Smart shopper feelings in the case of store brands: the role of human capital as a key antecedent and the implications for store loyalty

This paper asks the questions ‘how do store brands create smart shopper feelings?’, ‘what are the antecedents to this form of ego expressive benefits?’ and ‘what are the consequences for store loyalty if any?’ The findings reveal that ego expressive smart shopper feelings emerge from the interaction between shoppers’ food related human capital, in the form of information and knowledge capital, and retailers’ store brand products. As such, it draws attention to yet another element that contributes to the in-store value that some shoppers enjoy as part of the shopping process. While smart shopper feelings have typically been related directly to saving money, our findings find no such support: checking and engaging in price comparisons are not found to yield store brand smart shopper feelings. That store brands are cheaper appears to be taken as given. Rather, we find that food-related knowledge capital in the form of search skills and the ability to deal with more complicated forms of on-pack information coupled with food-related information capital are the antecedents to these ego-expressive benefits. Through ability and information, some shoppers experience these benefits to a greater extent. The consequence for retailers is that store brand smart feelings encourage loyalty to store brands in general rather than to a particular retailer, fostering store brand promiscuity rather than store loyalty.