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This paper aims to investigate how direct mail consumption contributes to brand relationship quality. Store flyers and other direct mailings continue to play a significant role in many companies’ communication strategies. Research on this topic predominantly investigates driving store traffic and sales. Less is known regarding the consumer side, such as the value that consumers may derive from the consumption of direct mailings and the effects of such a value on brand relationship quality. To address this limitation, this paper tests a causal model of the contribution of direct mail value to brand commitment, drawing on a value framework that integrates social theory of engagement regimes and literature on experiential customer value.

The empirical work of this paper is based on a rigorous four-study mixed methods design, involving qualitative study, confirmatory factor analysis and partial least squares structural modeling.

The authors develop two second-order formatively designed scales – familiar value and planned value scales – that illustrate the role of engagement regimes in consumer behavior. Although both types of value contribute equally to direct mail attachment, they exert contrasting effects on other mediational consumer responses, such as reading and gratitude. Finally, the proposed theoretical model appears to be robust in predicting customers’ brand commitment.

This study provides new insights into the research on consumer value and brand relational communication.

This study is the first to consider consumer benefits from the social perspective of engagement regimes.

Theodore Levitt's 1983 article on the globalization of markets has left in its wake a pitched battle between advertising agency converts and opponents, and a reassessment of many corporate strategies. Objections that there are only about three global brands‐Coke, McDonald's, and Kodak‐do not deter Proctor & Gamble from setting up global new product planning or N. V. Philips from realigning its advertising accounts worldwide. To illustrate its commitment to the issue, a major agency even recently changed its name to Needham Harper Worldwide.

Over the past decade, corporate philanthropy has undergone two fundamental transformations – strategic refocusing and globalization. Faced with scarcer resources and downsizing, leading firms have redefined philanthropy by tying it directly to corporate strategies and business units. Philanthropy is now seen as a component of long‐term competitiveness, rather than a short‐term image builder and sales generator. Internationally it can not only enhance and unify a global image, but also help open emerging markets through much‐needed social programmes. This high potential is unfortunately matched by an equally high risk. Global philanthropy can represent an ethical minefield, owing to extreme difficulties in monitoring subsidiary operations. In order to address this issue, presents a dual strategic framework for multinationals and their non‐profit counterparts. Adopts a stepwise approach, starting with a mission review and moving to a partner screening process, an internal audit and action plan, followed by actual programme development and performance monitoring. Despite the complexity of global corporate/non‐profit alliances, this strategic approach can minimize ethical and financial risks and give both entities a powerful competitive edge.

Single-family houses are a common form of housing in Europe. Most were built in the context of the suburbanization after World War II and are now facing challenges arising from generational changes as well as increasing living and energy standards. According to the hypothesis of this paper, in several EU regions, single-family houses may face future challenges arising from oversupply and lack of adaptation to current demand. To examine this, the paper analyses the present situation and discusses the prognosis for the challenges described above regarding the three neighbouring north-western European countries Belgium, Germany, and the Netherlands, based on available data and a review of country-specific characteristics of housing markets as well as national policies. Despite an impending mismatch between demand and supply, planning policies still support the emergence of new single-family houses. The comparison of Belgium, Germany, and the Netherlands shows the growing polarization between shrinking and growing regions and central and peripheral sites apparent at different stages in the three countries. While a high rate of vacancies is already registered for some regions in Germany, in the Netherlands this phenomenon can only be seen near the borders and in villages within the Randstad conurbation. In Belgium also, this phenomenon is not yet widespread, but in some suburban neighbourhoods dating from the 1950's and 1960's more and more single-family houses are becoming more difficult to sell, indicating an emerging mismatch between supply and demand. This article proposes some instruments which enable municipalities to intervene in single family housing neighbourhoods which are largely dominated by private ownership. These instruments are not yet widely established in single-family housing neighbourhoods but that may become important in the future.

The purpose of this paper is to show how analysing sales flyers with a combination of eye tracking, measurement of emotions, interview and content analysis can give an in-depth understanding on how different design aspects influence sales flyers’ effectiveness as a communication tool. The paper shows the relationship between different sales flyer design principles and a person’s preference towards it, as well as the intent to read it.

The paper chose for pilot study using eye tracking and emotions measurement to analyse retail sales flyers. In addition, interviews and content analysis were conducted to fully understand which aspects of sales flyer design influenced consumers.

The paper’s main findings are that sales flyers that evoke more positive emotions are prone to be chosen, and the attention and the view time of content pages is related to the number of elements on the page, page coherence and the location of the offers.

This research uses eye tracking were sales flyers are shown on screen, which is not a natural way to read sales flyers. Future research should aim to test this methodology and prepositions in the natural environment.

The paper includes implications for designing better sales flyers.

To the authors’ knowledge, sales flyers have never been studied with a research design combining eye tracking, measurement of emotions, interview, content analysis and preferences.

The relationship between research and teaching – sometimes referred to as the research–teaching nexus – is an important issue in education literature. However, although it is acknowledged that this question is specific to each discipline, it is rarely addressed in the management accounting (MA) literature. Outside MA, the literature focuses on the influence of research on teaching but rarely touches on the influence of teaching on research. This paper has two aims: to enhance the understanding of the research–teaching link in MA and to analyse the link from teaching into research.

The paper is based on a reflexive analysis of a case in which the content of a management control course progressively changed over a period of 15 years. The authors structure their description of the case using Dewey’s concept of inquiry.

This paper first shows that designing the content of this course was a form of research and it produced knowledge. This analysis also suggests that the influence of research on teaching can take other forms than introducing research results or methods into teaching; designing teaching content is nurtured by not only scientific considerations but also pedagogical considerations and lecturers’ values; and linking research and teaching raises different issues dependent on the stance adopted by MA scholars in their research.

The academic community should seriously consider that knowledge can be produced in a teaching context, through the design of a teaching content.

This paper contributes to an inquiry process by documenting how course content is actually designed, which has not yet been done in the MA literature.

1989 was designated Museums Year to commemorate the centenary of the Museums Association, and unlike many of these PR exercises this one resulted in museums (especially national museums based in London) receiving an unusual amount of coverage in the qualities. Whether stories of protests and problems would have the desired positive effect on actual attendances has not yet been calculated. The unusually sunny weather cannot have helped much either. But the Museums Association itself produced a series of 11 regional guides which if read on the beach or in the pool would have enabled the readers almost to think that they had actually visited the collections described in considerable detail. Too many to note here but a list of all the titles is available from the MA or the Museums and Galleries Commission. Simon Olding's Exploring Museums: London (ISBN 0 11 2904653) and Arnold Wilson's Exploring Museums: The South West (ISBN 0 11 2904696) tackle their areas entertainingly, but their step‐by‐step guides to some of their subjects may soon be outdated as many existing museums are currently undergoing major rearrangements or refurbishments.

The “global responsibility” theme is today in the same state of affairs as the “sustainability” theme, devised by the UNO, was in the 1990s. From a meaningless compromise situation, it has gradually acquired some sense, due to the interest shown by the actors, whether these belong to the political scene, non‐governmental organizations, enterprises, etc. Insofar as the “global responsibility” theme contains the word “responsibility”, it is necessary to propose an understanding of it, with reference to the various areas supporting it (its use in law, in philosophy) before underlining the development of the theme of responsible enterprise and the search for an underlying concept. This text ends on an analysis of the ideological function of the “global responsibility” theme.