Gary Davies

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Verified

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• PhD
• Professor Emeritus at The University of Manchester

Purpose The purpose of this study is to compare two different types of measures of social desirability bias (SDB), a short form of the Marlowe–Crowne measure, a popular direct measure, and an example of a projective technique where half of the respondents record the views of their “best friends”. Design/methodology/approach The data were collected...

In this paper, the theoretical framework of the Stereotype Content Model (SCM) was applied in the context of a host country promoting its tourism to new or underdeveloped markets. The host country’s perceived Warmth, Competence and Status were each relevant to an understanding of the attitude toward the country itself and as a tourism destination....

Purpose The purpose of this paper is to test if the order in which potential customers receive company related information and product related information about a new brand can influence their trust and purchase intentions towards that brand. The empirical context is when both product and company are new to a market and share a brand name. Design/...

Prior work suggests that employee views of corporate reputation can influence a firm’s future financial performance and that previous financial performance can also influence employee views of reputation. What is not known is which is the greater effect, or whether the virtuous circle this implies might exist, particularly in smaller firms. The aim...

Answering survey questions can require significant cognitive effort and ability and cause difficulties to many respondents. This difficulty can lead respondents to adopt strategies to reduce the “task difficulty” of answering a questionnaire. Task difficulty has been widely researched in the educational and ergonomics literatures (e.g., Bittner et...

Drawing on regret and reputation literatures, the authors demonstrate how positive corporate associations can mitigate the effects of share performance on investor regret. Three studies are presented, the first involved the observation of six investment club meetings. The second is a survey of investors exploring some of the findings of the first s...

We report on a study of the longitudinal effects of the 2014 World Cup on the host Brazil's overall image and for tourism intentions in three other countries (total sample = 207). Brazil's image declined significantly 2013–2014 on some but not all measures and improved amongst a significant minority. The mixed outcomes are explained by the moderati...

This study aims to identify the factors responsible for creating brand trust and brand distrust among consumers. It uses a grounded theory approach to guide the conduct and analysis of 20 semistructured interviews that yielded 120 descriptions of consumer‐brand interactions. The 3‐stage model that emerged shows a process whereby consumers prioritiz...

Purpose This paper aims to critique human personality as a theory underpinning brand personality and to propose instead a theory from human perception, and by doing so, to identify universally relevant dimensions. Design/methodology/approach A review of published measures of brand personality, a re-analysis of two existing data bases and the analy...

Purpose The purpose of this paper is to test whether employee characteristics (age, gender, role and experience) influence the effects of employer brand image, for warmth and competence, on employee satisfaction and engagement. Design/methodology/approach Members of the public were surveyed as to their satisfaction and engagement with their empl...

Watching television advertising can represent a significant decision in time allocation. Those who avoid advertising represent a threat to advertisers and to television companies who depend upon advertising revenue. Two factors central to time allocation theory are identified as relevant to an understanding of television advertising avoidance behav...

Purpose This paper aims to identify a typology of corporate misconduct affecting trust; to test the relative ability of individual misconducts to reduce trust and; to explain differences in how individuals respond to corporate crises. Design/methodology/approach The main research design uses conjoint analysis. Respondents ( n = 404) rated eight co...

This study explores how the appropriation of another country's cultural initiatives by a consumer can influence country of origin (COO) effects and how this might be explained using theory on the positioning of stereotypes. The first of two empirical studies identifies a measure of cultural appropriation relevant to the context of the Hallyu (or th...

Corporate reputation is defined somewhat differently in various literatures but a common theme is “the accumulated impression held of the organization”. Two stereotyping factors have a substantial influence on reputation, the company's country of origin and the company's market sector. Reputation can be central to the management of, in particular s...

Corporate reputation is variously defined but a commonly quoted definition is “the accumulated impression that a stakeholder has of the organization”. Other definitions place the concept closer to that of corporate image or corporate brand. Corporate reputation is seen as a corporate asset and a source of competitive advantage. Reputation is create...

The aims of this paper are to determine what constitutes internal reputation from the perspectives of both senior managers and employees and to use this understanding to create and assess measures of internal reputation. We also hypothesise and test the relationships between the views of each group and performance, using data from a survey of audit...

Purpose This paper aims to test one of the symbolic influences of the employee on brand associations and by doing so demonstrate why the stereotyping of employees should be added to the research agenda for corporate branding. Design/methodology/approach The research is a quantitative study of the employees ( n =424) and customers ( n =964) in 28 b...

