Ioannis Assiouras

The impact of corporate social responsibility in food industry in product‐harm crises

Purpose – The first purpose of this study is to analyse the impact of prior CSR information on the perceived degree of danger, attribution of blame, brand evaluation and buying intentions after a product‐harm crisis in the food industry. The second purpose is to examine the moderation effect of CSR importance ascribed by the consumers on the above mentioned relations.Design/methodology/approach – An experimental design consisting of three between‐subjects conditions was applied and three CSR initiative conditions were selected (positive, negative CSR and no CSR information as a control condition). In this framework, three different scenarios were designed and tested under the condition of a product‐harm crisis related to margarine.Findings – This study highlights that CSR has an impact on attribution of blame, brand evaluation and buying intention but not on the perceived degree of danger. CSR importance has a moderation effect on the relationship between CSR and blame attribution, brand evaluation and bu...

The impact of brand authenticity on brand attachment in the food industry

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to investigate the impact of brand authenticity on brand attachment and subsequently on consumer behaviour related to food brands. Design/methodology/approach – Results are derived from primary data collected from a consumer sample in Greece. Respondents rate their brand authenticity and brand attachment for two well established authentic Greek brands in the food industry. Findings – The study confirms that brand authenticity predicts the brand attachment, while brand attachment influences consumers purchase intentions, willingness to pay more and promote the brand. Practical implications – The benefits of brand authenticity should not be ignored and should be protected by the brand managers of food brands because it can be the one of the competitive advantages that can be leveraged in the competitive food industry sector. Originality/value – It provides the required empirical support for the impact of brand authenticity on brand attachment and behavioural intentions...

Segmenting East Asian Tourists to Greece by Travel Motivation

This study compares the push and pull motivations of East Asian (Japanese, Chinese and Korean) tourists who visit Greece and also proposes market segmentation based on travel motivations that transcend the national boundaries of those countries. Four main push factors were identified: “Knowledge”, “Ego-enhancement”, “Escape & Relaxation” and “Novelty”. Similarly, four pull factors were also identified: “Leisure, shopping and safety”, “Variety and cost”, “Culture & heritage” and “Travel arrangements and facilities”. Cross-cultural differences were found regarding the importance of travel motivations. Chinese tourists scored higher than other nationalities for almost all motivation categories. Although the cross-cultural differences are important, this study proposes another way to tackle the market segmentation by conducting an international segmentation based on inherent similarities across different nationalities of travelers. Three segments emerged from that analysis with the “Novelty Seekers” to be the largest followed by the “Want-it-All” and the “Lowly Motivated”.

The role of fashion involvement, brand love and hedonic consumption tendency in fashion impulse purchasing

The purpose of this study is to explain the paths that lead to impulse purchasing of fashion products by investigating, for the very first time, the role of brand love in impulse purchasing. In this research, impulse purchasing is defined as the strong and unexpected desire to purchase a product without having pre-shopping intentions to buy it. A theoretical model of fashion-product impulse-buying was developed, by examining the associations between fashion involvement, brand love, hedonic consumption tendency, positive affect, fashion impulse tendency, shopping enjoyment, browsing, available budget and urge to impulse-buy a fashion product. The urge to impulse-buy a fashion product can be explained mainly by fashion involvement, which directly and indirectly influences several related variables, such as shopping enjoyment, browsing and fashion impulse tendency. On the other hand, brand love and hedonic consumption tendency increase the positive affect that consumers feel when visiting stores, which stimulates them to impulse-buy fashion products. Finally, the impulse purchase is influenced by urge and available budget.

Matching tourism type and destination image perceptions in a country context

Recent upheavals caused in a largely globalized macroeconomic environment have affected places and countries that previously seemed immune to challenge. Country image perceptions are gradually reconsidered while the post-recession status is in a dynamic formulation. Cities, regions and countries strive in order to market themselves professionally in the international arena (van Ham, 2001) and achieve higher levels of market orientation, possibly reinforced by factors such as market turbulence and competition intensity (Denis, Czellar and Graber, 2001). Tourism plays a crucial role in the field of country image since “it allows personal interaction with locals and the host country culture” (Dinnie, 2011, p.80). International tourism market comprises of a variety of destinations offering alternative selling propositions to a proliferation of tourism segments. A single country may provide several tourism products (i.e. distinct forms of tourism) and may be “multibought” by different groups at the same time; hence, “it must be ‘multisold’, or sold as a product to these segments based on their need” (Mossberg and Kleppe, 2005, p.9). The question raised relates to the possible effect of country image on the various tourism forms in the destination portfolio.

