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PurposeThis study seeks to investigate the service interaction behaviors that elicit a sense of comfort for the customer in the service encounter, and to investigate the mediating role of comfort on assessments of quality, customer satisfaction and positive word‐of‐mouth in two industries.Design/methodology/approachIn‐depth interviews were used to create an initial list of interaction behaviors displayed by service employees in an encounter. A quantitative study was then used to collect data to empirically examine the relationship between the constructs of interest.FindingsTwo key groups of interaction behavior are identified and contain specific behaviors that create a sense of overall comfort for the customer. Overall comfort positively impacts both overall quality and customer satisfaction, and this ultimately leads to positive word‐of‐mouth.Research limitations/implicationsThe research focuses on two industries only: fashion apparel retailing and casual dining restaurants. Future research needs to examine other industries, experiential or credence services, level of involvement or the impact of culture.Practical implicationsManagers are recommended to incorporate interaction behaviors into front‐line employee training and design of comfort‐enhancing strategies.Originality/valueResearch on employee behaviors and emotional aspects of the encounter is relatively scant, and this study investigates the specific behavioral repertoire that gives rise to an overall feeling of comfort in the service encounter. Although employee behavior is widely acknowledged to have an immense impact on the customer's evaluation of the encounter, there still exists much room to explore specific behaviors that are important for successful service delivery.

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Emerging countries such as China are fuelling the rapid growth of luxury brands. With China expected to overtake Japan as the world's largest luxury goods market, practitioners are keen to uncover the luxury buying behavior of this eminent group. Hong Kong is a renowned haven for luxury goods and attracts the bulk of Chinese luxury shoppers. In spite of the optimistic outlook, the luxury goods market is facing a multitude of challenges including changing clientele, fierce competition from other luxury brands and even rivalry from fast fashion retailers. These forces result in an increasing crowded luxury market and consumers becoming more astute in their tastes.The intensity of these forces is compelling luxury retailers to embrace customer perceived value (CPV) as a strategic imperative to achieve customer loyalty and create competitive advantage. However, extant research on customer perceived value in the luxury retail context is scarce and current models of CPV lack important retail components. With the prolific growth of this market, unveiling the drivers of luxury consumption is imperative. Therefore this study addresses an important gap in the literature by investigating the drivers of luxury fashion CPV and examines whether they differ from the CPV drivers of mass fashion. Few studies have incorporated a mass versus class perspective, however with the prevalence of luxury dilution, understanding service evaluation at both levels is crucial.Focus groups with mainland Chinese were conducted to uncover important attributes of luxury brands and develop a list of luxury and mass fashion brands for use in collecting survey data. Findings highlighted the tendency of Chinese shoppers to judge luxury mainly on extrinsic attributes. A subsequent small scale survey (n=138) affirmed the importance of attributes such as use top quality materials, a prestigious brand image and ability of the luxury good to enhance one's social image. Conversely attributes such as brand heritage and expensive were deemed less important features of luxury goods. The next stage of the study sampled luxury (n=282) and mass fashion (n=240) shoppers to gather data for hypotheses testing. Multigroup analysis showed significant differences between the two shopper groups and subsequent analysis was carried out on each group separately.The findings of the study show some differences in the CPV drivers between luxury and mass, with price, lower perceived risk and service quality being the top drivers of CPV in the luxury context implying the dominance of functional attributes in retail evaluation. The importance of lower perceived risk comes as no surprise given the numerous instances of deceptive counterfeit products in China. However drivers pertaining to experiential needs failed to exert significant effects on luxury shoppers' CPV. The findings imply that purchase of luxury fashion items by Chinese shoppers appears to be for the fulfillment of functional and social needs rather than experiential needs. Conversely, in the mass fashion context, ...