Journal of Product and Brand Management最新文献

Purpose

This study aims to examine the public discourse on sustainable food packaging, evaluating the main characteristics of that discourse and how risk and analytical message content influence consumer engagement.

Design/methodology/approach

The authors use two studies with databases built from messages posted on Twitter (now X). Study 1 explores the discourse of sustainable food packaging by conducting a content/sentiment analysis. Study 2 examines more than four million messages posted by or mentioning the world’s most relevant food companies. Hypotheses are tested through censored regression analyses.

Findings

The results show that plastic is the term that can better classify how we talk about sustainable food packaging. The authors also show that food packaging messages related to sustainability, compared to those not related to sustainability, are composed using more analytical language, contributing to generating greater engagement. Moreover, social network users remain skeptical about food companies, as the latter messages on packaging sustainability generate less engagement (likes + retweets) than when other users post these messages.

Originality/value

This study addresses important points in the public discourse on social networks about the sustainability of food packaging and its language features. First, the data are representative of the food market with posts from leading worldwide food companies. Second, identifying the hot topics of the discussion on sustainability packaging on social media provides a new perspective on how companies and society view sustainable food packaging. Third, the authors show how the source of the message moderates the impact of sustainability on engagement.

Purpose

Building on technology acceptance and learning transfer theories, this study aims to evaluate the integration of mobile augmented reality (MAR) in omnichannel retailing touchpoints for Generation Z (or Gen Z)'s apparel shopping, assessing how habitual augmented reality (AR) use in nonretailing contexts impacts Gen Z's motivations, acceptance and use of MAR shopping apps.

Design/methodology/approach

A total of 562 participants downloaded a footwear MAR app and completed a survey. Data were analyzed using confirmatory factor analysis and multivariate regression to explore moderated mediation effects.

Findings

The study reveals a paradigm shift: Gen Z's habitual use of AR in social media (e.g. Snapchat and TikTok face filters) significantly influences their intent to use MAR in shopping, overshadowing hedonic motivations. This marks a transition from AR as a gimmick to a practical utility in omnichannel touchpoints, with performance expectancy emerging as a critical mediator in adopting MAR for utilitarian purposes.

Research limitations/implications

This study highlights how Gen Z consumers’ tech habits influence their pragmatic view of MAR, urging re-exploration of the main constructs of the Unified Theory of Acceptance and Use of Technology 2 (UTAUT2) model.

Practical implications

Findings suggest Gen Z values practicality over fun in MAR shopping apps, guiding marketers to emphasize tangible benefits for this demographic.

Originality/value

This research underscores the evolving perception of AR in retail among mobile natives, highlighting the shift from novelty to habitual utility. It offers strategic insights for integrating AR into omnichannel strategies, catering to the utilitarian expectations of Gen Z in the digital retail landscape.

Purpose

The purpose of this study is to explore brand customer erosion at both the category and brand levels while considering consumer socio-demographic characteristics and weight of purchase factors.

Design/methodology/approach

Data from 3,563 buyers encompassing 20,601 purchases were collected from a prominent household data panel.

Findings

Brand customer erosion varies depending on socio-demographic factors (householder age, family size, life cycle and social class) and weight of purchase; variations are evident depending on the specific brand.

Originality/value

The paper makes a substantial contribution to the established fields of marketing and consumer behavior literature by opening a new line of research. It does so by demonstrating, the impact of socio-demographic factors on customer erosion. Simultaneously, it presents results that contradict the limited existing research on the influence of weight of purchase on brand customer erosion.

Purpose

This paper aims to examine how visual elements used in packaging design relate to diasporic consumer identity and influence aesthetic appreciation.

Design/methodology/approach

Drawing on social identity theory, research on aesthetic principles and using a mixed methods approach, two studies are conducted. Study 1 involves a qualitative exploration of the nature of diasporic consumer identity and its relation with visual design in packaging. Study 2 involves quantitative testing and calibration of this relationship and its subsequent influence on aesthetic appreciation.

Findings

Diasporic consumers from the Middle East appreciate hybrid visual designs and prefer packaging that strikes an optimum balance of visual elements (colour, shapes, patterns) from the heritage aspects of their ancestral homeland and more contemporary aspects from their culture of living. Preference for balance elicits an overall positive diasporic identity feeling that mediates the relationship with aesthetic appreciation of visual design in packaging.

Research limitations/implications

These findings offer new knowledge about the role of visual design in packaging in delivering symbolic value to diasporic consumers, evidencing how diasporic consumers’ dual identities shape aesthetic appreciation and preferences for hybrid visual designs.

