Conclusion

It's relatively hard to find objective information on brand products, so that information should be kept.
However, some of it would be better organized if merged. As a guideline,
1. Articles that are 'iconic' or 'universally well known' always deserve their own article. Note that there are a lot of those.
2. Major products from a company should be added to the company article, unless the company article becomes too large, in which case they are put in their own article.
3. Minor products from a company should be merged into a 'list of minor products from this company' which is kept in the company article, unless it becomes too large as above.

Attempted consensus

Sometimes, a group of similar or related articles is nominated for deletion over a short period of time. In cases like this, it seems prudent to have one centralized discussion about the entire group, rather than repeating arguments over each member thereof. This is an attempt to forum consensus on one such groups of articles.

Note that individual members from the group may still be considered notable on other grounds. This discussion is purely to determine whether membership of this group, solely on its own, is merit enough for inclusion in Wikipedia.

Description

A number of substubs and articles on brand name products have been created. Many of these appear to have little chance for growth beyond beyond a long dictionary definition without branching into advertising. Others have grown beyond being a simple consumer product and have developed a cultural identity.

The question arises, where does the bar of notability lie for these articles and how is such notability determined? Consideration should also be given to how to handle itmes that fail to reach notability, as many of these items are likely to be recreated if simply deleted.

Arguments for deletion

If the article is obvious advertising for an item that most people otherwise wouldn't have heard of, it should be deleted. Radiant _* 12:03, Mar 29, 2005 (UTC)

Arguments for keeping

Items where the name (or brand) of the item has become the generic term (ie. Xerox, Hoover, Kleenex) should definitely have an article, maybe two: one for the generic object (photocopier, vacuum cleaner, facial tissue) and one for the brand-name object.
Items where the product is the major or best-known product of the company should have their own article (assuming the company should have its own article).
Items where the product is well-known apart from the company should have their own article. --Carnildo 20:40, 28 Mar 2005 (UTC)
- I agree generally with bullets one and three of Carnildo's proposal above. Bullet two strikes me more as an argument for a detailed mention within the company's article (and a redirect to it). I would prefer to modify the wording of bullet three to allowing stand-alone articles for "products which, while never genericized, had designs which have proven to be significantly influential on the industry as a whole". An example might be the Ford Mustang. That seems a bit more objective than "well-known apart from the company". Rossami (talk) 21:41, 28 Mar 2005 (UTC)
Brand name products that have existed for a reasonable period of time, say 10-20 years, and have significant recognition in the public may warrant their own article. For example the Mars bar and Moon pie are both more recognised than the companies that make them. If a product has iconic advertising, I would prefer to see an article on the product that also describes the various advertising campaigns than articles on mascots.--nixie 01:50, 29 Mar 2005 (UTC)
There are plenty of notable brand name items that are neither old, nor generic - say, the Xbox - which merit an independent article. However, I agree with Carnildo's comment below that lesser known items should be kept on the company's article. -- 8^D BD2412 ^gab 04:55, 2005 Mar 29 (UTC)
- Vote changed to merge, explained below. -- 8^D BD2412 ^gab 05:02, 2005 Apr 7 (UTC)
It depends on how notable the product is. If its a product that has entered the public conciousness, then it should be kept. If it is an obscure product or brand that no one has ever heard of, it should either be merged to the article on the company or deleted. DaveTheRed 05:42, 29 Mar 2005 (UTC)
Notable brand names that have influenced the culture and behavior of a society definitely have to be kept. Zzyzx11 06:34, 29 Mar 2005 (UTC)
Items that are brand name products should be treated no different than other article subjects, held accountable to the same standards. They should be considered on a case by case basis and not lumped into one policy. -- Glen Finney 21:08, 29 Mar 2005 (UTC)
I would almost always vote keep unless the product in question is hopelessly obscure (foods made at just one local restaurant, products which never made it to market, etc.). Products are part of our modern cultural heritage, and one thing most people don't realise is that most products generally do a poor job of keeping their own history. Something like Levi's Hard Jeans, for example, which are relatively recent and were given a huge advertising push in the 90s, score just 6 unique Google hits today. If someone were to write an article on them, and they should, it would be the only information source on them in the world outside Levi's own private archives. This is history that won't keep itself, which goes largely unwritten and will eventually be permanently lost unless we seek to preserve it. Andrew Lenahan - Starblind 03:53, Apr 4, 2005 (UTC)
In the case above, for example, I think a merge with Levis would be the best approach, which seems the be a pretty popular suggestion in general. I see no reason why, for example, Bud Lite should not be included in the Budweiser article, Nike Airs should not be in the Nike, Inc. article, Levi 501 Blues should not go to Levi Strauss, etc. This should be the general plan for companies that make one type of product in general (beer, sneakers, jeans, in the cases above) but probably not for Proctor and Gamble products, as they make everything. -R. fiend 19:22, 4 Apr 2005 (UTC)
I think almost anything even remotely well-known should be allowed to have it's own article if someone wants to write it. Why *reduce* the information available on this site? A mention of a product in a company's article will rarely be as detailed as a dedicated article. I seriously don't see why factual articles should be deleted, even if they're obscure; Wikipedia is not paper. ShardPhoenix 07:21, 7 Apr 2005 (UTC)
The more obscure, the better. We want information not available elsewhere, not only information available everywhere else. Mirror Vax 14:53, 16 Apr 2005 (UTC)
- I generally agree with this reasoning, though you'd be surprised how tough it is to find info on even common and famous products, especially if you want info not from the company producing the product itself. This is all the more reason why Wikipedia should cover them. Andrew Lenahan - Starblind 15:43, Apr 16, 2005 (UTC)
Keep. JuntungWu 12:47, 21 Apr 2005 (UTC)
I agree that brands are relevant for inclusion. If notable in their own right (and likely to persist as notable) then they ought to be articles. If minor or heading toward historical oblivion, then they should be merged into a higher-level topic. Tobycat 01:22, 23 Apr 2005 (UTC)

