close attention to the consumer, P&G has historically succeeded in creating mass demand for its products. This success is also because P&G has been able to differentiate their products to distinguish them from intrinsically similar ones on the market (Deal, 1982).
Currently, Procter & Gamble is a conglomerate that operates in numerous markets. Unlike in its beginnings in the early twentieth century, however, today's competitors are mostly from other big firms that are divisions of conglomerates (Schiller, 1994). Indeed, the company's most direct competitor is Unilever, which challenges Procter & Gamble in nearly all its markets because of the two giant's similar consumer product lines. Thus, the various markets tend to be oligopolistic, dominated by a relatively few (from five to a dozen) large national brands battling for market share. Yet they are even more concentrated than that because often such corporate leviathans as P&G and Unilever have more than one brand on the market to accommodate different segments.
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