Morris B. Holbrook’s research while affiliated with Columbia University and other places

Food consumption presents an opportunity more for memorable experiences than for mere physical nourishment. Almost any business report about the new trends in food includes experiences as the key drivers for the future of the industry. Everyone agrees that the food industry is witnessing a revolution as it evolves from serving utilitarian needs to providing hedonic pleasures. The traditional focus on utilitarian value has been integrated with and sometimes even replaced by attention to the role of hedonic value. Scholars have studied consumption experiences via an intense and broad debate about their definition, antecedents, and consequences, highlighting the role of fantasies, feelings, and fun as drivers of hedonic value. Based on a solid psychological stream of research, a broad range of studies has addressed the link between individual emotions and market performances in the areas of advertising, customer satisfaction, or branding and even just as antecedents that explain consumer attitudes and decisions. © 2019 selection and editorial matter, Wided Batat; individual chapters, the contributors.

The purpose of this study is to investigate the relative impact, if any, of three main aspects of movie success (Simonton, 2009)—namely, reviewers’ ratings, opening box office, and Oscar nominations—as market cues that might influence consumers’ subsequent evaluative assessments. Based on public real‐world data, via path analysis on longitudinal observations for motion pictures released in two different years, Studies 1 and 2 test and compare the impacts of these key success criteria and their interactions. Measures of the relevant variables were gathered over time and statistically controlled for typical objective movie features available in the market at the beginning of any motion‐picture life cycle. Findings show that only reviewers’ ratings have an impact on consumers’ quality judgments, whereas opening box office and Oscar nominations have neither a main nor an interaction effect. Thus, they do not act as judgment devices.

Purpose This essay traces the origins, development, and future of the consumption experience as a concept in marketing and consumer research. Design/methodology/approach The author relies on Subjective Personal Introspection (SPI) to describe his involvement in the introduction and elaboration of the consumption-experience concept. Findings The author finds that the concept of the consumption experience has extended to many areas of marketing and consumer research, with widespread applicability in the creation of brand-related promotional messages. Research limitations/implications Working with Professor Elizabeth Hirschman, the author played a pioneering role in understanding the consumption experience and is happy to see that their contribution has encouraged others to pursue related themes. Originality/value Working with Professor Elizabeth Hirschman, the author played a pioneering role in understanding the consumption experience and is happy to see that their contribution has encouraged others to pursue related themes.

This essay pursues an approach that I call Subjective Personal Introspection (SPI) to comment on my own impressions concerning my experiences over the past fifty-plus years at one of our leading graduate schools of business. Herein, I trace my progress from MBA candidate to doctoral student to faculty member to retiree by suggesting ways in which – from my admittedly idiosyncratic perspective – business education has devolved toward a lower level of academic excellence, an abandonment of scholarly values, an unfortunate anti-intellectualism, a neglect of its commitment to the advancement of business- or marketing-related knowledge for its own sake, and a betrayal of its responsibility to work toward the protection of social welfare. Though the situation seems a bit hopeless, I offer a few modest suggestions for possible improvement.

Purpose In the fertile line of research on consumer value from the services literature, a gap exists between theoretical and empirical knowledge, in particular regarding Holbrook’s conceptual value framework. The present work seeks to find construct validity for a multidimensional value scale based on his proposal. Design/methodology/approach Based on a literature review, a qualitative phase, and consultation with an expert, eight value scales (efficiency, service quality, play, aesthetics, status, esteem, ethics, and escapism as an adaptation of spirituality) are tested on a sample of 585 hotel customers and are further analyzed with simple and partial correlations, multiple regressions, and structural modelling. Findings Following the literature on the merits of Holbrook’s value typology, results are presented in three concatenated phases: (1) validation of Holbrook’s eight value scales corresponding to his eight value types; (2) interrelationships between these value types showing a predominance of the extrinsic-intrinsic and self-other dimensions; and (3) construction of six indices based on the 222 matrix (self, other, extrinsic, intrinsic, active, and reactive) and a value index as a higher-order representation. The results support Holbrook’s typology, thereby supporting construct validity for the multidimensional scales. Research limitations/implications Implications for further conceptual research on value are presented. Meanwhile, the empirical study is context-specific, related to a hospitality experience. Originality/value Although Holbrook’s typology has gained widespread attention, to the best of the authors’ knowledge, no previous research has tested all eight value types simultaneously in the same empirical work.

Purpose This paper describes the personal history and intellectual development of Morris B. Holbrook (MBH), a participant in the field of marketing academics in general and consumer research in particular. Design/methodology/approach The paper pursues an approach characterized by historical autoethnographic subjective personal introspection or HASPI. Findings The paper reports the personal history of MBH and – via HASPI – interprets various aspects of key participants and major themes that emerged over the course of his career. Research limitations/implications The main implication is that every scholar in the field of marketing pursues a different light, follows a unique path, plays by idiosyncratic rules, and deserves individual attention, consideration, and respect … like a cat that carries its own leash. Originality/value In the case of MBH, like (say) a jazz musician, whatever value he might have depends on his originality.

In recent years, numerous marketing and organizational theorists have called attention to the analogy between jazz and management strategy. From the perspective of this jazz metaphor, key questions concern the implications of jazz training for marketing education. Too often—say, in motion pictures or television dramas—jazz is portrayed as an innocent folk music whose performance requires more feeling than knowledge. This inaccurate stereotype colors the treatment of music instruction found in the film Mr. Holland’s Opus (1995). A contrasting view of jazz as a technically demanding art form appears in the movie Whiplash (2014). These two films also represent diametrically opposed teaching styles—the first nurturing and customer-oriented, the second sadistic and product-oriented. A third motion picture entitled Keep On Keepin’ On (2014) presents a resolution of this dialectic in the form of a marketing-oriented instructor whose method of teaching combines kindness (the customer-oriented thesis) with rigor (the product-oriented antithesis) to achieve a balanced reconciliation (the marketing-oriented synthesis). From this perspective, like jazz training, marketing education is itself embarked on a marketing project that benefits from a rapprochement of customer-oriented and product-oriented impulses to attain a marketing-oriented synthesis. Thus, insights about jazz training become relevant to the challenges of marketing education—as illustrated by various examples from the author’s own experiences.