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Service convenience and social servicescape: retail vs hedonic setting

Doan T. Nguyen (UQ Business School, The University of Queensland, Brisbane, Australia)
Tom DeWitt (College of Business and Economics, University of Hawaii – Hilo, Hilo, Hawaii, USA)
Rebekah Russell‐Bennett (School of Advertising, Marketing and Public Relations, Queensland University of Technology, Brisbane, Australia)

Journal of Services Marketing

ISSN: 0887-6045

Article publication date: 29 June 2012

13274

Abstract

Purpose

While there have been numerous studies on the antecedents and consequences of service quality, there has been little investigation of the moderators of service quality. The purpose of this study is to demonstrate the effects of two moderators: service convenience and the social servicescape. The moderating effects are tested in two service settings: retail and hedonic (concert).

Design/methodology/approach

A survey of 270 customers at kitchen display showrooms and 320 concert‐goers was undertaken. The results were analysed using regression analysis.

Findings

The results show support for ten of the 12 hypotheses. Service convenience moderated the relationships between perceived service quality and its three sub‐dimensions (interaction, environment, and outcome quality), differently in different settings (retail vs hedonic). This supports the authors' general argument that the outcome dimension tends to be more important to customers in a retail setting, while interaction and environment quality dimensions tend to be more important in hedonic service consumption.

Practical implications

These findings suggest that managers need to use different service management tactics in retail and hedonic service settings. Specifically managers in retail settings need to pay more attention to service convenience to achieve service quality and managers in hedonic settings should concentrate on the social servicescape.

Originality/value

This paper is the first to test the moderating factors of service convenience and social servicescape on service quality.

Keywords

Citation

Nguyen, D.T., DeWitt, T. and Russell‐Bennett, R. (2012), "Service convenience and social servicescape: retail vs hedonic setting", Journal of Services Marketing, Vol. 26 No. 4, pp. 265-277. https://doi.org/10.1108/08876041211237569

Publisher

:

Emerald Group Publishing Limited

Copyright © 2012, Emerald Group Publishing Limited

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