Stuart Roper

Constructing luxury brands: exploring the role of consumer discourse

Purpose – The aim of this paper is to offer a discursive perspective on luxury brand consumption.Design/methodology/approach – Discourse analysis is used to examine how consumers construct their luxury brand consumption amidst countervailing cultural discourses in the market (Thompson and Haytko). Consumer discourse is generated through in‐depth, semi‐structured interviews.Findings – In the context of countervailing discourses that challenge the notion of luxury (e.g. “masstige”, “chav” and “bling”), respondents construct an ostensibly distinct and stable version of luxury expressing its subjective, experiential, moral and artistic constructs. Analysis demonstrates how these four themes operate at a linguistic‐textual level to delineate important cultural categories and boundaries around luxury. Luxury brand discourse operates strategic juxtapositions between normatively positive (ideal) and normatively negative (problematic) categories, which are paradoxically interdependent.Research limitations/implicat...

Vulnerable consumers: the social impact of branding on children

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to focus on a relatively unexplored area of branding literature, which is a study of the social impact of branding upon “tweens,” pre‐adolescent children aged between seven and eleven. Brands promote a desire in consumers that allows a premium price to be commanded. What is the impact upon children from lower socio‐economic groups who may not be able to afford these premium brands?Design/methodology/approach – An exploratory qualitative study involving focus groups with primary school teachers in the UK and Kenya and open‐ended projective questionnaires with primary school children in both countries formed the primary data collection. The data were then analysed using thematic analysis. The research objectives were as follows: to assess the importance of brands in the lives of primary school children and whether the exposure to brands has a positive or negative impact on children; to investigate the social impact of branding on children from low income families from ...

Business to business branding: external and internal satisfiers and the role of training quality

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to consider whether the affective components of brand association influence the key stakeholders of business‐to‐business (B2B) brands. The aim is to demonstrate the importance of branding to organisations involved only in B2B markets by testing three hypotheses: that the customers affective brand associations predict satisfaction with the company; that customer and employee affective brand associations correlate, and; that the better the training employees believe they receive, the stronger their affective brand associations and the higher their satisfaction with the organisation.Design/methodology/approach – The paper uses a survey of the customers (280) and employees (367) of two construction companies involved only in B2B markets using a multidimensional measure of corporate brand personality. Structural equation modelling and regression are used to test the hypotheses.Findings – Customer satisfaction is predicted by corporate brand personality. The customer view...

Exploring consumer brand name equity

Purpose – Academic literature generally regards the brand name element as central to consumer brand equity. Unfortunately scant research has been carried out to justify such a position for established products and services. The purpose of this study is to address this research gap.Design/methodology/approach – A series of 25 semi‐structured qualitative interviews was carried out with consumers, exploring functions performed by brand name for established products and services. In order to isolate the brand name element this focused on global marketing induced brand name changes.Findings – Many of the corporate‐led functions performed by brand name within the literature received validation. This suggests that a concept of consumer brand name equity for established products and services can be justified. The study also indicated that a material proportion of the equity from a brand name was determined by the consumer. It revealed that many consumers had created their own associations for the brand name, posi...

Using corporate stories to build the corporate brand:an impression management perspective

Purpose – A recent area of academic interest within corporate branding and reputation is the use of storytelling in order to differentiate the corporate brand, however there is little empirical research exploring the contents of corporate stories, and how they are used by organisations to build the corporate brand. This paper aims to utilise impression management theory to bring insight into the potential role of corporate stories in shaping the corporate brand. Design/methodology/approach – Corporate stories were identified from the web sites of 99 organisations in both the for-profit and not-for-profit sectors, and content analysis conducted on the stories, using a deductive approach to identify the story elements present in the stories. Findings – There are wide variations in the inclusion of different elements in the stories, indicating that organisations place greater importance on the inclusion of some elements in their corporate stories than others. Research limitations/implications – The paper hig...

Storytelling in organisations: supporting or subverting corporate strategy?

Purpose: Storytelling is claimed to be an effective way of communicating corporate strategy within organisations. However, previous studies have tended to focus holistically on storytelling in organisations rather than investigating how different groups may use and be influenced by stories. This paper addresses these gaps in the literature by investigating how storytelling in internal communication can either support or subvert corporate strategy. Design/methodology/approach: A qualitative study was conducted into storytelling in two large companies in the UK energy industry. Data was collected through 70 semi-structured interviews, documentary research, and observation research. Impression management theory was used to analyse how stories supported or subverted corporate strategy. Findings: Storytelling by employees in the corporate and customer service areas of the organisations showed the greatest support for corporate strategy. There was more subversive storytelling in the operational areas, particularly by lower level employees. Stories subverted corporate strategy by recounting incidents and encouraging behaviour that contradicted the organisation’s vision/goals and values. Originality/value: The study shows the important contribution of employees to the collective sensemaking process in organisations, by narrating supportive or subversive stories. Engaging employees in storytelling can enhance support for corporate strategy, however managers should also see subversive stories as an opportunity to identify and address problems in the organisation.

UK expat political connectivity and engagement: Perspectives from the far side of the world!

Abstract Research among expatriates eligible to vote in country of origin elections is sparse and tends to focus on legal and political considerations while ignoring psychological and sociological issues. This is surprising given recent research suggesting that of approximately 5.5 million UK citizens living abroad, only an estimated 13,000 registered to vote in the 2010 UK General Election. Drawing on social psychology, consumer behaviour and political marketing literature, this research provides insights into voting attitudes and behaviour of UK expatriates living in New Zealand. Adopting a qualitative research methodology incorporating diary completion and interviews, findings are reported in three key areas: contextual political and socio-economic influences on decisions to move abroad, levels of political connectivity, and finally levels of political engagement. Based on these findings, a segmentation tool and tentative engagement strategies are proposed to enhance the likelihood of expatriate participation in future elections.