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The purpose of this paper is to investigate situational factors (i.e. social risk) and negative emotions (e.g. shame and guilt) on consumers’ purchase intentions for premium private labels (PPLs) vs national brands (NBs) at discounter (Lidl) in the UK, and the underlying process of this effect.

The authors conduct a 2 (social risk) × 2 (brand type) between-subjects design experiment employing a Qualtrics online panel in the UK.

The study shows that NBs still have the edge over PPLs when consumers shop for socially risky situations, which is due to higher product expectations of NBs, and a moderated mediation shows that this effect is more pronounced among consumers that feel negative emotions when shopping at Lidl.

This study included leading NBs, which differ in terms of price compared to selected PPLs. Researchers should include pricing information as an additional factor and investigate Lidl’s options to deal with negative emotions in the online setting.

The results help brand managers to understand consumer reactions toward PPLs vs NBs at the discounter in UK.

NBs have recently joint rather than fight discounters’ product assortment, this study contributes to understand the moderating impact of negative emotions and product expectations as the driving force in consumers’ purchasing decision.

This paper analyses three strategies in customers’ use to afford consumption in a developed and an emerging market for different product groups. The strategies are: (1) usage of loyalty cards, (2) usage of credit cards and (3) usage of long-term credits.

Mall intercept surveys conducted in Poland (emerging market) and Germany (developed market) provide data for testing a set of hypotheses using ANOVAs.

Results show that customers in emerging markets show no differences in the usage of loyalty cards for product categories with high shopping frequency (groceries) compared to developed markets, while in all other product categories loyalty card usage is stronger. Results show further that in low price categories, customers in emerging markets use credit card payments more often compared to customers in developed markets. In high price categories, they use credit cards less often, but long-term credits more often.

Results have implications for the design of loyalty programs and payment options in different markets. Results have also implications for public policy regarding concerns about increasing private debt in emerging countries.

This paper suggests a cost-benefit framework where customers in emerging countries perceive benefits of loyalty cards and credit options higher, while they are willing to bear higher costs. As a result, effects of product category characteristics on usage that are observable in developed markets do not exist in emerging markets.

While previous literature focusses on the impact of unit pricing on the customer level by analysing customer awareness and product choice, the present research aims to highlight the impact unit pricing has at the store level.

The impact of unit pricing on the store price image is investigated in two experiments. While the first experiment assesses the general influence of unit price presence and unit price prominence on store price image, the second experiment provides further insights into the influence of unit price prominence on store price image and shopping intentions under consideration of moderating variables.

This research demonstrates that the availability of unit prices influences several store price image dimensions positively, namely, price processibility, price perceptibility and evaluation certainty. There is also an indirect positive effect on value-for-money perception. Furthermore, unit price prominence has a positive effect on the dimension price processibility. There is a positive influence of unit price presence and unit price prominence on the consumers’ intention to shop at a given store through the store price image.

This paper adds to the existing unit price and store price image literature and derives implications for retailers as well as for policymakers regarding the presentation of unit prices on price labels. Policymakers can use the results for motivating retailers to use unit price information more actively and present it more prominently beyond the minimum regulatory standards.

Governmental regulations aiming to protect environmental goals often require firms to increase sales prices with negative consequences on price fairness perception. Companies might therefore either justify the price increase by highlighting the good cause (environmental framing) or they could blame the government for the regulation (governmental framing). Firms might also communicate their investments in the relationship to motivate customers to stay. This paper aims to examine the impact of such communication content on price increase fairness perception and switching intention in a contractual service setting.

This paper first examines the content of 119 price increase letters from electricity suppliers in a qualitative pilot study. The main study then tests our research framework with 552 respondents using a 2 x 2 x 2 between-subjects experimental scenario design (manipulating framing, effort and regret communication).

Customers perceive governmental framing as fairer than environmental framing. Effort and regret communication by firms weaken or reverse this effect. They reduce customers’ fairness perception for the governmental framing, while regret communication increases it for the environmental framing. However, regret communication also increases switching intention in both framings through a strong direct effect.

Cost-induced price increases are perceived on a “locus continuum” on which reason-framing and relationship investments can shift the consumer perception. Future studies may apply our framework in different industries and contexts.

The results provide guidelines for communicating price increases. Firms should prefer a governmental framing and they should also hesitate to communicate relationship investments, which signal internal locus of the firm, such as effort or regret.

Our results question the naive assumption of general positive effects of environmental framings and relationship investments on customer responses. Based on a new view on attributions of cost-caused price increases, we suggest and find several counterintuitive results. We argue that the framing and relationship investments shift the cause perception of an external cost increase on the attributional locus continuum.

Shopping apps are a highly relevant channel and an increasingly important part of omni-channel retailing, as they strengthen the customer relationship. This study analyses the possibilities available to retailers to encourage consumers to download a shopping app and use it in the long-term.

The study uses a scenario-based online experiment with a 2 × 2 × 2 between-subjects design and data from 332 participants. A second online experiment with a 2 × 3 between-subjects design and data from 200 participants supplements the main experiment. The data obtained from these experiments were analysed using M/ANCOVA and PROCESS.

