Purpose – This article seeks to illustrate how social commonalities between employees and their customers often result in customers believing that they are entitled to discounts in retail settings. Design/methodology/approach – This study employs survey methodology to reveal the extent to...

Purpose – Researchers have explored the extent to which consumers belonging to minority, ethnic, marginalized, and sub‐cultural groups experience discrimination in retail settings. This study aims to explore the converse of retail racism – namely, reverse retail discrimination. The work...

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to put forth an expanded servicescape framework that shows that a perceived servicescape comprises physical, social, socially symbolic, and natural environmental dimensions. Design/methodology/approach – This conceptual paper offers an in‐depth...

Purpose – When consumers help other users of the same brand, both the brand and consumers benefit. To determine when consumer‐to‐consumer helping behaviors occur and to help managers encourage this value‐creating activity, this paper aims to investigate relationships between social...

Purpose: This commentary puts forth a conceptual framework, referred to as the consumer, organization, government framework of unintended digital technology service failures, that specifies consumer, organizational and governmental shortcomings that result in digital technologies failing in...

Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to challenge service researchers to design for service inclusion, with an overall goal of achieving inclusion by 2050. The authors present service inclusion as an egalitarian system that provides customers with fair access to a service, fair treatment...

Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to explore the concept of customer discomfort in service settings when employees and customers who share social incompatibilities, stemming from war, nationalism, religious differences or terrorism, work together in service settings....