to guarantee greater quality and an increasing care to sustainable innovations for their fountain pens. Strategies of innovation found in this case were classified as sustainable innovations reached due to the coherent, systemic and aligned integration of several types of innovations in order to obtain competitive differentiation in long-term.