Brand Universes - Dr Tim Hill

Event Date: 20 November 2025

Speaker: Dr Tim Hill, University of Bath School of Management

Location: Online

Time: 11am

Abstract: This research introduces Brand Universe as a novel type of brand architecture that explains the inner workings of complex, multi-faceted, and loosely organised entities such as Lego, the Kardashians, and WWE, among others. Leveraging the extended case method and assemblage theory, this article explores the Marvel Brand Universe, one of the oldest and largest Brand Universes in existence. We find that the continuous functioning of Brand Universes depends on the ability of managers to consistently turn distinct pairs of (de)stabilizing tendencies within Brand Universes (e.g., Complexity and Accessibility) into Paradoxical Adaptive Capacities (e.g., Accessible Complexity) enacted through a range of original marketing practices (e.g., Signposting and Referencing). This research makes several contributions. First, we offer substantive contributions to marketing theory that relate to brand architecture, brand extension, and brand longevity. Second, we introduce Paradoxical Adaptive Capacities (PACs) as a novel theoretical tool to analyze brand flexibility in various scenarios (e.g., re-branding). Third, we introduce the M.A.R.V.L. (“Marvel”) framework for managing Brand Universes. We conclude with an extensive research agenda on the subject of Brand Universes from multiple perspectives.

Biography: Dr Tim Hill is a Senior Lecturer (Associate Professor) in Marketing at the University of Bath's School of Management, where he has taught since completing his PhD at the University of Melbourne in 2016. His research typically examines 'outsiders'—individuals and groups existing at society's margins, distant from centres of political, economic, and cultural power. His scholarship has been published in journals including the Journal of Marketing, Sociology, Marketing Theory, and Journal of Marketing Management, and is the author of The Dark Side of Marketing Communications. He is currently on sabbatical and is using a multi-sited ethnographic approach to investigate the emergence of the cultivated meat sector.

Published: 4 March 2026