Consumers’ interplays between solidity and liquidity in life: Insights from tattoo consumption

Chloe Steadman, Emma Banister and Dominic Medway

Journal of Business Research, 2023, vol. 164, issue C

Abstract: This paper builds on growing research in marketing around liquid consumption. Drawing on 31 biographical-style interviews with 18 tattoo consumers, we reveal how individuals’ interplays between ‘solidity’ and ‘liquidity’ experienced in life–from homelessness to heartbreak–can be navigated and represented through tattoo consumption practices. Given much liquid consumption research is conceptual, a key contribution lies in providing detailed empirical insights into how consumers negotiate perceived solidity and liquidity at the scale of their wider lived experiences through consumption practices. In doing so, the paper moves beyond understandings of a linear shift from solidity to more liquid experiences—or vice versa—by revealing consumers’ dynamic negotiations between the two. Our findings also unsettle the typical conceptualisation of tattoos as a solid marketplace offering by demonstrating how tattoos can also encompass more liquid features. Finally, implications for businesses and marketers operating within liquid consumer society are provided.

Keywords: Consumer culture; Liquid consumption; Liquid modernity; Solid; Tattoos; The body (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2023
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations:

Downloads: (external link)
http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0148296323003260
Full text for ScienceDirect subscribers only

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:eee:jbrese:v:164:y:2023:i:c:s0148296323003260

DOI: 10.1016/j.jbusres.2023.113968

Access Statistics for this article

Journal of Business Research is currently edited by A. G. Woodside

More articles in Journal of Business Research from Elsevier
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Catherine Liu ().