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An executive summary for managers and executive readers can be found at the end of this issue.
Introduction
In an era of omnipresent marketing messages for a bewildering number of competing options, a brand must find a way to create a connection with the consumer that leads to loyalty. One way that successful brands build and maintain a positive relationship with consumers is through establishing a favorable brand image (Keller, 1993). Brand image is defined as perceptions that consumers associate with a particular brand (Keller, 1993). The brand image of a fashion product is particularly important to consumers because they use its rich symbolic meaning to express self-identity (Bearden and Etzel, 1982; Escalas and Bettman, 2005). Consumers are likely to purchase fashion brands that assist them in creating the image they desire (Escalas and Bettman, 2005). Fashion entails the adoption of a new style by consumers (Solomon, 2012), and fashion-related brands depend heavily on the distinctive yet continually evolving elements of style, such as printed patterns on fabric or shades of color in cosmetics, to drive consumer demand. Thus, fashion-related brands include not only apparel and footwear products but also products such as cosmetics and jewelry. For instance, standalone cosmetic brands, such as Bobbi Brown or Clinique, can be considered fashion-related brands because the distinctiveness and evolving nature of their style/design elements (e.g. color, fragrance blends) are used to entice customers back each season.
Research has supported that a positive brand image elevates brand loyalty, positive word of mouth, purchase intentions and consumers' willingness to pay a premium price (Esch et al. , 2006; Ismail and Spinelli, 2012; Keller, 1993; Kim et al. , 2009), which contribute to building brand equity. Consumer-based brand equity is the overall strength of a brand, which can be established by consumers' favorable, strong and unique associations with a brand and their positive responses to the brand (Keller, 1993, 2001). Fourteen fashion-related brands (i.e. appearance-related products that depend heavily on style trends), including luxury, cosmetics and sportswear brands (e.g. Gap, Gucci, H & M, L'Oreal, Louis Vuitton, Nike, Ralph Lauren and Zara), were listed among the global top 100 based on their level of brand equity ( Interbrand.com , 2014). This illustrates that building a favorable brand image is...