When using luxury brands consumers make a subtle claim that they are special, different and at the very forefront of social trends. Therefore, creating a fit between the social trends and keeping up with them is one of the critical strategic issues for all luxury brands. However, with mass-market brands gradually upgrading their appearance, strategic response and approach to marketing their products, many luxury brands are finding it hard to stay ahead of the peck.

In this scenario, many luxury brands have decided to move beyond their niche and diversify very quickly into other market spaces which the consumer may not associate with the specific luxury brand. The idea of brand extension and at times irrelevant diversification (i.e. moving away from one product category to another one) is particularly delicate issue for luxury brands. This is mainly because of the strong brand origin and brand image associations luxury brands have in consumer minds.

Luxury branding: barbie jewellary

While there are some brands who manage to extend their portfolio without any major issues, many luxury brands find it a massive struggle and therefore should think about such extensions carefully. For example, Prada’s move from shoes to handbags and then into ready-to-wear market worked every time. Same was the case with Gucci. However, it took many years for the first Bulgari watch to become a success. In case of smaller and boutique luxury brands, due to financial and marketing resource limitations, the issue of brand extension looks very lucrative but can become a bottleneck very quickly. For example, in 2005, Mattel decided to create Barbie-themed clothing and accessories and involved fashion designers such as Tarina Tarantino and Anna Sui to interpret Barbie’s wardrobe for grownups. However, this extension was identified as one of the worst extension for the year and so its effects on the involved designers may be felt in long-term. Another example of this is Audi in US market. Audi still struggles to crack the US market as consumers remember those sudden unintended acceleration issues and a series of product recalls associated with it nearly 3 decades ago.

Luxury branding and getting back to basics

In this regards, I would urge luxury brand managers to be highly cautious of brand extension and diversification. There are many other routes suggested by marketing experts which can be taken into account. For example, Ansoff’s Product/Market matrix provides good few insights on what other options can be exploited without diversification.

Figure 1: Ansoff product/market matrix for luxury brands

The image above shows interesting strategies for luxury brands too. In the quadrant 1 where a company wishes to expand itself into its present local market, could focus on various ‘market penetration’ strategies by (a) increasing the frequency of usage; (b) increasing the quantity used and (c) identifying new application of the product. I am sure the options a and b are quite feasible in case of most luxury brands which are used occasionally only by consumers as my research has shown. This in itself can lead to higher market share and stronger customer loyalty.

The quadrant 2 which focuses on developing new products for the current markets does not mean diversification but instead looks at ‘product development’ strategies. In this case, luxury brands can focus on product improvements (highlight them in communications carefully) and line extensions (after careful market research rather than an insiders only brainstorming).

The quadrant 3 focuses on ‘market development’ strategies. In this case, luxury brands should focus on (a) geographic expansion and (b) target new segments. For each of these options, specific strategic initiatives are required. Such as, for geographic expansion, cultural proximity and market understanding are a must. Similarly, when targeting new segments, it would be desirable to identify those peripheral groups which take the current luxury brand consumers as their aspirational leaders.

The quadrant 4 relates to diversification. However, remember this is quadrant 4 of 4 and that means it should really be thought of as one of the last options. If growth has not been possible with the first 3 quadrant a luxury brand should focus on diversification. However, in my own experience, I have seen entrepreneurs/managers focusing this as their first option. While if done carefully it can provide significant benefit, it’s quite risky also as seen in earlier examples.

My aim in this article was to offer some alternative strategies for luxury branding rather than just thinking diversification. Going back to basics can always help any luxury branding effort and I hope it would ignite that thought in you.

