The measurement of intangible brand associations is often operationalised using measures of brand personality and, while the approach has proven useful to both academics and practitioners in explaining the consequences of such associations with a brand (Eisend and Stokburger-Sauer, 2013), it has attracted controversy. In our paper, we focus on two related issues that have emerged since the first formal publication of a brand personality scale (Aaker, 1997): the theoretical foundations for the construct; and the overly large number of dimensions being discovered. Our main aim is to identify those dimensions of brand personality that can be regarded as truly generic, applicable across all contexts. Our paper has two main empirical components. The first analysis shows that a large number of ‘new’ dimensions are being identified in the literature but that many of these contain measurement items which are similar to those used in previous scales to identify dimensions which were given different labels. We then show how a more theoretically based, less empirically driven, approach could have identified three dimensions, (Sincerity, Competence, and Status) two of which are common to most existing measures. We demonstrate how Status could have been identified in two other studies, particularly if non-orthogonal data rotation had been used. We confirm the relevance of these three dimensions in one further study. In our theory sections, we critique the idea that human personality offers a convincing theoretical basis for brand personality and propose instead the relevance of signalling theory and the stereotype content model. Being clear as to the theoretical underpinning for brand personality is important because such theory will define the construct and its dimensionality. If human personality is not directly relevant to brand personality (as we will argue and evidence) then the assumption that it is will lead to both miss-identification of the construct and its dimensions.