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Keywords Self esteem, Consumption, Product image, Fashion industry
Abstract Self-esteem is an important motivational drive for consumption involving both the acceptance and rejection/avoidance of symbolic goods. This paper examines the relationship between self-esteem and the rejection of goods and brands within the context of fashion consumption by young professionals. A conceptualisation which accounts for consumers' use of various strategies in their efforts to maintain or enhance their self-esteem is suggested. A small-scale exploratory study is used to examine first, how consumers invest products and brands with negative symbolic meanings; and second, how this leads consumers to reject products and brands. The importance of understanding negative symbolic consumption when marketing high involvement products such as fashion goods is identified; and the implications for fashion retailers and marketing management are discussed.
Introduction
This paper explores the means by which young adult consumers use the negative symbolic meanings invested in fashion products as a key to identity negotiation. We investigate consumers' need to balance autonomy and affiliation in their choices of fashion, a market where consumers are defined as much by what they choose to reject as by what they actively purchase and display. The pursuit of self-esteem is recognised by marketing managers as one of the most important motivational drivers of consumer behaviour and decision-making, and, therefore, consumers' decisions are regularly made within the context of enhancing or protecting self-esteem, in recognition of the value of the self (Grubb and Grathwohl, 1967). Consumers often decide whether to accept or reject products and brands on the basis of their symbolic (as opposed to the functional) attributes, investing items with either positive or negative symbolic meanings. Despite considerable research into understanding how individuals maintain or enhance their self-esteem by consuming the symbolic meanings of products and brands, rather less attention has been directed towards understanding why consumers reject products or brands for symbolic reasons (i.e. negative symbolic consumption) to protect their self-esteem. One reason for this is that negative symbolic consumption leaves very few traces (WiIk, 1995, 1997). However, understanding why consumers reject products and brands is of central concern to marketing managers.
Literature review
The literature review focuses on symbolic consumption; self-concept; self-esteem; image congruency (Grubb and Grathwohl, 1967); and self-discrepancy theory (Higgins et al, 1994) incorporating...