Can Success Backfire? Consumer Judgments of Businesses that Repeatedly Win the Same Sustainability or Quality Award

ABSTRACT

Businesses strive toward winning awards, following the belief that the more times they win an award, the more positive they will be viewed by consumers. However, the current research highlights a context where increasingly winning an award over a period can backfire. Across two experiments, results reveal that although repeatedly winning an award enhances superiority perceptions relative to existing competitors, consumers conclude the award is uncompetitive, which increases the likelihood of switching to newly introduced competitors. This effect holds for primary (e.g., quality) and tangential (e.g., sustainability) awards, is pronounced for those who trust awards, and reveals important marketplace implications.

KEYWORDS:

• Awards
• restaurants
• switching
• quality
• perceptions

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Data availability statement

The data that support the findings of these studies are available from the corresponding author upon reasonable request.

Ethics approval

All procedures performed in study involving human participants were in accordance with the ethical standards of the institutional and/or national research committee and with the 1964 Helsinki declaration and its later amendments or comparable ethical standards.