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The Toys and Games retailer is facing one of the toughest challenges on the High Street. This paper looks at how, with price and product comparisons being very easy to make, and the ongoing rush of the Internet, the strive for a point‐of‐difference has never been more crucial in presenting retail offers. To make that point of difference, one first has to understand the current market and, more importantly, assess it from a customer's point of view.

Reviews the growth in branded licensed merchandise for children inspired by books: literary fiction is an art form which has always had a close relationship with the market, and the full commercial value of children’s books lies in the potential for interpreting their content and characters into diverse product categories. Considers the contrasting roles of three early‐mid 20th century children’s authors as brand managers and custodians: Dr Seuss, Beatrix Potter and A.A. Milne. Describes the products that have emanated from each: Milne’s Pooh character is the most commercially successful children’s literary character, and the least recognisable. Categorises Milne as having a permissive approach to brand management, because he was uninterested in how the Pooh books were positioned in the market; Dr Seuss was a purist who wanted his books to be educational or even subversive, and refused to let his characters like the Grinch be used purely commercially; but Potter was a pragmatist who embraced merchandising of her books in order to make money.

This chapter builds upon the analysis of the last chapter, as fans have to deal with the issues that arise from their team’s financial superiority. Here, we question what happens when that financial superiority is accompanied by significant moral and ethical issues. Recent involvement of state actors in the ownership of English football has been evidencable and occasionally appears clear. Various reflexes and cognitive distancing occur from fandoms when football club ownership engages in practices that, according to the normative models that fans ascribe to their clubs, are mutually exclusive with the values of the fanbase and the club’s history. A common form of fan reflex often takes the form of distancing the players on the pitch from the club’s institutional structures, effectively teasing out the matchday experience from the structures that benefit from the raw emotion it generates. Another reflex is questioning why the fan should surrender their club when a morally, ethically problematic ownership model has acquired it. Here we have perhaps the greatest challenge to the normative model and, rather than negotiating that tension, as often as not the response is to try and ignore it.

The aim of this chapter is a discussion of the post-modern shift towards symbolic economies as a substantial factor of transformation of urban public space. It argues that the shift towards a cinematic mode of production, in which production, distribution and consumption of images assume a dominant role in the social organisation, calls for a related cinematic urbanism analysing the prime role of cities as factories in the global system of symbolic production. The city of Florence is assumed as an exemplar case study, examining the way the symbolic productive chain develops towards the real and virtual domains. I argue that Florence represents an archetype of the cinematic city, anticipating since the renaissance the tendency towards global symbolic production as a dominant sector of its urban economy.

Explores the use of strategies adopted by authors and publishers to enhance the success potential of their books.

Drawing on the literature on the production of best selling business books, strategies and techniques increasingly being deployed in the production of social science texts are considered. These strategies are collectively referred to as the “Ritzerization of knowledge”. The Disneyization of Society, by Alan Bryman, is explored as an example of this Ritzerization strategy.

It is argued that while such techniques aid in the production of easy reading, or “knowledge‐lite”, the dictates of the market may threaten the survival of more demanding texts and, worryingly, the capacity for a scholarly depth of understanding or the development of a substantial knowledge base.

Examines the “Ritzerization of knowledge” in both a social and a marketing context.

The purpose of this paper is to explore the current role of competition as one of the neglected aspects of museum marketing management. It also aims to discover whether museum professionals consider museums to be market immune and to find out what they think about the role of competition in creating and managing their existing and new services.

The theoretical part of the paper is based on a review of the literature from the multidisciplinary field of arts and museum marketing management. The exploratory qualitative research included 17 museum professionals and was carried out in 17 museums in one EU emerging market country.

Museum professionals are not aware of the competition, or they tend to ignore its existence. They consider the preservation of objects (exhibits) to be equally or even more important than providing services. However, additional services become important. Although some museum professionals try to engage visitors in the active creation of museum experience, most are still conservative in such terms.

The primary research limitations are related to intentional, convenience sample and the perspective of one employee (marketing manager or museums’ director).