Image courtesy: BusinessWeek

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3. Effect of interpersonal influences on luxury consumption: empirical evidence

Interpersonal influences and luxury consumption

In one of my earlier research papers¹, I found that due to the highly social nature of luxury consumption, consumers try to gain social advantage following a desired group’s consumption pattern. Moreover, in my earlier posts relating to interpersonal influences, I have suggested the need for researchers to understand the importance of group effects on luxury consumption. To address this, we embarked on a journey focusing on three specific questions:
(a) Do consumers consume luxury goods with a tendency to conform to others expectations (normative interpersonal influences)?
(b) Are consumers accepting others view as reality when it comes to luxury consumption (informational interpersonal influences)? And
(c) Is this behaviour observed in developed and emerging markets consistently or there are differences between consumers in their susceptibility to interpersonal influences?

Using a sample of British and Indian luxury consumers we answered the questions above. The initial study results revealed that interpersonal influences were significantly influential in both developed and emerging markets. However, as we looked deeper, interesting similarities and differences between consumers emerged.

Significant impact of normative interpersonal influences was observed on luxury purchase intentions across both countries. It also demonstrates that consumers across markets use luxury consumption to build a superior image in the eyes of significant others. This can be attributed to the emergence of global lifestyles in the luxury industry, in which manufacturers and retailers are beginning to standardize their messages across the world. In turn, this creates similarities in terms of consumers’ reference point to consumption. While the impact of normative interpersonal influences on luxury purchase intentions was found to be significant across the countries, through mean difference analysis it was observed that Indian consumers were more susceptible to normative interpersonal influences than British consumers. This reflects the influence of collectivist psyche on consumer purchase intentions. Indian consumers being collectivist in nature increasingly look for fitting-in behaviour and therefore their consumption will be highly dependent on social cues and societal acceptance.

Similarly, Indian consumers were found to be more susceptible to informational interpersonal influences than British consumers. However, a surprising element of this finding was the non-significant relationship in terms of the impact of informational interpersonal influences and luxury purchase intentions among British consumers. The finding suggests that when consuming luxury products, consumers in developed markets, like the UK, do not rely on or accept information from others as evidence of reality. This could be due to three main reasons: increasing individualism due to rising individual and national wealth, easy availability of credit, and access to other objective information sources. In the past three decades, developed countries including the US and the UK have experienced a phenomenal rise in national wealth. Prof. Geert Hofstede associates the increase in individualism with an increase in national wealth. Such an increase can lead to higher levels of individualism among consumers and, in turn, affect how consumers in these markets accumulate informational cues. In addition to increased individualism, consumers are exposed to easy credit availability (i.e., through various financial instruments including loans, credit cards, debit cards and so on) which has created a unique consumption oriented culture. Moreover, numerous technological tools (i.e., dedicated Web sites, blogs, reviews, and other informational tools) help consumers gather information related to luxury products and brands. Many of the dedicated websites and blogs are run by the known experts in the luxury industry. These avenues of relevant objective information help consumers rely less on informational interpersonal influences, which can be highly subjective in nature.

Considering these differences in the two market and cultural contexts, managers associated with luxury products and brands should consider the overall significant impact of interpersonal influences in their strategies carefully.

The findings suggest that the impact of normative interpersonal influences is significant across markets. This result has important managerial implications in terms of strategic campaign building. It offers an opportunity to standardize the campaign across both individualist markets and collectivist markets. Thus, when planning their promotional activities and budgets, luxury marketers working with large luxury corporations or specialist niche players need not vary the proportion of interpersonal and impersonal communication activities and budgets across the two groups.

While normative interpersonal influences provide an opportunity to standardize, the findings pertaining to informational interpersonal influences suggest the need for adaptation. Consumers in collectivist markets rely heavily on informational interpersonal influences, and therefore managers should provide further avenues for consumers to engage in sharing information with others. The power of social networking, which has become a new channel for word of mouth in many developing markets, can be exploited in this case to build a stronger informational interpersonal influence. Conversely, consumers in individualist markets refrain from associating themselves with informational interpersonal influences. Therefore, managers would do better to build campaigns that have little reference to informational interpersonal influences in these markets.

