In Pursuit of the “Pink Pound”: A Systematic Literature Review

The visibility of non-heterosexual identities is more prevalent today than ever before, yet there is little research about the consumption behaviors and preferences of lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, transsexual, queer, 2/two-spirit, questioning, intersex, asexual, ally, and other non-heterosexual (LGBTQ+) consumers—often referred to as the “pink pound”. A rare systematic review of LGBTQ+ literature is presented in this paper with the purpose of offering an argument for a wider adoption by marketing scholars and practitioners for research into LGBTQ+ consumer segments. The results of a longitudinal bibliometric analysis are presented to objectively demonstrate the hitherto limited engagement that consumer researchers have had with the discipline, and the limited degree that the discipline has influenced that literature. The key findings reveal a growing, but formative body of inter- and intra-disciplinary literature that, hitherto, has only just begun to be addressed by present day marketing researchers. A conclusion of the paper is that although the bibliometric analysis identifies the limited engagement with LGBTQ+ consumer research, this limited engagement appears to present a very significant lacuna and just as significant an opportunity for both marketing scholars and practitioners to engage much further with this literature in the future. Building on the analysis, the value of the paper also discusses potential directions for further research in marketing scholarship and practice.