The terms gift and gifting are rarely formally defined, but are associated with something given without receiving payment, often in the expectation of reciprocation and of changing the relationship with the recipient. Extensive prior work across a number of disciplines tends to focus on gifting as a process and shows a broad conceptualization of th...

The objectives of branding and marketing in the public sector can differ in nature from those in the private sector, to include an improved responsiveness to public needs, rather than an increase in customer numbers. In addition, the customer orientation (a disposition that will influence brand perception) of public services is often questioned. Dr...

Market relationships are often influenced by factors inside of the firm. Here we examine how the employees' view of corporate reputation of a merged B2B firm, assessed by corporate character (empathy, warmth, integrity and conscientiousness), influences their emotional attachment, satisfaction and job security. Warmth and empathy correlate strongly...

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to consider whether the affective components of brand association influence the key stakeholders of business-to-business (B2B) brands. The aim is to demonstrate the importance of branding to organisations involved only in B2B markets by testing three hypotheses: that the customer's affective brand associations...

Purpose The purpose of this paper is to explore the similarity of the reputation of political leaders with those of their parties and to assess the claim of causal links. Design/methodology/approach A multidimensional measure of brand personality is used to measure the reputation among voters of the three main parties and their leaders in two surv...

Links between the reputation of organizations and their financial performance are intuitively attractive to assume, but often difficult to demonstrate convincingly. Gaps between employee and customer perceptions of corporate reputation have traditionally been associated with poor performance. In the context of service business and applying assimila...

The avoidance of TV advertising categories often include either mechanical (e.g., switching channels) or behavioral (e.g., talking to someone). Previous research seeking to explain avoidance with demographic and attitudinal factors shows conflicting results. Our aims are: to identify from these factors any that might consistently predict avoidance...

The leader of an organisation has a central role in managing reputation. Leaders can personify their company to many different stakeholders. Their personality will influence that of the organisation they lead. In a crisis internal and external stakeholders may insist that the leader accepts a prominent role. Research indicates that while the reputa...

A new study busts the myth that happy workers create happy customers. Reprint F0904B

Purpose The paper aims to investigate the impact of ruthless image on the attractiveness and connectedness of corporate brands. It proposes a model that trust mediates the influence of a ruthless image on these outcomes. The study aims to build upon previous theory which suggests that not all brands with negative aspects to their images are destine...

Purpose The paper seeks to explore the role of the employer brand in influencing employees' perceived differentiation, affinity, satisfaction and loyalty – four outcomes chosen as relevant to the employer brand. Design/methodology/approach A multidimensional measure of corporate brand personality is used to measure employer brand associations in a...

In the context of the conflicting results of earlier studies, this chapter proposes a model of pre-merger identification and commitment to merger (in a pre-merger setting) by taking into account the multi-dimensional nature of commitment. First it argues that commitment to merger, rather than commitment to organization, drives behaviour in a merger...

The emotional responses of differing stakeholders towards the corporate brand must be considered, yet few studies look beyond the customer. This paper examines a university business school from the separate perspective of its staff, students and employers. Members of the 3 groups returned 505 questionnaires, and qualitative research was also conduc...

Traditional methods of market segmentation based on demographic variables have shown mixed results in differentiating between those who are more likely to buy own brand products and those who prefer national brands. Taking advantage of the emerging convergence in human personality research on the Big Five dimensions, we focus on the potential of hu...

A suggestion by Pellegrini is used to equate innovation in the retail process to “technology push” and product innovation to “market pull” within the mainstream literature on innovation. A model is proposed that recognizes the objective of retail innovation as market differentiation. Innovation is seen as possible on the two dimensions of product a...

A good reputation can enhance the competitiveness of a nation and its corporate/product brands. As China `goes global', it is important that it manages its reputation, its nation brand, and shapes how it is viewed in the international arena. Ten challenges facing the branding of China are identified from a review of the relevant literature. They ce...

The article discusses the relationship between the reputation of an organization's chief executive officer and organizational performance. The article mentions a study testing the validity of officer reputation and the organization they lead. The theory is tested using the general elections in 2001 and 2005 in Great Britain. Leader image was measur...

Should the same corporate brand imagery appeal to both internal and external stakeholders? The authors explored similarities and differences in how the dimensions of corporate character affect the satisfaction and perceived differentiation of customers and employees of two successful retail organizations. Using multigroup structural equation modeli...

This unique book written by four world leaders in reputation research, presents the latest cutting-edge thinking on organizational improvement. It covers media management, crisis management, the use of logos and other aspects of corporate identity, and argues the case for reputation management as a way of overseeing long-term organizational strateg...

