Can corporate social responsibility effect the decision of buying luxury brands?
Better to provide your input with certain context or region.
CSR helps companies to build a strong reputation and has a positive effect on decision of buying luxury brands. But some studies have shown that the effect could be negative when the company image is associated to "perfection" as Rolex or Lexus.
Corporate Social Responsibility may affect the buying decision of not only luxury brand, but also any brand. Quality, reliability and safety are essential features of any product and manufacturers are responsible for any deficiency. Organizations practicing CSR, will ensure that products are absolutely harmless to the consumer as well as to the society and environment. Recently, in India, one global multinational company's branded food product is under scanner for allegedly containing an ingredient much above the safe limit, which may have long term health hazard. Although the deficiency is under prove, the controversy has lead to significant drop in the sales of the brand.
Dear Mahmoud and Jaharkanti,
Same type of research was conducted on possible effect of CSR on luxury brand buying and it showed positive effect on the buying decision of the customer. Here it is important to know the nature of market where you are focusing. Gulf countries markets are good for luxury brand selling.
Habib
If the context is that of Gulf countries, then you have to take into consideration the impact of culture as a moderator variable. A culture favoring values of help, generosity and solidarity will strengthen the positive influence of CSR on decision of buying luxury brands.
There are three elements in your question that are worth to talk about: (1) "is the CSR effective" - the real question is : "effective in comparison with what.?" PA.Dacin and T.J. Brown in their famous research presented in article The company and the product: Corporate associations and consumer product responses. Journal of Marketing; Jan 1997; 61, 1; pg. 68 confirmed the theory that Corporate Abilities (CA) works better than CSR in context of consumer products, (2) "luxury brands" - it is just a context = another product category in which the CA over CSR theory is to be checked, (3) research method - data generation in investigations carried in context of luxury brands may require to take into consideration so called "transformational communication" that is used to communicate the target positions of luxury brands . RK
PS
It's worth to take into consideration the "fit" ("match up") theory in CSR effecetiveness research. The "fit" theory suggests that when leveraging the product brand image by CSR (or other elements like co-brand, celebrity, country of origin etc) not the CSR project(s) but the fit between CSR projects and product brand explains consumer reactions. One of the most famous and seminal articles that empirically checks the fit theory in context of consumer brands is: Aaker, David A.; Keller, Kevin Lane, Consumer Evaluations Of Brand Extensions
Journal of Marketing; Jan 1990; 54, 1; pg. 27.
Dear Mahmoud, You are right, we have to consider different options and locations separately. Same concept will not applicable in one situation and can be applicable in other situation.
Dear Ryszard, effective interms of leading towards buying decision.
Rodula, it is good idea to look into CRI also to get some support.
Habib
Dear Habib,
You can find some information about this issue in the next links
http://www.luxurylabglobal.com
http://www.wwf.org.uk/deeperluxury/
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