Research findings provide valuable insights for both marketing academics and professionals engaged in the museum marketing management field. The contribution of the paper is also contextual as it helps to bridge the gap existing in museum marketing management research in the context of the emerging markets.

El objetivo de este trabajo es explorar el papel actual de la competencia, como uno de los aspectos que ha recibido escasa atención en la gestión del marketing de museos. Además, busca descubrir si los profesionales de museos consideran los museos inmunes al mercado, y conocer cómo reflexionan sobre el papel de la competencia en la creación y la gestión de los servicios existentes y los nuevos.

La parte teórica del trabajo se basa en la revisión de la literatura del campo multidisciplinario de la gestión de las artes y del marketing de museos. La investigación cualitativa exploratoria ha incluido 17 profesionales de museos y se ha realizado en 17 museos, en un país emergente de la Unión Europea.

Los profesionales de museos no son conscientes de la competencia, o tienden a ignorar su existencia. Consideran la conservación de objetos (exposiciones) igual o incluso más importante que la prestación de servicios. Sin embargo, los servicios adicionales están ganando en importancia. Si bien algunos profesionales de museos tratan de involucrar a los visitantes en la creación activa de la experiencia del museo, la mayoría de ellos todavía son conservadores con respecto a esta idea.

Las limitaciones principales de la investigación serefieren a la muestra intencional de conveniencia y el punto de vista de solo un empleado (gerente de marketing o director de museo).

Los resultados de este estudio proporcionan información valiosa tanto para los académicos de marketing como para los profesionales que trabajan en el campo de la gestión de marketing de museos. Además, la contribución de este trabajo es contextual puesto que ayuda a llenar el vacio existente en la investigación de la gestión de marketing de museos en el contexto de los mercados emergentes.

This paper aims to evaluate how places approach the promotion of local food products and what it means to produce, consume and support local produce in a rural region.

The study uses a participatory action-reflective approach through a series of three focus groups held over consecutive weeks with nine participants. This included local food producers, artists and community members, with data collected through focus group discussions, reflective video diaries and a questionnaire. The research was conducted in Rhondda Cynon Taf, Wales, a region with entrepreneurial potential but lacking a reputation for food.

Findings demonstrate confused perceptions of local identity, leading to a clichéd image of the region. As such, an origin brand may do little to enhance the value of local produce or increase economic prosperity in places that lack an established identity. Places with a more recognised reputation for food, such as Wales, could benefit from an origin brand, similar to Brittany.

The study extends the academic understanding of place branding by investigating the value of using origin branding in promoting food products. The context of a lesser-known region highlights the importance of awareness and reputation for the successful implementation of the brand. Additionally, the unique community-led action-reflective methodology provides a holistic model in exploring the effective development of the brand.

Attempts to increase public participation in heritage‐related activities have had mixed success. This research seeks to understand the degree to which people value heritage, what influenced their degree of engagement with heritage and what elements of a heritage item impacted upon the value attached to it by the public.

Focus groups and repertory grid analysis were used to gain a sense of how people defined heritage and the factors that influenced their perceptions and involvement. A survey of a nationally representative sample of over 3,200 people was then conducted to empirically test these findings.

The results emphasise that people are highly motivated to engage in heritage activities that they find directly relevant to their own specific interests, culture or history. Heritage was defined broadly, encompassing a wide range of objects, places and experiences, summarised here under 15 categories. The key criteria in determining whether a particular object was viewed as being worthy of heritage protection were its perceived importance to the nation, personal relevance, irreplaceability and uniqueness.

The data is limited to the Australian context, and the approach should be replicated in other nations to examine generalisability of results. The complex way in which the public defines heritage means that much work is still to be done to understand how the various attributes of a heritage item interrelate to influence its perceived value.

This paper includes implications for heritage managers, specifically on how to educate and support the public connection with heritage by encouraging them to build personal connections through experience, storytelling and celebrations.

Through its use of multiple methods of data collection, and inclusion of oft‐overlooked groups, this study presents a rare “national” perspective on public views of heritage and how they are formed.