Building Brand Love Through Co-creation

The last few years, the concept of co-creation emerges as central for both academia and industry (Pongsakornrungsilp and Schroeder 2011). Despite the undeniable importance of this topic, the investigation of co-creation’s role in building strong brands in the literature is limited. More precisely although there is some research investigating the role of co-creation in branding issues (e.g. Payne et al. 2009; Tynan et al. 2010; Bello et al. 2007), the impact of co-creation on consumer’s love for a brand remains unexplored. This conceptual paper is a first effort to build the theoretical grounds for the relationship between co-creation and brand love. More specifically, we examine how co-creation affects various dimensions of brand love, as they have been conceptualized by Batra et al. (2012). At the same time, we provide some first theoretical insights on how co-creation can indirectly positively influence brand love through other constructs such as product quality and brand personality.

A Predictive Model for Affective, Cognitive and Behavioral Consumers’ Reactions to Product-Harm Crises: Applying Product Involvement, Product Type and Crisis Response Strategies

This study investigates, through the formulation of a conceptual model and its empirical verification, the impact of severity and attribution of blame on behavioral intentions by examining the direct but also the indirect impacts through an affective (through anger and disgust) and through a more cognitive route (through trust and reputation). For the purposes of this paper, an experiment was conducted by using a 2 (Product Involvement: High vs. Low) × 2 (Product Type: Hedonic vs. Utilitarian) × 4 (Crisis response strategy: Denial, Voluntary Recall, Involuntary Recall & Super Effort) between-subject factorial design. The vast majority of hypotheses investigated in the basic model were confirmed. Results show that the perceived severity of the event positively affects blame, consumers’ negative emotions (anger and disgust) and NWOM and negatively affects company trust, reputation and purchase intentions. Furthermore, it was shown that blame attribution negatively affects company reputation and trust and positively affects negative emotions and NWOM. Additionally, results reveal that the emotional route plays a more important role for hedonic products than for utilitarian. Moreover, it was supported that product involvement differentiates the intensity of specific relationships and thus can be a key factor for the outcome of a crisis as it seems to be an important determinant of consumers’ behavior. Finally, in terms of crisis response strategies, voluntary recall is the best choice while denial should not be considered as an option. All factors investigated here produced valuable and attention-grabbing results for crisis management.

The Influence of Product Knowledge on Consumer’s Company and Product Evaluations in Product-Harm Crisis Situations

This paper assesses the role of product knowledge on consumer response to product-harm crises. An experiment with three product categories – cars, notebooks, and sports drinks – was carried out. The study reveals that the company’s product evaluation, as well as company attitude and company trust depends on subjective product knowledge. Results indicate that in the case of notebooks and sports drinks experts react more positively towards a company and its products than novices do. Particularly, experts put more trust in a company facing a crisis. Moreover, they show a more favorable attitude towards the company and evaluate its products and the product confronted with the crisis higher than novices. Following these findings, assumption are made that this is based on the fact that experts have more information stored in their memories about the product category in general, and adding one piece of information – even if it is negative – makes little difference in how consumers react. The results did not confirm the hypothesis for the product category of cars; there are no significant differences between experts and novices.

CO-Creation and Brand Love: Developing a Theoretical Framework

The objective of this study is to develop a conceptual model of co-creation and brand love. The main contribution of the present study is that is suggests both a direct impact of co-creation on brand love sub-dimensions as well as an indirect one through quality. More precisely, the authors explore the influence of co-creation on self-brand integration, passion-driven behaviors, positive emotional connection, long-term relationship, anticipated separation distress, overall attitude valence, and attitude strength. It is clearly demonstrated that co-creation is associated or could lead in the aforementioned sub-dimensions of brand love. Furthermore, it is showed that co-creation has an impact on quality, which is conceptualized as one of the main antecedents of brand love. As a conclusion the authors suggest that co-creation can lead to brand love.