Practical implications

Provides marketing practitioners and packaging designers with a concise and contextual directive for creating visual designs that appeal to a growing segment of diasporic consumers.

Originality/value

This research draws on social identity theory to uncover an aesthetic cultural precept – heritage, yet contemporary – that can inform the development of packaging designs targeting diasporic consumers.

Purpose

Oppositional brand loyalty poses a challenge to the management of virtual communities. This study aims to categorize these loyalty behaviors into positive (willingness to pay a price premium and brand evangelism) and negative (schadenfreude and anti-brand actions) dimensions. It then explores how customer engagement and moral identity influence these dimensions in the context of brand competition.

Design/methodology/approach

Structural equation modeling was conducted to analyze the main and moderating effects, using survey data obtained from 498 valid responses out of a total of 636 responses from Xiaomi's virtual communities.

Findings

The results indicate that customer engagement significantly influences all four dimensions of oppositional brand loyalty. The relationship between customer engagement and brand evangelism is notably stronger among customers with a strong moral identity. Conversely, the effects of customer engagement on schadenfreude and anti-brand actions are attenuated for these customers.

Originality/value

Anchored in theories of brand tribalism, social identity and brand polarization, this study bifurcates oppositional brand loyalty into directions of preference and antagonism, empirically showcasing moral identity's moderating effect. It contributes to the literature on antagonistic loyalty and moral identity, offering strategic insights for companies to navigate schadenfreude and anti-brand actions in online communities.

Purpose

Visual sustainability has gained significant relevance for both firms and consumers. While the importance of perceived sustainability in package design is well researched, there is a research gap regarding divergent responses of consumers to perceived visual sustainability. This research aims to close this gap by providing deeper insights into the underlying mechanisms of perceived visual sustainability in package design. As a boundary condition, this work also investigates gender differences in response to a design’s visual sustainability.

Design/methodology/approach

To explore the mediating influences of cognitive (i.e. a product’s gentleness and power) versus emotional (i.e. moral satisfaction) attributes as well as the role of consumer gender in the perceived visual sustainability–purchase intention relationship, the authors extend previous research through three experiments.

Findings

Study 1 provides initial evidence supporting the main effect of perceived visual sustainability on purchase intention. Findings of Study 2 show that moral satisfaction serves as a significant driver of purchase intention for females, while power-related attributes are more influential for males. Study 3 provides additional evidence for the main effect, the interaction effect with consumer gender and underlying mechanisms.

Practical implications

These findings have important implications for marketers and designers aiming to design packages that appeal to different consumer groups based on their (gender-specific) values regarding visual sustainability.

Originality/value

This work extends the literature on green behavior by highlighting the importance of perceived visual sustainability as a factor that influences purchase intention and the role of cognitive versus affective mechanisms in shaping consumer responses to design sustainability.

Purpose

This study aims to understand the impact of extreme weather events on fast-moving consumer goods (FMCG) consumption and to examine the role of anticipated product scarcity and FMCG types on such behavior.

Design/methodology/approach

This paper conducted five studies, combining archival data analysis with behavioral experiments. The archival data included sales data from a supermarket chain and weather data from the National Weather Service. The experiments were designed to test the effect of extreme weather cues on consumption, the psychological mechanism behind this effect and moderators.

Findings

This research found that consumers’ anticipation of extreme weather events significantly increases their consumption of FMCGs. This research further discovered that these behaviors are driven by anticipated product scarcity and moderated by consumers’ altruisms and FMCG types.

Research limitations/implications

Limitations of the research include the reliance on reported sales data and self-reported measures, which could introduce biases. The authors also primarily focused on extreme weather events, leaving other types of disasters unexplored. Furthermore, cultural differences in disaster response might influence results, yet the studies do not fully address these nuances. Despite these limitations, the findings provide critical insights for FMCG retailers and policymakers, suggesting strategies for managing demand surges during disasters. Moreover, understanding consumer behavior under impending disasters could inform intervention strategies, potentially mitigating panic buying and helping ensure equitable resource distribution. Last, these findings encourage further exploration of environmental influences on consumer behavior.

Practical implications

The findings have practical implications for products, brand managers and retailers in managing stock levels and product distribution during disasters. Furthermore, understanding the psychological mechanisms of these behaviors could inform policymakers’ designs of public interventions for equitable resource allocation during extreme weather events.