Source:
Shukla, Paurav (2011), “Impact of interpersonal influences, brand origin and brand image on luxury purchase intentions: Measuring interfunctional interactions and a cross-national comparison,” Journal of World Business, 46 (2), Forthcoming.

Footnote:
1.    Shukla, Paurav (2010), “Status Consumption in Cross-national Context: Socio-psychological, Brand and Situational Antecedents,” International Marketing Review, 27 (1), 108-29.

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Effects of luxury brand origin and brand image

In today’s marketplace, many brands use strong brand origin cues in their promotions appeals. This is highly prevalent in the case of luxury brands including behemoths like LVMH and Gucci to specialist luxury players like Patek Phillipe and Bremont, which highlight their luxury brand origin in every promotion. For example, specialist luxury watch maker Baume & Mercier highlights its luxury brand origin within their logo itself. Researchers suggest that in markets such as luxury fashions and accessories, a specific country of origin or foreign image in general may carry a prestige connotation. It has also been observed that luxury brands spend a disproportionate amount of their overall budget on brand image building.

Image via Wikipedia

When looking at the country-of-origin literature, one can see that most of the country-of- origin literature has emphasized origin effects at the product level as opposed to brand level. Professor Keller opines that brand related cues act as a crucial competitive advantage element for luxury brands. Moreover, researchers have increasingly called for measuring the impact of luxury brand origin and brand image on purchase intentions. In one of my earlier papers, I found that due to the highly social nature of luxury consumption, consumers try to gain social advantage by following the desired group’s consumption pattern. Focusing on different facets of the independent self, it can be theorized that consumers will demonstrate fitting in behaviour by using brands which match the image of the group they wish to belong to. Furthermore, researchers have emphasized that brand related cues may provide a key to an improved understanding of luxury consumption. Thus, if consumers use branding cues to create a sense of belonging, it would seem logical to study how such branding cues can influence consumers’ purchase decision.

In recent times, the issue of luxury consumption has received a great deal of interest among marketing scholars. However, little is known about how to optimize the market and manage consumer expectations using management controlled factors such as luxury brand origin and brand image.

To find an answer to the issue of how management controlled factors can be used to optimize consumer expectations, we carried out a study focusing on following two questions:
1.    What is the influence of branding cues (i.e. luxury brand origin and brand image) on purchase intentions?
2.    Is the influence same across developing and emerging markets?

The full study has been published in ‘Journal of World Business’ which is available at (http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.jwb.2010.11.002)

The answer to question one will help researchers and managers in knowing whether the large amount of money luxury brands spend on brand image is worth it or not. Similarly, the answer to question two highlights what kind of standardization and adaptation is required when promoting luxury brands in different markets.

With this goal in mind, we studied consumers from the UK and India using a structured quantitative survey.

Findings relating to luxury brand origin

Prior studies focusing on regularly consumed products have found a greater influence of luxury brand origin on collectivist consumers. However, contradicting results were observed in the context of luxury purchase intentions. The study results suggest that consumers in individualist developed market rely more on luxury brand origin cues than consumers in collectivist, developing markets. This can be attributed to the nature of the market and competition. British consumers have been exposed to the process of globalization for a longer period than their Indian counterparts. While the elite in the Indian market were as aware and consuming global luxury brands as their developed country counterparts, the masses were not. Furthermore, global luxury brands entered various developing markets including India in the late 1990s and early 2000s. For example, LVMH entered India through a joint venture in 2003, and Armani arrived in India only in mid-2007. The longer exposure of the masses to global luxury products, availability of more brands, and greater competition make British consumers increasingly aware of the luxury brand origin cues associated with the luxury products or brands. Therefore, to differentiate themselves, British consumers use stronger luxury brand origin cues than Indian consumers who only recently have been exposed to global luxury brands in their home markets.

