How much do you like a person who loves the brands you hate? We investigated an effect we call the brand negativity bias, which occurs when an unfavorable brand reduces the attitudes toward an associated target product or person. Using a person perception paradigm in the context of brand placements, Experiment 1 established that unfavorable brands reduced attitudes toward a new digital product (i.e., a movie) in which the brand was placed. Experiment 2 showed this effect was driven by a reduced ability to connect with the character in the movie who was associated with an unfavorable brand in two serial processes (lower perceived similarity leading to lower empathy). These results provide the first evidence showing how unfavorable brands can reduce empathy between people. Supporting the brand negativity bias, we found that unfavorable brands yielded stronger effects across every evaluative outcome suggesting that unfavorable brands held more influence over consumer judgment compared to favorable brands. Lastly, these results add a layer of complexity to B2B partnerships and tell a cautionary story of when unfavorable brand associations transfer between entities.

In this research, we show certain relationships between brand (company) image and corresponding financial image, which has not revealed well. With considering the results of this research, brand manager will be able to establish their brand strategies more comprehensively and enhance their brand value.

While Brand Love has been extensively studied, Brand Hate is still in the early stages of its theoretical development. Aiming to reduce that gap, this project has three main goals: first, conduct a thorough literature review, seeking to consolidate what has been written about the concepts of love, hate, brand love, brand hate and several supportive elements such as emotions, consumer-brand relationships, brand and anti-brand communities; second, perform and code multiple semi-structured/in-depth interviews, analyse and discuss the Portuguese costumer’s perception on the topic and link it with academia; third, build a literate crossing between Marketing and Linguistics that can be used by future studies. Supporting these objectives is the Constructivist Grounded Theory methodology. Among the findings generated by this process, seven facets were uncovered: emotions are essential to the shopping experience; there is an occasional contemporaneity between diverse elements of Active Brand Hate; Negative Past Experiences was the most cited antecedent of Brand Hate; it is possible to turn Brand Hate into neutral or positive relationships, but so is the inverse; Negative Double Jeopardy should be divided into parcels; Oppositional Brand Loyalty ought be tested as another antecedent; there are dissimilar types of Brand Hostages.