Social implications

The research provides significant social implications by highlighting how extreme weather events impact FMCG consumption. This understanding can guide public policymakers in creating efficient disaster management plans. Specifically, anticipating surges in FMCG purchases can inform policies for maintaining price stability and preventing resource shortages, mitigating societal stress during crises. Moreover, these findings encourage public education around responsible purchasing during disasters, potentially reducing panic buying. By collaborating with FMCG manufacturers and retailers, governments can ensure a steady suppl

Purpose

New product introductions, particularly line extensions (LEs), are common in consumer goods categories. Despite their commonality, the success of LEs are not guaranteed. The purpose of this study is to provide brands that introduce LEs a benchmark about what success to expect.

Design/methodology/approach

This study investigates the success of 36,994 LEs in each quarter for the first three years after introduction. Four indicators are calculated using consumer panel data to benchmark how long LEs survive (failure rate), how competitive they are in the category (market share) and how they are adopted by category buyers (penetration and repeat buyer rate).

Findings

Most LEs survive after the first year, but many cease to exist or perform well in the long term. Around 50% of LEs fail a year after launch, but this failure rate halves once seasonal LEs are removed. Failure rates start to approach 80% after three years. Most LEs do not perform better than existing products. Around three in four LEs have a market share or penetration near or below the category norm. Although this percentage decreases the longer after launch, most LEs are still below the category norm.

Practical implications

These new product success benchmarks provide guidelines to practitioners about what success the “typical” LE will achieve. This research can help guide new product investment decisions because it provides context on what is feasible to achieve.

Originality/value

Four market success measures are used, a departure from past benchmarking research which uses practitioner evaluation on metrics seldom used in practice. The authors provide guidelines about when and how to measure LE and new product success more broadly.

Purpose

This paper aims to understand how dual sustainable-labeling strategies influence perceived value dimensions (i.e. quality, emotional, social and price) across vice vs virtue products and level of consumers’ consideration of future consequences.

Design/methodology/approach

Two online experiments are conducted with private label brands: one with organic and Fairtrade labels and one with organic and local labels. For each experiment, a conditional process analysis was used with the labeling strategy (i.e. no label vs organic label vs Fairtrade/local label vs organic label + Fairtrade/local label) as the independent variable, the product types (i.e. vice vs virtue) and level of consideration of future consequences as moderators, the dimensions of perceived value (quality, emotional, social and price) as the dependent variables.

Findings

Dual sustainable-labeling strategies lead to higher positive perceived value levels on all dimensions compared to no-labeling strategy. They however do not necessarily lead to higher levels compared to mono-labeling strategies such as organic labeling strategy (except for social dimension). Additionally, the positive effect of dual sustainable-labeling is lower for virtue products compared to vice products and is stronger for consumers with high level of consideration of future consequences for vice products for the social-value dimension.

Originality/value

Prior research has focused on the effect of multi-labeling strategies on willingness to pay with mixed results. This study brings insights to literature by testing the impact of dual sustainable-labeling strategies on the dimensions of perceived value as well as the moderating effects of the product types and consideration of future consequences.

Purpose

Front-of-packaging (FOP) is a critical branding tool that uses “cues” to communicate product attributes and establish distinct brand images. This paper aims to understand how food brands utilize cues and their relative proportions to hierarchically communicate brand image and belonging to particular subcategories.

Design/methodology/approach

A content analysis is used for analysing 543 food FOPs sold in Australia (breakfast cereals, chips, snack bars). Samples are collected and classified into product sub-categories defined by ingredients, consumer-audience and retail placement. A novel 10 × 10 coding grid is applied to each FOP to objectively analyse cue proportion, with statistical comparison undertaken between sub-categories.

Findings

Results reveal intrinsic cues are favoured over extrinsic cues, except for those in the eatertainment sub-category. Hierarchies are evidenced that treat product and branding cues as primary, with health cues secondary. Statistically significant differences in cue proportions are consistently evident across breakfast cereals, chips and snack-bar FOPs. Clear differentiation is evidenced through cue proportions on FOP for health/nutrition focused sub-categories and eatertainment foods.

Originality/value

“Cue utilization theory” research is extended to an evaluation of brand encoding (not consumer decoding). Design conventions reveal how cue proportions establish a dialogue of communicating brand/product image hierarchically, the trade-offs that occur, a “meso-level” to Gestalt theory, and achieving categorization through FOP cue proportions. Deeper understanding of packaging design techniques provides inter-disciplinary insights that extend consumer behaviour, retailing and design scholarship.