Parent brand quality, service intensity and consumers’ usage consideration of service-to-service brand extensions
| DOI | https://doi.org/10.1108/JPBM-08-2016-1299 |
| Published date | 20 November 2017 |
| Pages | 690-703 |
| Date | 20 November 2017 |
| Author | Kelley A. O’Reilly,Alhassan G. Mumuni,Stephen J. Newell,Branden J. Addicott |
| Subject Matter | Marketing,Product management,Brand management/equity |
Parent brand quality, service intensity
and consumers’usage consideration of
service-to-service brand extensions
Kelley A. O’Reilly, Alhassan G. Mumuni, Stephen J. Newell and Branden J. Addicott
Department of Marketing, Western Michigan University, Kalamazoo, Michigan, USA
Abstract
Purpose –This study aims to examine the relative impact of three drivers affecting consumers’usage consideration for a brand extension into a
service category using data from actual consumers of a national oil change retailer contemplating various service brand extensions.
Design/methodology/approach –Data for the study were collected in two separate surveys using structured self-administered questionnaires.
Three drivers were measured for their effect on consumers’usage consideration for service brand extensions (dependent variable), namely, parent
brand evaluation, extension fit and degree of service intensity of the extension.
Findings –The results indicate that parent brand evaluations are the strongest drivers of brand extension usage consideration, regardless of the
extension fit or the degree of service intensity of the extension. In addition, the findings suggest that the closer the fit to the parent bra nd, the more
likely the extension will be considered. In contrast, consumers are less likely to consider using an extension as the level of service intensity increases.
Originality/value –This study’s use of actual customers of the brand, for real service brand extensions provides a higher degree of external validity
than previous work in this area, and it yields a deeper understanding of the criteria used by consum ers when evaluating service brand extensions.
The study also provides managerial implications that are of practical value to academics and practitioners alike.
Keywords Retailing, Automotive, Brand extension, Extension fit, Parent brand evaluation, Service extension, Service intensity
Paper type Research paper
Introduction
Since the seminal article by Aaker and Keller (1990) on brand
extensions, there has been significantresearch effort devoted to
both replicating and extending Aaker and Keller’sfindings
regarding the drivers of brand extension success(see Appendix
for an overview of selected key literaturein this area). For both
goods and services extensions, several factors have emerged
from this effort, including the degree of fit between the parent
brand and the extension category (Bottomley and Holden,
2001;Carter and Curry, 2013;Grime et al.,2002;Kim et al.,
2014;Pina et al., 20062013;Völckner and Sattler, 2006), the
consumers’perceived quality of the parent brand (Bottomley
and Doyle, 1996;Echambadi et al., 2006;Sunde and Brodie,
1993;Van Riel et al.,2001), the number of other categories to
which the parent brand has already beenextended (Dacin and
Smith, 1994), the consumers’beliefs about the malleability of
brand traits (Yorkston et al.,2010), the extent of consumer
information about the extension (Klink and Smith, 2001), the
nature of the competitive landscape (Millberget al.,2010)and
the depth of association of the parent brand with a given
category (DelVecchio,2000).
By far, however, the most significant and pervasivedrivers of
brand extension success have been found to be the fit (or
similarity) betweenthe parent brand and the extension category
and the quality of the parent brand itself. Studies examiningthe
impact of these drivers have almost unanimously concluded
that brand extensions emanating from high-quality parent
brands and/or extensions intocategories that fit with the parent
brand elicit more positive consumer attitudes (Aaker and
Keller, 1990;Bottomley and Doyle, 1996), evaluations (Aaker
and Keller, 1990,Bottomley and Holden 2001)and
acceptance (Sunde and Brodie, 1993). The bulk of this work,
however, has focused on extensions where a brand name
associated with a physical goodis extended into a new physical
goods category (“goods-to-goods”extension), e.g. Häagen-
Dazs ice cream extendedinto Häagen-Dazs popcorn. As shown
in Table I, however, relatively fewer studieshave examined the
three other extensioncontexts where:
1 a physical goods brand extends into a service category
(“goods-to-service”extension), e.g. Goodyear Auto
Service centers;
2 a service brand extends into a physical goods category
(“service-to-goods”extension), e.g. Uncle Ed’s Oil
Shoppe launches Uncle Ed’s branded work gloves; or
3 a service brand extends into a services category (“service-
to-service”extension), e.g. Uncle Ed’s Oil Shoppe
launches a windscreen repair service.
In particular, drivers of service-to-serviceextension success are
more likely to be different than those of goods-to-goods
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
26/7 (2017) 690–703
© Emerald Publishing Limited [ISSN 1061-0421]
[DOI 10.1108/JPBM-08-2016-1299]
Received 19 August 2016
Revised 17 February 2017
4 May 2017
Accepted 12 May 2017
690
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