Marketing research shows that long-term customer-supplier relationships can reduce consequences of service failures in the hospitality industry. In addition to a long-term, continuous relationship, other types of long-term relationships are also conceivable as influencing factors. This raises the question of whether interactions with a company, based on customer engagement during childhood (childhood engagement) can influence the effect of a service failure. Similar to general child experience, it can be assumed that early engagement in the customer relationship can significantly affect later relationship perception. Furthermore, perceived controllability of the failure also plays a role. If the customer attributes responsibility to the company, negative reactions can arise. To examine this questions, an experimental study with 152 participants was performed. A moderating effect of perceived controllability and childhood engagement on repurchase intention as a consequence of disappointment was found. Previous customer engagement and a credible communication can thus prevent the termination of a relationship after a service failure. Contrary, early engagement does not generally prevent a company from customers’ disappointment. The article contributes to marketing research by integrating 1) the customer disappointment, 2) childhood engagement and its consequences for future interactions with the company as well as 3) the transfer of negative emotions from an employee to the company.

• Marie-Christin Papen(Technical University Dresden, Germany)
• Florian U. Siems(Technical University Dresden, Germany)
• Werner H. Kunz(University of Massachusetts Boston, USA)