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Ritualized retail events and brand-centric employee culture

Ritualized retail events and brand-centric employee culture PurposeThis study aims to explore how the ideal employee effects of internal marketing are created and sustained. It aims to reveal the role that outbound marketing activities play in the reproduction of a brand-centric employee culture.Design/methodology/approachFrom an organizational ritual perspective, this study conducts a qualitative study of a Chinese department store’s anniversary celebration, which is a multi-day annual sales event. Data were collected through in-depth interviews, supplemented with corporate documents and field observation.FindingsThis study reveals that the focal event remains a success because the well-managed coordination of its onstage and backstage activities serves to reproduce an employee culture of espousing and voluntarily enacting corporately mandated role norms, values and beliefs.Practical implicationsFor the management of retail events with the aim of building organizational culture, this study points to the importance of emphasizing the symbolism of the sales promotion aspects of an event and paying as much attention to employees’ backstage experiences as to the public execution of a consumer event.Originality/valueThis study shows that external marketing could set the stage for internal marketing, with the ideal effects of internal marketing actually constructed and institutionalized during activities and procedures comprising outbound marketing. This suggests that a more nuanced view of the practice of internal marketing is warranted. http://www.deepdyve.com/assets/images/DeepDyve-Logo-lg.png Qualitative Market Research: An International Journal Emerald Publishing

Ritualized retail events and brand-centric employee culture

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Publisher
Emerald Publishing
Copyright
Copyright © Emerald Group Publishing Limited
ISSN
1352-2752
DOI
10.1108/QMR-11-2016-0104
Publisher site
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Abstract

PurposeThis study aims to explore how the ideal employee effects of internal marketing are created and sustained. It aims to reveal the role that outbound marketing activities play in the reproduction of a brand-centric employee culture.Design/methodology/approachFrom an organizational ritual perspective, this study conducts a qualitative study of a Chinese department store’s anniversary celebration, which is a multi-day annual sales event. Data were collected through in-depth interviews, supplemented with corporate documents and field observation.FindingsThis study reveals that the focal event remains a success because the well-managed coordination of its onstage and backstage activities serves to reproduce an employee culture of espousing and voluntarily enacting corporately mandated role norms, values and beliefs.Practical implicationsFor the management of retail events with the aim of building organizational culture, this study points to the importance of emphasizing the symbolism of the sales promotion aspects of an event and paying as much attention to employees’ backstage experiences as to the public execution of a consumer event.Originality/valueThis study shows that external marketing could set the stage for internal marketing, with the ideal effects of internal marketing actually constructed and institutionalized during activities and procedures comprising outbound marketing. This suggests that a more nuanced view of the practice of internal marketing is warranted.

Journal

Qualitative Market Research: An International Journal – Emerald Publishing

Published: Jun 10, 2019

References

  • The effect of internal marketing on organizational commitment from market-orientation viewpoint in hotel industry in Iran