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This study aims to examine the moderating effects of two important consumer characteristics (product familiarity and risk aversion) on the relationships between two intransient cues (store image and product signatureness) and consumer quality perception of private label, as well as the interaction between the cues themselves.

This paper employs survey research to test three main hypotheses. The authors collected data from parents in an elementary school in a southern state.

The study yields some counterintuitive results. The paper finds that the combination of two diagnostic cues does not necessarily enhance the positive evaluation of private labels. Instead, store image reduces the effect of product signatureness. Further, product familiarity induces a positive moderating effect on product signatureness, whereas risk aversion exerts a negative moderating effect on store image.

Prior literature neglects the interactions between cues and consumer characteristics and the interaction between cues themselves in consumer quality evaluation of private labels. This research addresses these gaps and offers useful insights about private label strategies.

The purpose of this study is to develop and test a conceptual model of the moderating effect of customers’ value consciousness (CVC) on the relationship of store image (SI) with four dimensions of the perceived risk associated to the purchase of a store brand over a manufacturers’ brand, and the direct effect of those variables on the perceived unfairness of manufacturers’ brand prices.

A mall-intercept survey of 600 shoppers in Colombia (South America) gathered data on their consumption experiences of a store brand and manufacturer’s brand across six product categories and two supermarket chains.

Results suggest that SI exerts different influences on the four categories of perceived risk, the strength of which varies with value-consciousness. Perceptions of the price unfairness of manufacturers’ brands are attenuated by the financial and functional risk of buying store brands but increased by the social and psychological risk.

The findings may not be generally applicable to other shopping contexts or customers. The functional perspective on SI may mean that the results are not directly comparable with other studies adopting different perspectives.

For retailers, the key implications concern awareness and management of customers’ perceptions of relative risks and the impact of value-consciousness on the use of SI as a heuristic decision-making cue. For manufacturers, they are the need to demonstrate clear product differentiation as a rationale for higher prices.

This is the first study to encompass value-consciousness, SI, perceived risk and perceptions of price unfairness in a single field survey.

This study examined the influence of supermarket brand name on the perceived quality of its private label merchandise. The purpose of this paper is to determine whether the fascia brand of a retail chain has the power to positively or negatively skew prevailing opinions concerning the quality of its own merchandise range, beyond the set of product-specific intrinsic benefits.

A within-subject two-phase research design was adopted, intially using an experimental approach and thereafter modeling the cognitive effect with the inclusion of a moderator variable (brand interaction). Paired sample t-tests were used to assess differences in mean ratings and partial least squares analysis was implemented in order to test the hypothesized relationships.

In the experiment phase, both products were rated equally at the outset in unsighted conditions, however, ratings diverged when brand name was introduced. Here, the high-end private label brand was scored considerably better than in its unsighted condition, while the low-end brand suffered a marginal decline in rating. In the modeling phase, two iterations of the conceptual model were run, considering the high-end and low-end brands seperately. The results were mutually reinforcing. A strong relationship, significant at the one percent level, was found to exist between brand name and perceived quality for both the lower- and higher-end brands, whereas no moderation effect was found to exist. This suggests that entrenched views of the brand strongly determine the perceived quality thereof, with operational and day-to-day fluctuations having little bearing on this.

This study focusses solely on South Africa, an emerging market within the BRICS consortium. To this end, the results are not transferable to other markets. The context of the study pitted a top tier retail brand against a mid tier retail brand. In accordance with this eventuality, lower income consumers, and retail chains catering to this market segment, do not constitute components of this particular study.

While the relationship between store image and perceived quality of private label merchandise is well documented, this study considers the effect through an experimental design. Here, perceived quality was measured both with and without brand cues evident. Thus, the results are likely to be more accurate than those acquired through strictly survey research. As a defining feature, the study points to the brand name as being a supremely powerful extrinsic cue, and hinting at the fact that it is long term influences that create a distinct brand aura, with these being largely undisturbed by short term fluctuations.

Although many scholars have acknowledged inconsistencies in the use of the retail brand term within the existing empirical literature, no one has conducted a systematic study to clarify the confusion of terms. Aiming at unifying the use of terms, this study aims to explore the terms that best express each retail brand concept, and discusses the definitions of proposed terms that can distinguish the connotation of different retail brand concepts.

Through a systematic review, 463 articles were obtained, from which retail brand terms and their definitions were further extracted. Semantic analysis and content analysis were adopted to analyze terms and definitions, respectively.