One determinant of the success of a retail outlet is its location. The location strategies adopted by many retailers of convenience products, including those marketing groceries, have been based upon the principle of siting stores away from competition. Recent moves by leading grocery retailers to develop out of town and other sites jointly, where...

Time allocation theory holds that individuals allocate their discretionary time purposively, depending upon their time orientation: to the past, present, or future. We use this perspective to understand more about why individuals avoid watching TV advertisements. We test a model of avoidance where time orientation influences attitude to advertising...

How employees and customers perceive the reputation of an organization will influence their behavior towards it. Particularly in a service business, the perspectives of employee and customer are seen as interdependent. Gaps between the two have been seen as potential causes of crises. Reported here is the development of a corporate character scale...

Most mergers and acquisitions fail to achieve their financial objectives (Buono & Bowditch, 1989; Cartwright & Cooper, 1996). For example, only 12% of a sample of mergers and acquisitions managed to accelerate their average revenue growth significantly over the three years after the companies came together (Bekier, Bogardus & Oldham, 2001). Yet the...

Thriving longterm channel relationships require trust. Previous empirical work and metaanalysis have emphasized the central role of trust but its potential as a mediator of power has not been tested empirically. A model is proposed that hypothesizes a central, mediating effect for trust between power constructs (power asymmetry, coercive and noncoe...

The selling prices to consumers of similar products vary considerably within the same retail outlet and between different types of retail outlet. Applying a value systems framework, the cost structures behind the selling prices of products in five product categories are identified using primary and secondary data. The quality of the competing produ...

Part 1: Reputation as a Strategic Approach 1. A Brief History of Strategic Thinking 2. The Traditional Way of Managing Reputation 3. The Reputation Paradigm 4. The Company as a Brand 5. Defending a Reputation Part 2: Managing Reputation by Managing Corporate Personality 6. Measuring Reputation: The Corporate Personality Scale 7. The Management of I...

There is little empirical research published testing the interdependency between conflict in business-to-business relationships and commercial performance. The “conflict–performance assumption”—all other factors being equal, relationships where conflict is low will outperform relationships where conflict levels are higher—remains central in the mar...

The use of metaphor in research and in marketing is discussed. A typology is presented for the structure of the use of metaphor in understanding the brand concept. Three underpinning or 'root' metaphors are identified together with fourteen associated branch or sub-metaphors. The three root metaphors are: brand as differentiating mark, brand as per...

Assesses the influence that certain retail buyer characteristics have on how the buyers approach their buying task. By examining five different buyer characteristics and the relative importance that individual buyers place on six different product attributes, draws some pertinent conclusions as to how the buying task is approached. A total of 100 i...

The corporate branding and reputation literatures both refer to the signi.cance of gaps between the employee and customer perceptions of the corporate brand. There is a generally held view that the two perspectives should be aligned. In particular there is a view that any gaps between the two should be reduced. In this study a standardized ‘Corpora...

The aim of this paper is to investigate the phenomenon of "atmosphere" in business-to-business relationships and its link to corporate reputation. The work of the IMP Group has emphasised the importance of a positive atmosphere but until recently has measured it only in a qualitative manner. Research in the fields of retail and services marketing d...

The paper describes the development and testing of a questionnaire instrument designed to assess the attitudes of individuals towards time. Five constructs are identified from the literature: past, present and future orientations, time pressure (or time as duration) and planning (time as succession). Scale items were developed and tested in four co...

Retail buying is a particular form of industrial buying, one characterised by buying for the purposes of reselling to the ultimate customer, rather than for use. Retail buyers have a complex role. They are responsible for meeting the requirements of their target customers and they also have to manage relationships with suppliers in order to obtain...

Many existing approaches to the measurement of corporate reputation have been criticized as being overly focused on the financial performance of companies and on the views of external stakeholders. Further, there is as yet no established universal measure to assess both the internal (often referred to as identity) and external (often referred to as...

Gaps between the perceptions of buyers and sellers on the relative strengths of competing purchasing options are likely to exist in any commercial market. In the case of international trade, one contributing factor is likely to be the Country of Origin effect, the stereotyping by buyers in one market of suppliers or products from another. While thi...

This study is concerned with the reputation-building potential of corporate websites. Claims have been made that companies are positioning themselves on the Internet by including mission and vision statements within their websites. The aim is to test these claims, and by doing so to explore the implications of the approaches used by companies in ma...

The structure of the retail sector in Japan has been the subject of considerable research interest. For such a developed country, Japan has a large number of independently owned, physically small retail outlets, a situation that has been promoted historically by legislation designed to protect small-scale business. The legislative environment chang...

