Introduction to Transformative Services

Abstract

Services dominate the lives of consumers all over the world and constitute about 70 % of the world economy and are an integral part of consumers’ day-to-day experiences. However, transformative consumer research (Mick 2006) has provided limited research attention to the role of services in affecting consumer well-being. Transformative service research (hereafter TSR) is proposed as a “new area” in consumer and service research (Rosenbaum et al. 2011). TSR emphasizes the role of services and service systems in affecting the individual and collective well-being (Ostrom et al. 2015). TSR is the all-encompassing term for service research the central emphasis of which is to investigate the well-being implications of service for consumers and for the broader society.