This study explores consumer ethnocentrism in the context of a globalized economy, reflecting on broader societal and marketplace shifts. Focusing on the Czech Republic as a case study, it employs a mixed-methods approach that integrates media discourse analysis of Czech press narratives with cluster analysis derived from data mining techniques. The research study identifies five distinct typologies of ethnocentric consumers, i.e. Ethno-Responsible Shoppers, Ethno-Quality Seekers, Ethno-Style Oriented, Ethno-Practical Shoppers, and Ethno-Heritage Explorers. These typologies reflect varying engagements with national, economic, social, political, cultural, moral, historical, and environmental discourses. This empirical study advances theoretical understanding by highlighting the interplay between macro-level media narratives and individual ethnocentric consumption patterns. Furthermore, the findings provide valuable insights for marketers and policymakers, identifying key characteristics of contemporary ethnocentric consumers. These insights can inform predictive marketing strategies, content creation, and alignment of policies and marketing campaigns.

This paper explores to what extent Instagram users in Sweden experience privacy concerns, and how their privacy concerns affect the three emotional factors of social media usage, namely social media trust, social media fatigue and privacy protection behavior. Additionally, this paper also aims to investigate the relationship between these emotional factors and social media usage. The data collection was done via online survey of 315 active users of Instagram in Sweden. Data analysis was performed using structural equation modelling. This paper suggests that there is a direct and positive relationship between privacy concerns and social media usage, but there are some mediating pathways that either reduce (through social media trust) or enhance (through privacy protection behavior) social media usage. This study is limited to Instagram users and cannot be generalized for other social media platforms. Moreover, it is the first to examine the relationship between privacy concerns and social media usage in the Instagram context. Moreover, this empirical study provides a more holistic perspective by investigating the direct and indirect relationship between privacy concerns and social media usage.

The purpose of this paper is to provide a clear conceptualisation of brand activism in contraposition to digital brand activism. Additionally, this paper aims to contribute to the development of branding and marketing theory, specifically by identifying the five key dimensions of brand activism as part of the brand-building process. The need to identify and examine the key dimensions of brand activism justifies the use of multiple case study methods. In total, eight brands born activists were selected for study. The brands were drawn from three different sectors in an attempt yo capture maximum theoretical variation. Relevant archival data about the brands was also collected in their websites, press and social media to provide triangulation. The preliminary findings of this research identify five key dimensions of brand activism as part of the brand-building process, namely: Purpose-Product Embeddedness, Profit-Cause Coexistance, Transformative Change, Provocative Behaviour, and Discussion Hubs. This paper advances the domain of brand activism by contributing to a clear conceptualisation of brand activism and the identification of its key dimensions.

This research investigates the mediating role of perceived brand authenticity (PBA) between brand experience (BE) and brand love (BL) of global high-tech brands Apple and Samsung. A quantitative study was conducted in Japan, India, and Portugal. The research found evidence that PBA is a multidimensional, reflective-formative higher-order construct composed of two lower-order components namely PBA Core and PBA Peripheral. The findings also contribute to understand how consumers are impacted by different BE and PBA dimensions using the lens of consumer culture theory and how BL is formed as a social-cultural phenomena. Finally, the study demonstrates for the first time that relationship intensity and self-authenticity moderate the effect of BE on PBA. Although limited to three countries and high-tech brands, the findings are of relevance to global brands by raising awareness that culture plays a key role in how consumers perceive authentic brand experiences and how passionate feelings for global brands can be strengthened.

While brands are among the most valuable assets for companies and serve as a basis for competitive advantage, limited research exists on how manufacturers in the luxury car segment interact with their stakeholders in the value co-creation process. A review of the main theories on brand co-creation, value creation, and sensory marketing is used together with a case study of a global car manufacturer in the premium segment to explore the co-creation of multi-sensory experiences within the car’s interior. Our findings show that co-creation of these experiences is achieved by employing a brand heritage theme in designing a value proposition. Suppliers contribute with competence, knowledge, and skills in ideating the car´s interior, while consumers assist the manufacturer to identify which factors contribute to an outstanding multisensory experience. A framework for understanding the co-creation of multi-sensory brand experiences is proposed reflecting the contribution of stakeholders in this process.