This paper examines the likely influences on the sourcing of textiles by UK retail buyers. It reports the results of secondary data analyses on the retail market and primary data from personal interviews with 102 textile buyers. The main influence on the British market from changes in international agreements will be a greater opportunity to source...

Market segmentation in retailing can be based on traditional demographic measures of the customer base or on other measures including shoppers’ motivations. One criticism of existing approaches is that they are not based on a theoretical model of consumer behaviour. In this paper the potential for time allocation theory to provide the necessary the...

The purpose of this study is to develop and test a model of channel member behaviour that hypothesises a central mediating effect for trust between power constructs and key behavioural and attitudinal relationship outcomes. The model is tested on a large sample in a single channel using a dyadic approach.

Financial data drawn from Marks and Spencer's archives and annual reports is used to identify five phases in the Company' sales growth. Early, rather erratic, growth, often through acquisition, gave way to a second phase of store development funded by the Company's floatation in the 1920s. Sales growth in the third phase came substanriveljl through...

This research focuses on the delisting (or unbuying) of products and what in the attitude of the buyer might lead to a delisting of all the supplier's products, thereby ending the relationship. A del-isted product is defined here as one which was still being sold by other retailers. The decision to delist therefore involves a purposive action by th...

The marketing of own brands is a feature of modern multiple retailing. Retailers can create brand image by advertising their own products or creating brand equity in their own stores and transferring such imagery to their physical products. The costs of branding to the retailer are approximately an order of magnitude lower than that to the manufact...

A firm's reputation is an intangible asset (Dowling, 1993). The nature of such a reputation depends upon everything the firm does as an entity, (Weigelt and Camerer, 1988) and particularly the signals and communications it chooses to give to the marketplace (Fombrun and Shanley, 1990). The symbol of that reputation, the corporate name, when well ma...

Despite substantial research on market orientation in manufactured goods companies, few studies have examined the adoption of market orientation by retailers. Develops a framework for market orientation and examines the pattern of market orientation in UK multiple retail companies. Shows that market-orientated retail companies bear similar characte...

Time is a multidimensional entity and research into how we allocate our time is still at an early stage of development. Food shopping and meal preparation are two related activities which involve a significant consumption of time. Reports on research into attitudes to time and investigates three different aspects of people’s attitudes towards food...

Marketing as a discipline is concerned with understanding exchange processes, normally those of goods and services for money. However, individuals also trade in time and the current marketing paradigm contains a number of tenets about time. Our objective is to identify the marketing paradigm by constructing a framework describing the process of ind...

Marketing as a discipline is concerned with understanding exchange processes, normally those of goods and services for money. However, individuals also trade in time and the current marketing paradigm contains a number of tenets about time. Our objective is to identify the marketing paradigm by constructing a framework describing the process of ind...

Traditionally, research into supply chain management has focused on increasing the availability of products and reducing the cost of doing so by concentrating on coordination between supply chain members. Significant improvements have been made in improving the effectiveness and efficiency of supply chains. In this paper we compare the relative cos...

The way we think about retail location is dominated by the idea that the primary role of the retail store or the retail centre is to attract the shopper to the location. An alternative paradigm exists of taking retailing to where there are people either at home or in crowds and this is likely to become more important for a number of reasons. Just b...

This paper concerns the management and organization of the marketing function within large multiple retail organizations. The elements of the retailer's marketing mix are identified and the hypothesis is developed that the breadth of control over the marketing mix by a marketing department should correlate positively with commercial performance. A...

The maintenance of relationships with retailers is as important strategically to a supplier of consumer products as is its marketing to final consumers. The relationship between retailer and supplier is threatened if the retail buyer decides to delist or to deselect one of the supplier's products. The relationship ends when all a supplier's product...

The main aim of the research reported here is to identify any patterns in the delisting behaviour of retail buyers, where a delisted product is defined as one which is removed from sale by a retailer but which continues to be sold by other retailers. The influence of the retail buyer in the marketing of consumer products has become ever more signif...

The current paradigm of time in the marketing literature is one where time is linear, quantifiable and predominantly chronological in nature. This is merely one construct of one aspect of time and a construct that is largely specific to a western, industrialized society. The associated theory of time allocation assumes individuals seek to compress...

Considers the implementation of the customer care campaign within Asda, as a response to the results of a MORI survey of Asda staff and customers. The staff training programme took place between 1985 and 1987 with the stated aim of providing enjoyable and convenient shopping for customers. The campaign covered four phases: awareness; education; tra...

