Customer value and autoethnography: subjective personal introspection and the meanings of a photograph collection

Abstract

This paper applies the method of subjective personal introspection (SPI or autoethnography) to the analysis of a photograph collection from the viewpoint of implications concerning the nature and types of customer value. Borrowing from the branch of philosophy known as axiology, this focus emphasizes the centrality of customer or consumer value to the basic foundation for marketing and the essence of consumer value as an interactive relativistic preference experience. This conceptualization leads to a typology of customer value that serves as a lens or perspective to guide the interpretive analysis of photographs from a family archive. In sum, overall, the purpose of the paper is to demonstrate that consumer value (axiology) serves as a useful framework that furthers the application of SPI (autoethnography) to an interpretation of the meanings found in a photograph collection (archival artifacts).