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Purpose The aim of this paper is to consider place as a value proposition, in the context of Resource-Advantage Theory, by analysing the concept of terroir, including its antecedents and consequences. Design/methodology/approach The authors conceptually analyse the role of place in marketing by contrasting terroir to three other approaches: “in the style of […]”; “made in […]” and Protected Designations of Origin. They explore the impact of terroir on a range of products, offering a series of terroir value propositions. Findings Versus other place links, terroir offers a more specific Resource-Advantage, operating at environmental, philosophical and commercial levels. It offers a unique form of value to both consumers (e.g. identity, authenticity, cultural rootedness) and producers (e.g. irreproducibility, potential legal protection). Research limitations/implications Propositions address the antecedents and consequences of the terroir designation, the impact of consumer engagement, perceived authenticity and the added value offered to other regional goods. Additionally, how terroir may form a barrier to market entry, the relationship it has with the territorial brand, whether it offers greater product longevity and how it can be used as leverage for other related place-based brands and tourism are examined. Originality/value This is the first paper to address terroir as a marketing concept and to situate it within other forms of place marketing. It provides a definition, outlines the ways in which terroir creates value and provides a research agenda for future engagement with the concept.

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Consumers build social capital through purposeful consumer–place interactions. Airbnb claims that consumers want to “experience a place like [they] live there.” Previous research concentrates primarily on authenticity of objects, brands, and people, with limited development of place authenticity as a concept. But place authenticity represents an increasingly important marketing concept as consumers today, particularly millennials (Schulz, P. (2015, August 8). Not just millennials: Consumers want experiences, not things. Adage. Retrieved from https://adage.com/article/digitalnext/consumers-experiences-things/299994/), value experience over “stuff.” Authenticity provides an important place characteristic that if perceived, potentially unlocks a truly valuable consumer experience. Consequently, the research presented here develops an auxiliary theory of place authenticity (PA). The theory proposes a second‐order factor indicated by three coordinate subdimensions. Phase I of the research consists of five studies that develop PA, explore its dimensionality, and confirm the PA scale's construct validity. Phase II of the research involves a sixth study, which examines a set of hypotheses that begin to establish PA's nomological net. The results shed light on the psychology by which consumers extract value from experience and into ways marketing efforts can build effective place–value propositions.

Purpose – This paper aims to uncover humor mechanisms. Humor mechanisms influencing consumer behaviors seem relatively under-researched. In consequence, the effectiveness of humorous appeals is often questioned and research has yet to provide clear guidelines regarding why, for whom and when these appeals work. After uncovering ads that contain the two main types of humor mechanisms, the distraction and combined-influence hypotheses are tested in combination with dispositional and situation involvement. Design/methodology/approach – Using a focus group to define the ways consumers perceive humor, two pre-tests established a measure to identify arousal-safety (A-S) and incongruity resolution humor mechanisms. Two main studies (n = 486) test these mechanisms for two types of consumer groups (low and high NFC) in studies meant to replicate content-free and content-based media contexts. Findings – The results show that consumers are likely to have higher attitudes towards the humor ads that contain A-S. When considering the type of ad mechanism used, the results support the distraction hypotheses even for consumers with high NFC and even when in high situational involvement. No support for the combined-influence hypothesis is uncovered. Originality/value – It is shown that humorous mechanism is an important consideration when creating humor ads. The results also add more detailed support for the distraction hypothesis. From these results, marketers have a better understanding of humor mechanisms and practitioners of how to position their humorous advertising depending on the outcome behaviors they wish to encourage. Marketers are also advised to create humorous advertising that is simple rather than complex.