To rent, or not to rent?
(2017) BUSN39 20181Department of Business Administration
- Abstract
- New and innovative retail models such as product-service-systems (PSS) seem to offer a promising solution for more sustainable shopping activities. However, the adoption rate of PSS remains to date regretfully low. With the aim to investigate this problem, the present thesis focuses on the rental fashion model of use-oriented PSS and examines emotions that consumers experience in this context, whereby the detection of emotional ambivalence and coping strategies to handle emotions constitute the focal point of the research interest. For this purpose an explorative study with an inductive character was conducted. The qualitative data was gathered throughout three focus groups and nine in-depth semi-structured interviews. In order to gain... (More)
- New and innovative retail models such as product-service-systems (PSS) seem to offer a promising solution for more sustainable shopping activities. However, the adoption rate of PSS remains to date regretfully low. With the aim to investigate this problem, the present thesis focuses on the rental fashion model of use-oriented PSS and examines emotions that consumers experience in this context, whereby the detection of emotional ambivalence and coping strategies to handle emotions constitute the focal point of the research interest. For this purpose an explorative study with an inductive character was conducted. The qualitative data was gathered throughout three focus groups and nine in-depth semi-structured interviews. In order to gain insights from different perspectives, both users and non-users of the model were interviewed on the matter. The findings revealed an existence of a variety of positive and negative emotions experienced with regards to the fashion rental model and confirmed an existence of mixed emotions in this context. Among positive emotions are excitement about access and variety, instrumental satisfaction felt from saving money or joyful elation of dressing up. The negative emotions evolve around scepticism, caution and fear of damaging the rented apparel, worries that the service would not work, or fear of social judgement, among others. From the identified emotions three main areas of conflict were detected, all of which have the positively perceived dimension of self-interest on the one side and (1) scepticism and fear of the unknown, (2) shame and fear of social judgement, and (3) worries connected to continuous risks, on the other side of the conflict. Finally, the findings disclosed that different coping strategies are utilized to handle positive and negative emotions. To enhance positive emotions consumers tend to share their experiences with others and repeat the rental experience. Contrarily, to overcome negative emotions strategies such as searching for additional information, protecting the rented garments, omitting the truth or justifying one’s rental decision were applied. This study contributes to the existing literature on PSS and sustainable consumption models. It further provides managerial implications for fashion rental service providers who can address and mitigate detected ambivalent feelings of consumers with concrete marketing tools. (Less)
Please use this url to cite or link to this publication:
http://lup.lub.lu.se/student-papers/record/8944609
- author
- Nikolai, Soh-Pih LU and Zonina, Anna LU
- supervisor
-
- Ulf Elg LU
- organization
- alternative title
- Exploring Consumer Ambivalence and Mixed Emotions in Rental Models for Fashion
- course
- BUSN39 20181
- year
- 2017
- type
- H1 - Master's Degree (One Year)
- subject
- keywords
- clothing product-service-systems, fashion rental model, consumer emotions, consumer ambivalence, coping strategies
- language
- English
- id
- 8944609
- date added to LUP
- 2018-06-28 14:39:09
- date last changed
- 2018-06-28 14:39:09
@misc{8944609,
abstract = {{New and innovative retail models such as product-service-systems (PSS) seem to offer a promising solution for more sustainable shopping activities. However, the adoption rate of PSS remains to date regretfully low. With the aim to investigate this problem, the present thesis focuses on the rental fashion model of use-oriented PSS and examines emotions that consumers experience in this context, whereby the detection of emotional ambivalence and coping strategies to handle emotions constitute the focal point of the research interest. For this purpose an explorative study with an inductive character was conducted. The qualitative data was gathered throughout three focus groups and nine in-depth semi-structured interviews. In order to gain insights from different perspectives, both users and non-users of the model were interviewed on the matter. The findings revealed an existence of a variety of positive and negative emotions experienced with regards to the fashion rental model and confirmed an existence of mixed emotions in this context. Among positive emotions are excitement about access and variety, instrumental satisfaction felt from saving money or joyful elation of dressing up. The negative emotions evolve around scepticism, caution and fear of damaging the rented apparel, worries that the service would not work, or fear of social judgement, among others. From the identified emotions three main areas of conflict were detected, all of which have the positively perceived dimension of self-interest on the one side and (1) scepticism and fear of the unknown, (2) shame and fear of social judgement, and (3) worries connected to continuous risks, on the other side of the conflict. Finally, the findings disclosed that different coping strategies are utilized to handle positive and negative emotions. To enhance positive emotions consumers tend to share their experiences with others and repeat the rental experience. Contrarily, to overcome negative emotions strategies such as searching for additional information, protecting the rented garments, omitting the truth or justifying one’s rental decision were applied. This study contributes to the existing literature on PSS and sustainable consumption models. It further provides managerial implications for fashion rental service providers who can address and mitigate detected ambivalent feelings of consumers with concrete marketing tools.}},
author = {{Nikolai, Soh-Pih and Zonina, Anna}},
language = {{eng}},
note = {{Student Paper}},
title = {{To rent, or not to rent?}},
year = {{2017}},
}