Once they’ve been there, they like to share: capitalizing on ephemerality and need for uniqueness to drive word of mouth for brands with pop-up stores

Abstract

Retail has responded to the continuing shift in consumer preferences toward ephemerality and immediacy with the development of temporary experiential stores known as pop-ups. In the realm of experiential stores, research has identified retail and brand experience as affecting positive word of mouth (WoM). Surprisingly, however, studies have yet to consider pop-ups’ distinguishing feature of ephemerality or their main type of visitor, consumers with a high need for uniqueness (NFU). Building on five studies (two field studies, three experiments) and contributing to scarcity research, our results demonstrate the positive effect of an experiential store’s temporal scarcity for consumers and brands–namely, an enhanced brand experience. Moreover, our research corroborates our prediction of self-enhancement: For high-NFU consumers, brand experience translates into increased positive WoM when communicating with distant others. In contrast, when communicating with close others, the instinct of high-NFU customers to preserve their uniqueness does not affect positive WoM.