Findings suggest that a rebate (monetary incentive) increases the download intention. Online and in-store app features (non-monetary incentives) do also have positive impacts on the use intention, though the in-store feature only works when it is offered in combination with the online feature. The relationships are mediated by the perceived usefulness of the shopping app. Moreover, the non-monetary features interact with the channel preference of the consumers, who react more positively towards features offered in a non-preferred channel. A supplementary study supports this finding.

This research is novel as it analyses the impact of monetary (rebate) and non-monetary (online and in-store features) incentives on both the download and use intention of a shopping app separately. Further, it contributes to research on the topic by examining which features consumers perceive as useful. Finally, the study considers the omni-channel environment regarding consumers’ channel preference.

This study aims to investigate the impact of social risk and inter-tier brand competition across traditional retailers and discounters on consumers' purchase intentions in the UK.

The authors conduct a 2 (social risk) × 3 (brand type) × 2 (retailer type) between-subjects design (n = 309; UK) experiment employing a Qualtrics online panel in the UK.

The study shows that while premium private labels (PPLs) are on par with national brands, discounter's PPLs outperform mainstream retailer's PPLs. Furthermore, consumers appear to purchase standard private labels and PPLs for themselves when shopping at a discounter but turn to national brands when shopping for socially risky situations.

While Tesco's premium (Tesco Finest*) and standard private label (Tesco Everyday Value) explicitly make reference to the retailer's name, for Lidl's premium (Deluxe) and standard private label (e.g. Milbona), the discounter's name is not visible. This is something this study did not control for.

Given that Lidl has opened its first US store in 2017 with ambitious expansion plans, our findings provide in particular practical guidelines for how to promote PPLs in countries where the discounter landscape is less saturated than in Germany.

This study provides insights into the understanding of the influence of social risk on purchasing intentions of premium private labels vs standard private labels vs national brands offered by mainstream retailers or discounters in the UK.

The purpose of this paper is to analyse how five price image dimensions influence shopping intentions for different store formats.

In total, 306 espondents evaluated three stores from a list of 18 retailers on a multiple‐item scale, resulting in 918 price‐image measurements. Based on these data, a covariance structure analysis in Mplus analyses the direct and indirect impact of five price image dimensions on shopping intentions. A multiple group analysis identifies differences in the effects between store formats.

The impact of image dimensions differs substantially between store formats. For discount stores, value for money is by far the most important image dimension. For supermarkets, price level and value are equally important, but price perceptibility and price processibility are also relevant. For organic food stores, value is most important, followed by price processibility and evaluation certainty. For the weekly market, price perceptibility plays a key role in explaining customers' shopping intentions.

The results carry several implications for retail pricing practice, as they indicate that retailers should not focus exclusively on price level competition. Depending on the store format, retailers should attach importance to the price image dimensions in varying degrees.

The study contributes to the literature by: advancing price‐image measurement; modelling direct effects on shopping intentions; analysing a number of different indirect effects in an integrated model; and taking the moderating effects of store format into account.

The purpose of this paper is to provide an analysis of consumer shopping travel behaviour with a focus on its environmental effects. In particular, the paper aims to contribute a deeper understanding of the drivers of consumer travel behaviour and their interrelations.

Based on a literature review, relevant influencing factors of shopping travel behaviour are identified and a theoretical model is deducted. Qualitative interviews were conducted to analyse the model, with interviewees chosen from five life cycles and three residential areas.

The influencing factors of shopping travel behaviour differ among life cycles. There are two main aspects hindering environmentally friendly behaviour: the perceived necessity of mobility during the various life cycles (by which parents are particularly affected) and the negative evaluation of public transport in terms of flexibility and comfort. The life cycles are linked with a shopper typology, characterizing shopper types by shopping trip planning and the needs the transport modes should address.

The theoretical framework and the shopper typology can serve as a basis for future research.

Retailers, transport service providers and policy makers should encourage environmentally friendly travel behaviour (e.g. delivery services offered by retailers would make public transport use more comfortable).

While previous studies have analysed single influencing factors of shopping travel behaviour, we provide a comprehensive theoretical framework, synthesising several influencing factors. A qualitative study based on the model derived analyses interrelations among these factors.

The aim of this paper is to investigate how different design elements of retailer coupons increase the attitudinal loyalty towards retailers.

Three design elements are manipulated in a 2x2x2 experimental design. Data is analysed using structural equation modeling.

The results demonstrate that addressing customers personally and face value have a positive impact on attitudinal loyalty. Surprisingly, the positive effect of personalization is stronger than that of typical variations in face value. In contrast, a high minimum purchase amount restriction has a negative total effect on loyalty and neutralizes the positive effects generated by personalization. The results illustrate further that personalization influences loyalty via self-reference and enjoyment independently of any cognitive evaluation of the coupon, while face value and the minimum purchase amount require at least some cognitive processing to have a loyalty impact.

Future studies can use the developed framework to test the impact of other design elements, promotion types or loyalty schemes.

The results underline that personalization offers opportunities for increasing loyalty without the necessity of large investments. As these effects can occur without redemption, coupon promotions should not be evaluated based on redemption rates only.

The study extends existing research by focusing on retailer coupons, analyzing the combined loyalty effects of three coupon design elements and developing a framework to analyze direct and indirect loyalty effects as well.