The finding relating to brand image is worthy of attention. The study findings revealed that brand image does not influence consumer purchase intentions directly however it significantly moderates the relationship between normative interpersonal influences and luxury purchase intentions in both countries. This finding gives empirical support to the theorized argument put forward earlier regarding fitting in behaviour and the influence of brand image. The study shows that consumers demonstrate higher self-brand connection when the brand image is consistent with the image of the social group they wish to associate with. Brand image was also found to be an influential moderator for the relationship between informational interpersonal influences and luxury purchase intentions. However, this was only significant in the context of the UK. This finding corroborates the earlier result regarding the use of strong brand cues among the British consumers. It again highlights the importance of brand building.

Managers vying for acceptance of their luxury brands in developed markets like the UK should focus on developing a campaign that highlights the luxury brand origin prominently. The findings highlight the interesting contrasts in consumer behaviour across nations. Indian consumers are highly focused on social acceptability and look for others views of reality to fit in. On the other hand, British consumers associate with a favourable luxury brand origin to fit in. Luxury brand managers need to be aware of consumers’ limited awareness and understanding of luxury brands in developing markets (due to less exposure). Therefore, it may be necessary to opt for meaningful co-branding and joint ventures in such markets to achieve a greater prominence of their brands in consumers’ minds which in turn will build strong loyalty and equity in these markets.

Overall, the findings also highlight a unique contextual association of luxury. Prior researchers observed the importance of luxury brand origin and image in the case of Indian consumers’ consumption decisions for regularly purchase products however, contradicting findings of this study suggest that luxury as a context is quite unique. Therefore, managers should approach generalized findings relating to regularly purchased products with caution when considering it in the context of luxury consumption.

To read the full technical paper with detailed explanations please follow:

Shukla (2011), Impact of interpersonal influences, brand origin and brand image on luxury purchase intentions: Measuring interfunctional interactions and a cross-national comparison, Journal of World Business, (http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.jwb.2010.11.002).

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We are happy to announce a special issue of ‘Asia Pacific Journal of Marketing and Logistics’ on ‘Emerging Trends for Marketing in Asia’ guest edited by Prof. Kim-Shyan Fam, Prof. Ernest de Run and me.

Asia is a continent of paradoxes. It has some of the fastest growing economies of the world, the largest populace, and some of the wealthiest as well as the poorest societies in the world. It also possesses rich web of cultural complexities. Since the days of the Silk Route, Asia has always fascinated historians, merchants, philosophers and rulers from other parts of the world. Recently however, increasing household income, higher education and an expanding mid-to-high income class with smaller families, globalization, westernization influences and plus the loosening of regulations on foreign direct and indirect investments by most Asian governments have spurred the influx of global businesses into the Asian market. This creates an interesting situation in Asia in the realm of business. Contradiction abounds, from that of a traditional business marketing effort such as relationship marketing to the specialized mass marketing of mega businesses.

Given this growing attractiveness of the Asian region, we invite submission to a special issue of the Asia Pacific Journal of Marketing & Logistics focusing on Emerging Trends for Marketing in Asia. We encourage papers both theoretical and empirical using either qualitative or quantitative methodology.

We welcome the submission of papers that address the Special Issue theme as well as all functional areas of marketing. Authors may consider any of the subject areas listed below, but need not limit their options to these areas. If you are uncertain whether your paper fits the Special Issue theme or not, please contact the guest editors:

• Agricultural Marketing
• B2B, CRM and Relationship Marketing
• Branding for Services
• Consumer Marketing
• Country of Origin effects in International Marketing
• Cross-Cultural Marketing
• E-Marketing
• Environmental Marketing
• Market Orientation
• Marketing in Transition Economies
• Marketing Innovations
• Marketing of Education
• Mobile Marketing
• Marketing Communications
• Marketing Strategy
• Retail Marketing
• Sales and Sales Management
• Sales Promotion and Sponsorships
• Service Quality Excellence
• Services Marketing
• Social Marketing
• Strategic Marketing Management
• Supply Chain Management

Accepted papers will be published in Volume 24 Issue #2, 2012. Papers must conform to the Asia Pacific Journal of Marketing & Logistics requirements. Please send your submissions by email to either one of the guest editors by March 01, 2011.

