Alliances Between Corporate and Fair Trade Brands: Examining the Antecedents of Overall Evaluation of the Co-branded Product

Sylvain Sénéchal, Laurent Georges () and Jean Louis Pernin ()
Additional contact information
Sylvain Sénéchal: TBS - Toulouse Business School, IUT de Tarbes - UT3 - Université Toulouse III - Paul Sabatier - UT - Université de Toulouse, LGCO - Laboratoire Gouvernance et Contrôle Organisationnel - UT3 - Université Toulouse III - Paul Sabatier - UT - Université de Toulouse
Laurent Georges: LGCO - Laboratoire Gouvernance et Contrôle Organisationnel - UT3 - Université Toulouse III - Paul Sabatier - UT - Université de Toulouse, IUT de Tarbes - UT3 - Université Toulouse III - Paul Sabatier - UT - Université de Toulouse
Jean Louis Pernin: IUT de Tarbes - UT3 - Université Toulouse III - Paul Sabatier - UT - Université de Toulouse, LERASS - Laboratoire d'Etudes et de Recherches Appliquées en Sciences Sociales - UPVM - Université Paul-Valéry - Montpellier 3 - UT2J - Université Toulouse - Jean Jaurès - UT - Université de Toulouse - UT3 - Université Toulouse III - Paul Sabatier - UT - Université de Toulouse

Post-Print from HAL

Abstract: This research investigates the potential for a ‘‘fair'' co-branding operation. A major corporate brand is fictitiously allied with a Fair Trade labelling organization brand. The sample for the study is composed of 540 respondents, representative of the French population. By considering commercial brands and Fair Trade labels as dissimilar in terms of customers' perceived Fair Trade orientations, this article studies (1) how this lack of similarity impacts perceived congruence between both entities (i.e. perceived relevancy and expectancy of the alliance) and how prior brand attitudes and congruence influence customers' evaluation of the co-branded product. The results of this research demonstrate that: Consumer prior brand attitudes toward the partner brands influence very little customers' evaluation. (2) Perceived similarity of the partner brands has a strong influence toward congruence of the co-branding operation. Results also indicate that congruence (measured as relevancy and expectancy) has a strong influence upon customers' evaluation. An inverted U-shaped relationship exists between perceived similarity and relevancy of the alliance, and between expectancy and customers' evaluation. The results obtained through the test of a partial least square model, and inverted U-shaped hypothesis, represent a new insight into co-branding theory. The high discursive power of fair co-branding is a key issue: the corporate brand provides the alliance with its leading position, while the Fair Trade brand provides the ethical attribute.

Keywords: Co-branding; Congruence; Curvilinear relationships; Fair Trade; France; PLS analysis (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2013-09-10
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations:

Published in Journal of Business Ethics, 2013, 124 (3), pp.365-381. ⟨10.1007/s10551-013-1875-z⟩

There are no downloads for this item, see the EconPapers FAQ for hints about obtaining it.

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:hal:journl:hal-04017383

DOI: 10.1007/s10551-013-1875-z

Access Statistics for this paper

More papers in Post-Print from HAL
Bibliographic data for series maintained by CCSD ().