Semantically, the terms that best express four levels of retail brand concepts are own product brand, store brand, platform brand and retailer brand. Six key elements to distinguish different levels of a retail brand are identified through the content analysis of definitions, and on this basis, four proposed terms are defined.

Noting that no study focuses on the conceptual confusion of retail brands in recent decades, the findings are expected to clarify the confusion of terms and unify the use of terms, hence facilitating the communication between scholars and the sharing of research results.

Online group buying (OGB) websites have rapidly increased in number in recent years and have become an interesting model for online transactions. Previous studies have shown that consumers’ individual characteristics are critical in group buying participation and the perceived usefulness (PU) of an information system, whereas the role of consumer characteristics on the OGB website-quality-PU relationship remains unclear. The purpose of this paper is to investigate whether consumer characteristics (i.e. gender and utilitarian orientation) moderate the OGB website-quality-PU relationship.

A total of 658 OGB website consumers participated in this study. Data were analysed by employing hierarchical moderated regression method.

The primary findings are as follows. First, the effect of system quality on consumer PU of the OGB website was stronger for male consumers than for female consumers. Second, the effect of information quality on PU was stronger for high-utility-orientated consumers than for low-utility-orientated consumers.

Because of the increasing importance of e-commerce and the growing number of shoppers purchasing from OGB websites, the finding provides enhanced understanding of OGB consumers for segmentation strategies.

In the context of online travel communities (OTCs), this paper aims to identify the relationships between value-creating practices, trusting beliefs, solution acceptance and stickiness and the moderating effects of risk aversion on the relationship between trusting beliefs and solution acceptance and on that between trusting beliefs and stickiness.

A total of 408 survey responses obtained from Amazon website panels were used to test the proposed hypotheses through a structural equation modeling analysis.

The results show that three dimensions of value-creating practices, namely, social networking, community engagement and brand use, had positive effects on trusting beliefs; trusting beliefs had positive effects on solution acceptance and stickiness; and solution acceptance had a positive effect on stickiness. Risk aversion moderated the trusting beliefs-stickiness relationship.

A key limitation of this study is related to the sample collected from Amazon website panels, which may limit the generalizability of results to other OTC members. The results have important theoretical and practical implications in OTC settings. For example, OTCs should be used by members as key platforms for acquiring trust information prior to their behaviors.

This study extends the OTC literature by integrating different research realms into the proposed research model for a better understanding of the relationships between value-creating practices, trusting beliefs and OTC behaviors.

A significant and increasing number of graduate recruits take up employment for specific companies by virtue of their ethical reputation and profiles. As such, ethical fit has become an important dimension of the attraction and retention of graduates. However, preconceived notions of a company’s ethical orientation obtained through the media and initial recruitment exercises may be challenged during the induction and socialization phases of organizational entry, such that people may find that the reputation is just an external façade leading to disappointment and a reassessment of the employer. The paper aims to discuss these issues.

The study’s essential focus is on building a conceptual ethical fit model and to underline the need for further conceptual development in the area. The analysis of extant secondary data and the methodology of serendipity were used.

The model’s conceptual cogency and practical utility for human resource management are analyzed in the light of specific secondary data and specific propositions described.

A major concern with conceptual models is empirical validity and practical utility which requires empirical testing. However, this limitation has been mitigated by the use of a serendipitous approach from a qualitative empirical study with a generalized person–organization (P–O) focus.

Various practical implications of the model described in the paper for HR management are evident from empirical studies in the area which have dealt with particular aspects of the model. For example, Bauer et al. (1998) found that socialization effects employee turnover. And, Cable and Parsons (2001) indicate that organizational socialization is critical in generating committed employees whose values are congruent with those of the organization. Since committed employees are critical for the success of the organization, they suggest training programs for hiring managers and criteria in performance appraisals that include the development of employee value congruence through specific formal socialization tactics.

The paper contributes to the extant literature by building a dynamic conceptual model with attendant testable propositions that explore the implications of employee misalignment in pre-socialization anticipatory organizational ethical fit and post-socialization organizational ethical fit. More specifically, the study contributes to the extant literature by considering the socialization process in relation to ethical fit dynamics. It also considers from the point of view of specific moral development theory and changing perceptions of ethical climate that occur during organizational socialization. Serendipitous material obtained from a qualitative study of P–O fit puts flesh on the bones of the effects of the socialization process on ethical fit described by the paper’s conceptual model while providing circumstantial evidence for the propositions and their practical utility for HR management.