Arguments for merging

Items that are significant but don't meet the above criteria should be merged into either the article for the company, or merged into a list of that company's products. --Carnildo 20:40, 28 Mar 2005 (UTC)
I acknowledge R. fiend's concern that corporate shills may try to use Wikipedia as a database to advertise their products, and this concerns me as well - especially in light of some lists of products that were created with brand new red links for every minor variation of a Nokia phone. It would be ridiculous to have lots of seperate pages with repetitive information about similar products... but I'm fine with having a single article on Nokia phones that lists all the types and mentions any particularly significant variations. I'm frankly not worried about the shills taking advantage of the project - let them worry about policing the articles, reverting vandalism, and (worse) discovering that their "advertisements" will quickly evolve into balanced critiques that may even compare their products negatively with competitors. -- 8^D BD2412^gab 04:56, 2005 Apr 7 (UTC)
- (This does constitute a minor shift in my thinking expressed above - based solely on the concerns raised by the product lists with the sea of red links, all of which should be redirected to the appropriate section on the merged page). -- 8^D BD2412 ^gab 05:00, 2005 Apr 7 (UTC)

Other

I think that in most cases where a particular item is specifically sought by name by many consumers it may well deserve an article. Ask someone what kind of beer they drink and they'll tell you, but ask them what windshield wiper blades they use and you'll likely get a blank stare. We have articles on many different beers (though I think many could be merged together), but hopefull we will not be seeing any on windshiled wiper brands. This is sort of a tough issue, because the line between an article an promotion can be thin. Wikipedia is already turning into a catalog, just look at List of Nokia products (most of which are not known by name, but many still have their own articles; I wouldn't be surprised if the person writing them works for Nokia). A line needs to be drawn somewhere. -R. fiend 21:38, 28 Mar 2005 (UTC)

Generalization

How about this... I was impressed by the proposal at the Characters from Fiction page, and it may well apply here.

Major products from a company should be added to the company article, unless the company article becomes too large, in which case they are put in their own article.
Minor products from a company should be merged into a 'list of minor products from this company' which is kept in the company article, unless it becomes too large as above.
Articles that are 'iconic' or 'universally well known' always deserve their own article.

Radiant _* 12:03, Mar 29, 2005 (UTC)

This looks good. I believe that preference should be given to merging over seperate articles as much as possible (i.e. all laptop PCs from a single company with a Pentium 4 CPU together no matter how famous a single variation becomes). --Allen3 ^talk 00:33, Mar 30, 2005 (UTC)

Looks like the best plan to me. BigFatDave 01:24, 1 Apr 2005 (UTC)

I agree with this suggestion. Similar products should be grouped together as in 'Nokia 3300-series' and then all the product names that belong to the group redirect to that page. If one product of the group is very significant, then it must have its own page with a link from the group page. --Jannex 12:31, Apr 1, 2005 (UTC)
This is the right way of thinking. Still leaves the problem of which fly-by-night one-product companies are worthy of inclusion, but it's a good start. I wonder, though, if some products are better organized by category (Shampoo) rather than manufacturer (Procter and Gamble). Some companies make a wide variety of products. —Wahoofive | Talk 22:13, 1 Apr 2005 (UTC)
If we need criteria to decide which relatively obscure products from relatively obscure companies are sufficiently notable, and which are not, some of the following may be reasonable metrics of commerical success.
- A brand for a consumable product that existed for at least N years (5? 10?) must have enjoyed some degree of commercial success.
- A small durable good that enjoyed any commercial success is probably available for sale used. How readily can it be found on ebay?
- Large durable goods (cars, major appliances) are generally made by large manufacturing concerns, and so shouldn't trouble us that much.

--Shimmin 18:08, Apr 4, 2005 (UTC)

Concerning "relatively obscure products", wouldn't one metric be verifiability? Especially if we require proof of existence from a source other than the manufacturer. If a product can't manage to receive a review from a publication or in fiction (by which I include radio, tv & print), then it's undeniably obscure. -- llywrch 23:00, 8 Apr 2005 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Deletion policy/Brand name products