Dictionary definitions of “retail” and “retailing” emphasize the activity of selling in small quantities. Challenges such a concept of retailing as a description of both the commercial activity and the academic topic which the word now represents. Investigates the historical evolution of the concept of retailing and proposes a new definition, one w...

Retailers, it is said, are behaving as brands. Tests whether retailers can be considered to be brands by comparing the current practices of British retailers against four criteria for a brand which are developed from the existing literature on branding. The four criteria are that the brand should: differentiate; be capable of a separate existence;...

Presents a case history of a specialist health food retailer to illustrate the effect of the growth in interest during the 1980s in consuming “healthier” products. Health food shops had earlier benefited from the trend, but found it more difficult to survive once the concept was exploited by mainstream grocery and chemist retailers. The study is ba...

A retailer's selling space is one of its more important assets. While there are a number of approaches that can be adopted to define the space that is allocated to both products and customers inside the store, it is argued that few approach the problem of space allocation from the point of view of the customer. Many approaches are of tactical rathe...

Retailers can compete on price or can insulate themselves from direct price competition through location. Alternatively retailers can add value to the basic utility of place through appropriate marketing. One objective of retailer marketing is argued to be concerned with achieving a differentiated image through positioning. Attributes that can posi...

As more men adopt the role of grocery shopper, the potential grows for positioning a supermarket chain against the male shopper. Anecdotal evidence and previous research suggested differences between male and female shoppers over the time taken to shop. A study is presented where male and female shoppers were timed while shopping in a branch of Saf...

Retailer advertising has grown in volume, but there is disagreement about its strategic role. Some successful retailers do not use media advertising, some less successful retailers have spent considerable sums on advertising. Correlations are presented in four retail sectors, DIY, electrical furniture and department stores. In the first three, posi...

There have been two revolutions in retail trading in the history of distribution; the emergence of retailing as a specialist function and the growth of multiple retailing. The slow rate of change in the distribution system, when viewed from the perspective of long term control, has tended to obscure the extent of a third revolution, that of retaile...

Most businesses have a clear objective. It might not be posted on a noticeboard or even at the front of every employee’s mind. But the objective is obvious enough; to improve last year’s sales and profit performance.

Mr Bhati took over a 21-year-old leasehold property in 1975. A small retail outlet situated between Central and Churchwood North tube stations at 11B Spring Gardens, Richmond. Prior to 1975 the shop had been run by an elderly gentleman, Mr Jameson, who had kept it as a small delicatessen. Mr Bhati took over and revised the product range to include...

The topics of store design and product merchandising are closely related. A good layout, effective lighting and appropriate fixturing can change the perception shoppers have of a product. However, once the retailer has decided on a store layout, the emphasis shifts to decisions on what products go where and on minor changes in product display.

Few retail commentators disagree about the future of the multiple operators: continued expansion leading to a larger share of the retail market place; success to be achieved through improved efficiency with EPOS computer systems; the development of new retail concepts starting from the exploration of ‘niche markets’ and the provision of new ‘out-of...

The Bolton Report of 1971 noted eight problem areas for small businesses. We shall focus on two of the most important, and continuing problems:1. Raising and using finance. 2. Costing and control information.

In true marketing fashion the next stage in the study of the ‘small’ retailer arena must be a strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats (SWOT) analysis of the sector. The authors’ optimism for the future of the smaller shopkeeper already evident from chapter 1 indicates that the strengths and opportunities analysis will act as a starting poi...

The old addage has it, reputedly from Colonel Sanders, that there are only three important factors in retailing: location, location and location. BP’s Richard Jungins has a slightly different law for his Food Plus Convenience outlets, ‘location, location and operation are the golden rules’. A number of exceptions in the multiple sector to these app...

In 1610 Ben Johnson wrote a comedy entitled The Alchemist. In one scene Abel Drugger, a would-be tobacconist, enquires of the Alchemist as to how he should design his shop: I would know, by art, sir, of your worship which way I should make my door, by necromancie And, where my shelves And, which should be for boxes, And, which for pots.

Comment has been made throughout the book about how small retailers can develop their ‘service’ offer to use as a competitive weapon against the multiples. A fundamental element of good service is the ability to provide the goods the customer wants at the time he/she requires them. It is all very well training your staff to be able to describe the...

The main controls in retailing are common to all types and size of retailer. Every retailer looks to make a trading profit. That profit will need to be large enough to satisfy the owners, be they shareholders or a husband and wife. A satisfactory profit is normally one that provides an income from the investment by the owners that compares well eno...

The man behind the success story.