APJML: Download the PDF version of call for paper.

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1. 2012 IMRA Emerging Markets Conference in London

This is a module for the MSc Marketing students.

The present day strategic orientation to marketing has evolved through multiple stages and it calls for using systems and methods, which can enhance the responsiveness of the firm to its stakeholders. The crux of effective marketing action is contingent upon continuous and real-time planning, analysis, implementation and control. The hallmark of strategic marketing, therefore, is proactive and future oriented strategic stance. This module attempts to sensitize participants towards the proactive thinking, dynamism and action orientation of strategic marketing. It will provide insights into the models and methods employed by organizations worldwide to generate sustainable competitive advantage. This module examines key theories within the field of marketing management.  Issues such as analyzing marketing opportunities, developing marketing strategies, enhancing marketing decision making process, managing and delivering marketing programmes will be analyzed from various organizational perspectives.

All the module related information can be found in the document links below.

Module content

Course outline

Assignment brief

Sessions

Marketing objectives and strategy: The customer led business

Segmentation, targeting and positioning

Strategic marketing planning

Market dynamics and competitive strategy

Product and brand strategy

Pricing strategy and policy

Communications strategy

Managing marketing channels

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Recently, I came across an article which focused on “15 reasons [why] luxury brands must be on twitter”¹. When I started reading those 15 reasons, it got me a bit worried. I was unsure as to if any of those reasons really had a merit for a luxury brand. Like most academics, when I read lists like these, I generally tend to do what academics do first. Research – to find out the scientific basis for such list.

Funny enough I came across a recent study carried out by an analytics company in the US, called Pear Analytics². The study was conducted by looking at the content of 2,000 randomly sampled twitter messages from the public stream of Twitter. The analyst then separated these messages into six buckets: (a) news; (b) spam; (c) self-promotion; (d) pointless babble; (e) conversational and (f) pass-along value.

The striking result of this study was that more than 40% of the total twitter posts were put in the category ‘pointless-babble’. Furthermore, some of the top 15 reasons mentioned above suggest the use of twitter for (a) news and (b) self-promotion. However, these two put together had not even a double-digit share of the twits (News – 3.60% and Self-promotion – 5.85%).

The study also revealed some other striking stats which have not been captured in mass-media. For example, 1 percent of the addicts contribute 35% of the total visit to twitter and 72% are just passers-by. These 1% consumers must be those extremely tech-savvy people I believe.

Another report by Gizmodo (one of the highly ranked tech-site) mapped twitter users by asking if only 100 people were on twitter how would it look like.³ It had similar results which demonstrated that there would be 5 loud-mouths in these 100, but more than 50 people would be lazy (not twitting even once a week and therefore hardly visiting) and 20 dead (with empty account). A report from TechCrunch (another highly regarded tech-site), also suggested that facebook has 12X the number of ‘addicts’ compared to twitter and stumbleupon can drive more traffic to your website than twitter.⁴

No doubt twitter is being talked about everywhere, however in light of the above evidence, is it really a place luxury brand or any brand other than technology brands should be?

I wanted to answer this question from a different perspective. This brought me back to some of my earlier posts regarding ‘what is luxury?’ and ‘importance of luxury value perceptions’. Luxury is an intricate web of emotions and can it be captured in 140 characters (and that too with a shortened link of some sort if the company is trying to drive some traffic to a specific webpage or website). Secondly, with 40% babble around the message what value will that message generate and what are the chances that it will stand out? Third, what are the chances that the real consumers will read it and take actions on the basis of these? With all due respect to the original author of the above mentioned 15 reasons, I beg to differ significantly and following are the reasons why I do so.

