Question

1. List and briefly characterize four types of relationships a person might have with a product. Provide examples to illustrate each, according to Salomon. Book: Consumer Behaviour, Michael R. Solomon

Answer 1

Here are some of the types of relationship a person may have with a product:

● Self-concept attachment – the product helps to establish the user’s identity.

● Nostalgic attachment – the product serves as a link with a past self.

● Interdependence – the product is a part of the user’s daily routine.

● Love – the product elicits bonds of warmth, passion or other strong emotion.

One American consumer researcher has developed a classification scheme in an attempt to explore the different ways that products and experiences can provide meaning to people. This consumption typology was derived from a two-year analysis of supporters of a baseball team, but it is easily transferable to the European context. This perspective views consumption as a type of action in which people make use of consumption objects in a variety of ways. Focusing on an event such as a football match is a useful reminder that when we refer to consumption, we are talking about intangible experiences, ideas and services (the thrill of a goal or the antics of a team mascot) in addition to tangible objects (like the food and drink consumed at the stadium). This analysis identified four distinct types of consumption activities:

1. Consuming as experience – when the consumption is a personal emotional or aesthetic goal in itself. This would include activities like the pleasure derived from learning how to interpret the offside rule, or appreciating the athletic ability of a favourite player.

2 Consuming as integration – using and manipulating consumption objects to express aspects of the self. For example, some fans express their solidarity with the team by identifying with, say, the mascot and adopting some of its characteristic traits. Attending matches in person rather than watching them on TV allows the fan to integrate his or her experience more completely with his/her self – the feeling of ‘having been there’.

3 Consuming as classification – the activities that consumers engage in to communicate their association with objects, both to self and to others. For example, spectators might dress up in the team’s colours and buy souvenirs to demonstrate to others that they are diehard fans. Unfortunately, the more hard core express their contempt for opponents’ supporters violently. There is a profound ‘us’ and ‘them’ dichotomy present here.

4 Consuming as play – consumers use objects to participate in a mutual experience and merge their identities with that of a group. For example, happy fans might scream in unison and engage in an orgy of jumping and hugging when their team scores a goal – this is a different dimension of shared experience compared with watching the game at home.