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Purpose – We study weight loss communities to contribute to the understanding of how gifting, sharing, and the relationship between them allow individuals to pursue status transitions for a social identity.

Methodology – We employed archival netnography to capture emic experiences for a stigmatized circumstance in American society. We analyze data from four communities to obtain a broad range of consumer experiences within fee versus free communities.

Findings – We explain how individuals differentially employ sharing and gifting to create and sustain communities in support of status transitions within a social identity. Further, we describe roles of gifting, sharing, and prosumption, and their contributions to the transformative process of weight loss.

Research limitations/implications – The data comes from communities that may be viewed as stigmatized within the United States, one cultural milieu. Future research should examine these concepts across additional contexts and cultures.

Practical implications – Our analysis reveals the basis for virtual community development in support of status transitions. These results underscore the necessity to examine how consumers co-opt market resources to enact private, albeit life altering, goals.

Originality/value of paper – Most extant literature focuses either on gifting or sharing with little attention to how consumers employ community and membership to achieve personal goals. Our research articulates how individuals employ market resources to enact customized rituals and achieve individual goals within communities.

The author describes how he entered the marketing field and describes his contributions in four sections: articles written, books published, students nurtured, and executives consulted and trained. He describes his contributions to the marketing field in nine areas: marketing theory and orientations, improving the role and practice of marketing, analytical marketing, the social and ethical side of marketing, globalization and international marketing competition, marketing in the new economy, creating and managing the product mix, strategic marketing, and broadening the concept and application of marketing.

For one merit-based undergraduate scholarship program at Washington University in St. Louis (the University), discovery and dialogue have been essential to the program’s nearly 30-year existence. Named for Dr. John B. Ervin, the first African American Dean at Washington University in St. Louis, the John B. Ervin Scholars Program has attracted, recruited, retained, and graduated over 600 students deemed to exemplify extraordinary commitments to four pillars – scholarship, leadership, service, and diversity. Because the Program’s administrators have cultivated a community grounded in discovery and dialogue, the Ervin Scholars’ resolve to foster a more just and equitable society has deepened over time, perhaps preparing them for this time in which universities, this nation, and our world face crises over race. This resolve has manifested the last few years as Ervin Scholars have responded quickly to racial issues at Washington University in St. Louis and throughout the nation.

With its 30-year foundation, the John B. Ervin Scholars Program continues to develop, nurture, and support young people who advance discovery and dialogue. Drawing on a number of interviews, Program and University publications, and external publications, “A Legacy of Commitment,” the second installment of the Program’s history, demonstrates how the presence, contributions, and achievements of Ervin Scholars have changed Washington University in St. Louis. The Ervin Program has been an important part of the University’s efforts to be more diverse and inclusive, and it will continue to be integral to the University’s current and future plans.