Loyalty in a Cultural Perspective: Insights from French Music Festivals

Abstract

Purpose

This chapter addresses the concept of loyalty from a consumer culture theory perspective.

Methodology

We investigated loyalty in the context of annual (French) music festivals and their ritualized meanings for consumers with a multi-method approach, both qualitative and quantitative methods.

Findings

From our study loyalty appears as: (a) social rather than individual; (b) outcome of a social evaluation of emotional experiences rather than individual satisfaction; (c) temporally and (d) spatially structured and structuring. This stands in contrast to dominant conceptualizations of loyalty that emphasize individual’s satisfaction as antecedent of loyalty.

Originality/value

Our findings take off from Fournier and Yao’s (1997) and Fournier’s (1998) suggestions that loyalty can be reconceptualized as relationships. However, we argue that these relationships are as much a matter of social relations between people than between people and brands (or brands as anthropomorphized by brand communities) that are performed ritually and repetitively. This research highlights the necessity to reconsider both the definition of loyalty and organizations’ main loyalty strategies, which are individual-centric and do not consider the social and cultural environment of consumers.

Citation

Collin-Lachaud, I. and Kjeldgaard, D. (2013), "Loyalty in a Cultural Perspective: Insights from French Music Festivals", Consumer Culture Theory (Research in Consumer Behavior, Vol. 15), Emerald Group Publishing Limited, Leeds, pp. 285-295. https://doi.org/10.1108/S0885-2111(2013)0000015019