Abstract Marketers often use endorsers to transfer desirable attributes from the endorser to the brand (e.g., showing a brand with an athlete to convey an “athletic” image). The present research tests whether such attribute transfer extends to characteristics conveyed by the endorser's facial appearance. In three preregistered experiments, altering an endorser’s facial appearance to appear high in communion or agency shaped perceptions of the endorsed brand’s warmth or competence. Consistent with contemporary theories on attribute conditioning, these effects occurred only when participants remembered the brand-endorser pairing. Furthermore, endorsers’ facial features also influenced product choices, such that brands paired with high-communion (or high-agency) endorsers were preferred for products associated with high warmth (or competence). Overall, the present findings show that subtle variations in an endorser’s face influence the endorsed brand’s image.

Abstract Waiting is often treated as dead time to be minimized. This paper shows how it can become a positive, shared practice when it moves online. We analyze a 10-week period of digital co-waiting in a public Facebook group formed around the pre-launch of Teenage Engineering’s Pocket Operator Modular synthesizer, using a netnographic design to follow naturally occurring posts, comments, memes, and images from announcement to first deliveries. We distinguish anticipation (future-oriented projection) from savoring (present-focused enjoyment) and show how both are collectively enacted rather than privately endured. Emotional engagement is cyclical rather than steadily fading, with peaks and lulls punctuating the wait as members narrate delays, exchange reassurance, and celebrate arrivals. Conceptually, we reframe waiting as a socio-temporal practice: consumers do not merely wait together online; they make the wait meaningful together. The paper contributes a process account of how anticipation converts into shared savoring over extended durations and outlines implications for research on time, emotion, and community in consumption.

Abstract Prior research suggests that background music influences consumer spending on food and beverage products. Specifically, it has been shown that playing classical versus pop background music generally leads to greater consumer spending on these products. However, it remains unclear what factors and mechanisms underlie such effects. The present research attempts to fill this gap. The research demonstrates that music style has no significant influence on the lower (minimum) acceptable price limits. However, pleasure level and product type both moderate the effect of music style on the upper acceptable (maximum) price limits. Specifically, the findings indicate that the maximum price of a utilitarian product is not significantly influenced by background music style (classical or pop), while the maximum price of a hedonic product is estimated to be higher when classical versus pop music is played, especially when consumers' pleasure levels are high. As a result, exposure to classical music, as opposed to pop music, increases the reference price, the internal price against which the individual compares the asking price for a product or service, followed by a concomitant expansion of the acceptable price range. These results are consistent with the musical congruity hypothesis. Moreover, the findings refute the notion that arousal level, perception of product quality, level of knowledge, involvement level, sense of task ease, and level of interest in music could account for the results. The paper concludes with a discussion of research limitations and directions for future research.

Abstract This study examines the impact of online movie reviews on consumer demand within and across two sequential release stages: theatrical run and online streaming. In contrast to extant findings of a diminishing sales effect of online reviews, we observe an increasingly positive impact of movie reviews in the cinema release stage, in line with the theory of diffusion of innovations. Moreover, consumers are predominantly conservative in using product reviews to select foreign products due to the cultural gap. After movies are released online, the role of product reviews changes according to the release gap. Movies with a higher review valence and volume during the cinema release will continue to benefit from the reviews with a shorter release gap. In contrast, movies that receive a lower review valence in the early market benefit from setting a longer release gap and waiting for the online buzz to dissipate.