Abstract
A large numbers of studies have supported the crucial role of brand love in consumer–brand relationships; however, research that examines fashion brand love and its relationship with cognitive aspects and self-concept congruency remains limited. Therefore, the purpose of this study was to identify important factors that are associated with fashion brand love. A questionnaire in which participants provided self-reported responses was created to measure the constructs and structural equation modeling (SEM) and independent sample t-tests were conducted to test the hypothesized relationships. Our results indicated that consumers who know more about fashion brands are more likely to have stronger emotional attachment to their favorite fashion brand and brand love, in turn, has a significant effect on performing brand-loyal behaviors. Furthermore, our results demonstrated that fashion brand love is strongly associated with actual and ideal self-congruity. These findings suggest that it is important for fashion brands to focus on developing affective relationships with consumers to gain brand loyalty and one way to achieve this goal is to enhance brand awareness or knowledge among consumers. Fashion brands also need to invest in activities that aim to deliver a brand image congruent with actual and ideal self-concepts of the target market.
Highlights
Brand love has become an area of growing interest among scholars and practitioners over the past few decades as consumers’ emotional attachment to a brand has been recognized as one of the most reliable indicators of a strong brand (Batra et al 2012)
We showed that fashion brand expertise can create a pathway through which consumers develop a strong emotional bond toward a brand
Our results indicated that consumers who know more about fashion brands are more likely to have stronger emotional attachment to their favorite fashion brand, and brand love, in turn, has a significant effect on performing brand loyal behaviors
Summary
Brand love has become an area of growing interest among scholars and practitioners over the past few decades as consumers’ emotional attachment to a brand has been recognized as one of the most reliable indicators of a strong brand (Batra et al 2012). There has been a substantial amount of academic research on brand love and its relationship to consumer behaviors such as shopping/brand experiences (Pandowo 2016; Sarkar et al 2019), purchase intentions (Fetscherin 2014; Pawle and Cooper 2006), brand loyalty (Alnawas and Alrarifi 2015; Drennan et al 2015; Fournier 1998; Huang 2017; Thomson et al 2005; Wallace et al 2014), brand trust (Albert and Merunka 2013; Langner et al 2015), positive word-of-mouth (Karjaluoto et al 2016; Wallace et al 2014), and willingness to pay (Albert and Merunka 2013; Thomson et al 2005).
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