Brand Corporateness: Measurement and Symbolic Meaning of an Unfavorable Brand Association

Journal of Consumer Research · 2025 · Volume 52 · Issue 3

Abstract

This research establishes brand corporateness as a novel brand association that most consumers find unfavorable. Exploratory focus group findings first illuminate consumer meaning structures and attitudes around brand corporateness. An inductive grounded theory approach suggests three core ( hierarchical , mechanistic , opaque ) and three ancillary ( ubiquitous , traditional , strategic ) dimensions of the construct, informing a subsequent literature review that theoretically confirms this structure. Our theorizing also suggests that greater corporateness diminishes consumers’ self-brand connection because the symbolic meanings of its core dimensions clash with several fundamental human values, a negative effect that is heightened among more politically liberal consumers. The main empirical work then develops and validates a measure of brand corporateness across 11 studies using best practices in scale development. After a rigorous item generation and refinement process, our studies provide converging evidence for the scale’s structural, nomological, discriminant, predictive, and ecological validity.

Keywords

brand corporateness, brand associations, political ideology, scale development, self-brand connection

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