Looking at the 15 reasons posed by the author, I thought:

1. Will a company be able to convey that it is a dynamic, forward-thinking brand by being on twitter? Or will it be able to convey this by actually innovating and getting promoted by the people who are in the know?
2. Are luxury consumers really on twitter?
3. Have luxury companies made fun of their competitors in any sort of media? Differentiation and uniqueness is what drives luxury, isn’t it?
4. Do Gucci, Hermes, LVMH really need to be found? Hermes’ quarterly profit as announced today has risen by 55%.⁵
5. Are the patricians and parvenu really on twitter? If not, does a brand need to show its supreme desire is to serve these premium clients and customers?
6. With 40% of the twits being pointless babble does a brand need to leverage the massive momentum Twitter has garnered from offline media?
7. After decades of research behind us we are still not very close to understanding the “know, like, trust” reasons behind buying decisions? Will twitter really reveal that for us?
8. With luxury brands having strong signals associated with them, do they need to provide clients and prospects with the kinds of valuable tips and information that could come back to you in the form of more business and good will?
9. Looking at all of the above, will a brand be able to expand its value using twitter?
10. While most luxury brands are struggling to create a web-presence how relevant and manageable will special and time-sensitive offers be?
11. Will any brand really be able to offer useful information via twitter?
12. Will any brand manager be able to respond quickly to any customer care-related questions and issues that may have been aired publicly in a seemingly innocuous tweet or blog post? And doing so quickly may have its own kind of repercussions, isn’t it?
13. Can a brand really give those unfamiliar with the brand a small, delightful taste of what it is by using twitter?
14. Else than a quirky message (which most luxury brands avoid) how one can express the entangled web of o expressions on twitter?
15. Will a brand be able “to stay ahead of the curve” using twitter? Really?

Presently, I see twitter as more of a sensationalization tool, rather than a brand-building tool. It would be good for those brands which are sensation-seeking for sure. However, when your clientèle happens to be patricians and parvenus, do you really wish to focus on sensation-seeking of signalling? Probably in future this situation may change but as of now, the question remains on should luxury brands or for that matter any brand (other than tech brands) be using twitter?

While writing this post, my twitter client suggests that (with the 795 people I am following) I have already got more than 393 twits pending to be read if I refresh and instead of reading them, I have closed the client. Your message was lost if it was among them.

References:

1. The list of 15 items can be found here.

2. The full Pear analytics whitepaper can be downloaded from here.

3. The Gizmodo report is available here.

4. TechCrunch report can be found here.

5. Bloomburg on Hermes results.

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3. Effect of interpersonal influences on luxury consumption: empirical evidence

In some of my earlier posts, I have stated that there are two simultaneous paradoxical needs among us consumers with regard to consumption namely, (a) to conform and (b) to demonstrate uniqueness. In sociology and psychology this has led to creation of various terms such as fitting in or standing out, in-group vs. out-group behaviour, associative vs. dissociative group behaviour. All these can be of great help in segmenting consumers.

Segmentation as an idea seems to have cropped up from political ideology of ‘divide and rule’ and it still seems to work in most contexts. In this article, I wish to focus on segmenting luxury brand consumers. Recently, I came across an article in Journal of Marketing focusing on status signalling behaviour among consumers. The article is interesting as it looks at how subtle signals can enhance and trigger consumer consumption decisions.

The authors coin four segments of consumers using the famous four P idea of marketing. They segment the luxury consumers into 4 segments namely: patricians, parvenu, poseurs and proletarians.

The definition of each segment is as follows:
1.Patricians are super-rich who pay a premium for inconspicuously branded products. They do not look for explicit signalling but largely focus on subtlety.
2.Parvenus are probably the nouveau rich who have suddenly amassed big futures and are trying show they have arrived. They love explicit signalling.
3.Poseurs are fakers. They buy fake goods to demonstrate their affinity to the above two groups. They would also use explicit signalling.
4.Proletarians are the left outs in socio-economic status. They do not buy luxury goods and do not signal either.

