Latest research on brand relationships: introduction to the special issue
| Date | 11 March 2019 |
| Published date | 11 March 2019 |
| DOI | https://doi.org/10.1108/JPBM-12-2018-2167 |
| Pages | 133-139 |
| Author | Marc Fetscherin,Francisco Guzman,Cleopatra Veloutsou,Ricardo Roseira Cayolla |
| Subject Matter | Marketing,Product management,Brand management/equity |
EDITORIAL
Latest research on brand relationships:
introduction to the special issue
Marc Fetscherin
Department of Business, Rollins College, Winter Park, Florida, USA
Francisco Guzman
University of North Texas, Denton, Texas, USA
Cleopatra Veloutsou
Adam Smith Business School, University of Glasgow, Glasgow, UK, and
Ricardo Roseira Cayolla
Department of Management and Marketing, Polytechnic Institute of Viana do Castelo, School of Technology and Management,
Viana do Castelo, Portugal and Department of Sport, Instituto Universitário da Maia, Maia, Portugal
Abstract
Purpose –This paper aims to outline the role of brands as relationship builders and to offer a better understanding of the recent developments and
key literature in the area of consumer–brand relationships.
Design/methodology/approach –This paper is an editorial based mainly on a literature review on consumer–brand relationships. It uses the
sentiment range and passion intensity to position various brand relationship constructs. This work follows the same bibliometric-analysis approach
used by Fetscherin and Heinrich (2014) and looked for publications in the Web of Science on brand relationships, with reference to Fournier’s (1998)
seminal work and data collected for the period between January 2010 and November 2018.
Findings –First, this work presents the key consumer–brand relationship terms and positions the work on brand love, brand like, brand hate, brand
dislike and brand indifference. In addition, the bibliometric analysis offers a number of insights into the current state of the aca demic research in the
area of consumer–brand relationships, including a clear indication that the research on consumer–brand relationships is increasing.
Originality/value –This work and the wholespecial issue together help in the understanding of brandsas relationship builders, clearly explaining the
continuumfrom strong positive or negativerelationships with brandsto no relationship with brandsand the current state of researchin the area.
Keyword Consumer–brand relationships
Paper type Research paper
Introduction
Since the original work by Blackstone (1993),Fajer and
Schouten (1995) and Fournier (1998),researchabout
consumers’relationships with brands –with brands being
considered active contributors in these relationships –has gained
attentionfrom academicsand practitionersalike. In recentyears,
companies have come up with several measures related to brand
relationships, such as the Earned Brand Report[1]byEdelman,
the Experience Brand Index[2] by Jack Morton, the Brand
Intimacy Study[3] by MBLM, the Brand Affinity Report by
Rakuten, the Loyalty Report[4] by Bond Brand Loyalty and the
BrandPassion Report[5]byNetBase,tomentionafew.
This special issue of the Journal of Product & Brand
Management adds to the ongoing intense academic and
practical discussion dedicated to the topic of brands as
relationship builders in the consumer market. Given the high
level of academic and practical engagement with the topic, it is
not surprising that this is the third special issue in the past five
years in a journal publishing on consumer–brandrelationships.
The two previous special issues were publishedin the Journal of
Brand Management (2014, Vol. 21, Issue 5) and the Journal of
Product & Brand Management (2016, Vol. 25, Issue 6). This
issue contains 12 papers –half of them stem fromthe journal’s
regular submissions and the other half from work originally
presented at the 5th International Consumer Brand
Relationships Conference (www.consumerbrandrelationship.
com), held at the Porto Business School in Portugal in May
2017. At this high-quality international conference, fueled by
the increasing popularity of the topic, a growing number of
submissions were received from all aroundthe world, and close
to 50 papers from about 60 participants from 20 different
The current issue and full text archive of this journal is available on
Emerald Insight at: www.emeraldinsight.com/1061-0421.htm
Journal of Product & Brand Management
28/2 (2019) 133–139
© Emerald Publishing Limited [ISSN 1061-0421]
[DOI 10.1108/JPBM-12-2018-2167]
Received 16 December 2018
Accepted 17 January 2019
133
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