The localness effect of family firm branding on consumer perceptions and purchase intention: An experimental approach

Consumer preferences are changing, wherein brands with a pronounced local identity are garnering increased favorability. While family firms often embody this concept, there is limited consumer-focused research on its role in family firm management and branding. Drawing from consumer inference theory, we propose that consumers use a firm’s family status to infer its local character, including geographical reach, local iconness, national origin, and domestic production, to inform their purchase decisions. Our series of five experiments (N = 1,654) reveals that promoting family firm status generally enhances purchase intention. This is primarily due to the positive impact of perceived local iconness, overcoming the negative effect of perceived limited geographical reach. Amid ongoing debates on brand localness in a deglobalizing world, our study offers important theoretical insights into the local character of the most common global business form, with practical guidance for managers on leveraging the family firm status to enhance competitiveness.