Attached below is the model provided by the authors in their Journal of Marketing Article.

Source: Han, Y. J., J. C. Nunes, and X. Drèze “Signaling Status with Luxury Goods: The Role of Brand Prominence,” Journal of Marketing, 74 (4), 15-30.

While the segmentation looks really interesting, the question which arises is how can managers actually use this in the marketplace?

For example, can a consumer be a patrician and parvenu at the same time? For example, what if the consumer is actually using a Hermis Berkin (discreet signalling) bag with Christian Laboutin shoes (explicit signalling)? Similarly, can a consumer be a patrician and poseur at the same time. For example, a consumer may use a Seville Row tailored suit with a fake Mont Blanc. What need to be understood is that there are no water-tight compartments when segmenting luxury consumers. Certainly, there will be consumers who will belong to only one category however, that segment may not be the largest segment for any luxury brand.

I believe that meaning luxury segmentation will incorporate situation specificity. I have found strong influence of situation on most consumers’ luxury consumption and therefore that pertinent question of “for what occasion do you wish to use this luxury brand for” can be one of the most important questions segmenting luxury consumers. What do you think?

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For those of you who are researching the Asian economies, this is an interesting chance to participate in the debate. The ‘Marketing in Asia Group’ (MAG) is organizing the 2011 MAG Scholar Conference in Christchurch, New Zealand.

MAG consists of more than 400 researchers from all over the world and this conference will be a good chance for others to get in touch as well as join the network.

I am chairing the track ‘cross-cultural marketing’ and if you are working on cross-cultural issues, will be more than happy to hear from you.

The call for papers is attached herewith.

2001 MAG Scholar Conference Call for Papers

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When joining the ‘luxury society’ group, one of the interesting questions they asked was to provide your own definition of luxury.

My response to that was “luxury is a state of mind. It is about how you carry yourself and fulfil yours as well as others desires”.

My idea focused on the issue of luxury from the perspective of self and others. One does not consumer luxury for just oneself but it is very much socially oriented consumption. For example, why do wear the best suit (dress) when going for an important meeting or interview? Why do we make sure that we do not use a cheap perfume when going on a date? The aspect of self-indulgence is intertwined with the socially directed motives when it comes to luxury.

However, the questions asked at luxury society really made me think about how we define luxury.

The concept of luxury has been present in various forms since the beginning of civilization. Its role was just as important in ancient western and eastern empires as it is in modern societies. With the clear differences between social classes in earlier civilizations, the consumption of luxury was limited to the elite classes. It also meant the definition of luxury was fairly clear. Whatever the poor cannot have and the elite can was identified as luxury.

With increasing ‘democratization’, several new product categories were created within the luxury market which were aptly called – accessible luxury OR masstige luxury. This kind of luxury specifically targeted the middle class (or what is sometimes termed as aspiring class). As luxury penetrated into the masses, defining luxury has become ever so difficult.

In contemporary marketing usage, Prof. Bernard Dubois defines ‘luxury’ as a specific (i.e. higher-priced) tier of offer in almost any product or service category. However, despite the substantial body of knowledge accumulated during the past decades, researchers still haven’t arrived on a common definition of luxury.

While the word ‘luxury’ is used in daily lives to refer to certain lifestyle, the underlying construct’s definition is consumer and situation specific. If you earn less than $ a day, an ice-cream would be a really big luxury item for you. On the other hand, if you are going to a party with some big-wigs a $100,000 car may not be a luxury. The word luxury originates from the Latin term “luxus” signifying, “soft or extravagant living, indulgence, sumptuousness or opulence”. However, luxury is quite slippery term to define because of the strong involvement of human element and value recognition from others.

Many other attempts have been made to define luxury using the price-quality dimension stating higher priced products in any category is luxury. Similarly, researchers have used the uniqueness aspects of luxury too. However, with increasing quality orientation from lower end brands and massicification of luxury, it is hard to use either of the above dimensions to define luxury.

