Exploring online brand-mediated communities and customer experience: insights and evidence from the luxury fashion industry

Purpose Online brand community (OBC) research has been directed at examining the consequences of consumer–brand relationships on various behavioural issues, with little to say about reciprocity and variants of millennials’ loyalty in the luxury fashion industry. The purpose of this paper is to advance knowledge of millennials’ participation in OBCs and reciprocity. Design/methodology/approach This qualitative study utilised an interpretive research approach and focused on the voices of millennials who had experience with OBCs. This study builds on social influence theory and extends existing understanding of millennials’ participation in OBCs by highlighting the constructs of customers’ reciprocity structures that lead to loyalty towards luxury fashion brands. Fifty semi-structured interviews were conducted, and the emergent data were qualitatively analysed using thematic analysis. Findings This paper developed an emergent theoretical framework that identifies and conceptualises four archetypical categories of millennial consumers in the luxury fashion industry: traditionalists, inspirers, self-containers and expellers. The framework illuminates varying strategies and explains how certain strategies might be more effective with different categories of consumers. Originality/value This study builds on social influence theory and extends existing understanding of millennials’ participation in OBCs by highlighting the constructs of customers’ reciprocity structures that lead to loyalty towards luxury fashion brands.