Purpose: Place branding is a discipline with high relevance for a city's policymakers and for hospitality and tourism management, and this is even more true in the context of creative cities. This article explores how the creative class contributes to a city’s brand identity and, by doing so, delivers valuable advice for marketing representatives of creative cities.

Design/methodology/approach: Our study builds on a qualitative study, interviewing 18 members of the creative class in 3 diverse European cities. Our methodology was based on grounded theory: We simultaneously collected and analysed data and created analytic codes and categories.

Findings: This article suggests that the creative class is an important enactment stakeholder in the identity formation process of a place, as well as destination marketing organizations (DMOs) and other stakeholders. Additionally, it is demonstrated that the creative class co-creates a city’s brand identity by bringing new rhythms and forms of expression to the cityscape.

Originality: This article contributes to the fast-growing place brand identity literature by exploring the role of the creative class in the context of cities. It also intends to provide a better understanding of how the creative class co-creates and contributes to their city’s brand identity. Since similar studies do not exist, our article fills an important research gap.

Research limitations/implications: Our study shares the limitations of qualitative studies, but the resulting conceptual model of brand management in the context of a creative city offers a springboard for future research in this regard.

Practical implications: City representatives and tourist managers need to understand what is the value-in-use generated by the creative class in the brand identity process and must be aware that the creative class plays a key role in delivering the brand message.

Purpose

This paper aims to the literature on negative consumer-brand relationships by advancing knowledge on the key triggers of brand hate of global and prominent brands. It investigates for the first time the role of brand in triggering brand hate, as well as behavioral and emotional brand hate outcomes, i.e. willingness to punish and negative brand engagement. Additionally, it explores the impact of product ownership and previous love feelings in the formation of brand hate.

Design/methodology/approach

The data collection was conducted on two Apple anti-brand communities after the given consent of its administrators. Data analysis was performed using structural equation modeling.

Findings

The paper suggests that brand hate is a construct with four first-order formative triggers (symbolic incongruity, ideological incompatibility, negative past experience and brand inauthenticity). It also demonstrates that brand hate is a dichotomous concept that comprises negative emotional dimensions (i.e. negative brand engagement) and behavioral dimensions (i.e. brand aversion, negative word-of-mouth and willingness to punish brands). Finally, it shows how brand hate differs among users vs non-users and passionate vs non-passionate consumers of Apple.

Originality/value

This paper contributes to the literature on negative consumer-brand relationships by advancing knowledge on the key triggers and outcomes of brand hate of global and prominent brands. More importantly, it demonstrates empirically that brand hate does not occur at a specific point of time and may result in transient hatred motivated by emotion-eliciting events (e.g. using a product) or as a long-term consumer-brand relationship that changed from love to hatred.

This paper aims to investigate, for the first time, the mediating effect of brand love on word of mouth through brand experience, by using a comparative study of the IKEA brand in Sweden and Portugal. It also explores how the perceived functional and hedonic brand values mediate the effects of brand experience and brand love. The data collection was done via an online survey of real users of the brand IKEA in Portugal and Sweden. The paper suggests that brand love mediates the relationship between brand experience and word of mouth in both countries. This study also identifies differences in the effects of the sensory, affective, behavioral and intellectual brand dimension in brand love. Additionally, it is suggested that consumer-brand relationship duration, genre, and education levels influence brand love. This paper contributes to the fast-growing consumer-brand relationships literature by exploring the role of brand love in the context of retail brands. It also intends to provide a better understanding of how to build and nurture effective brand experiences in order to elicit intense and passionate feelings towards retail brands.