Prof. Jean-Noel Kapferer, takes an experiential approach and defines luxury as items which provide extra pleasure by flattering all sense at ones. Several other researchers, focus on exclusivity dimension and argue that luxury evokes a sense of belonging to a certain elite group. However, having an LVMH hang bag in central districts of any big city across the world, won’t make you feel that way. Rather in one of the earlier posts when I asked the question ‘if others can have it, is it luxury?’ consumers responded clearly saying that LVMH and Gucci are losing their lustre by the day in their minds.

The discussion above highlights the extremely subjective and multidimensional nature of the luxury construct. The attempts very much define a dimension of luxury such as high price, high quality, uniqueness, exclusivity etc.

However, it is still unclear ‘What is Luxury?’

So what do you think is luxury?

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Recently, I was re-reading the book ‘luxury brand management’ wherein the authors – Chevalier and Mazzalovo – suggest three criteria to classify a luxury item: (a) strong artistic content; (b) unique craftsmanship and (c) international reputation.

While I agree that the artistic content and craftsmanship is what differentiates most luxury product and brands from non-luxury, I somehow struggled with the idea of ‘internationalization’. The authors argue using an interesting point that a significant part of luxury brand’s business relies on consumers who are far from home country. This means that the other consumers in different markets must also realise the brand to be a luxury. This classification point of

Patola from Patan

internationalization misses on two fronts I guess. One, it creates the problem of massification (I have dealt with this issue in two of my earlier posts ‘Massification of Luxury: the Chinese Invasion’ and ‘If most people can have it, is it Luxury’. Secondly, it omits completely the local dimension of luxury. In this post, I wish to focus on the ‘local dimension of luxury’.

To put simply, I define ‘local luxury’ as a luxury product and/or brand which is not internationalised at all however, has a significantly strong association with luxury in its local (regional) catchment area. Examples of such luxuries can be found throughout the world wherein generations of craftsman have been producing luxury.  One striking example is such in an emerging market like India would be the Patola (a kind of a sari wore by woman across the Indian sub-continent) from Patan (http://www.patanpatola.com/).

Among Gujaratis (i.e. people from the state of Gujarat in the Western Zone of India with a population of approximately 50 million or more) patola is something legendary. The popularity of it in the luxury local circles is such that the order book has got a seriously lengthy weighting list. The amazing quality of the Bandhani (the finished textile product) has its origins in a very complex and tricky technique of ‘tie dyeing’ or ‘knot dyeing’ known as “Bandhani Process” on the warp & weft separately before weaving. There is only one family in the city of Patan (in the North Gujarat) which has been producing this quality product for the last ‘seven centuries’.

It is hardly international but it’s clearly a luxury. Every patola is unique in its design (none two are similar) and to do that for 700 years itself is mind-blowing. Moreover, the artistic content and unique craftsmanship is remarkable.  A patola costs probably 100 times or more in comparison to a normal sari.

Similarly, the chocolaterie in Brighton, UK called Choccywoccydoodah (http://www.choccywoccydoodah.com/) for the last 3 generations, has been producing amazingly creative chocolate one-off sculptured fantasies, bespoke wedding cakes and other items from chocolate. While it being a food item, one can imagine it will have a strong local dimension but there is nothing stopping it from becoming ‘international’. Paul from France has been international for quite long while.

I believe, the generic criteria of internationalization in this sense would hardly be able to capture such amazingly beautiful and exceptional artistry and craftsmanship. I am sure such unique examples would be present across the world wherein the luxury brand has got such a strong local dimension and hardly any international presence.

The major point I wish to make here is that in continuously focusing on the ‘international brands’ in our luxury debate, we are mostly missing out on some other substantial dimensions of luxury.

I would really like to learn from you all readers about your own experiences of such unique luxury brands which are hardly international but have got a very strong local dimension. Please share.

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