Brand extensions are a critical strategy for the introduction of new products, which are often prone to failure. The use of an established brand can help promote acceptance of the new product by reducing perceived risk, enhancing efficiencies in terms of distribution and promotion, and reducing overall costs associated with launching the new product. Previous research regarding brand extensions has shown that various factors influence success of brand extensions (e.g., marketing support and retailer acceptance). One of the most important factors driving brand extension success is the fit between a parent brand and its extension. A new marketing construct, emotional attachment to a brand, has recently been introduced to the brand extension literature. However, the role of consumers’ brand attachment, in terms of reactions to a brand extension has largely been ignored by researchers. The lack of research on brand extensions and brand attachment is somewhat surprising, given the considerable body of research findings that show consumers who are emotionally tied to a brand respond differently to that brand due to increased attachment. Building on this body of work, we propose that consumers who are emotionally attached to a brand will be less impacted by the degree of fit between the parent brand and its extension. In this research, we show that emotional attachment with a brand is an important factor underlying consumers’ responses to a brand extension. In particular, we explore the moderating role of brand attachment on consumers’ responses to extensions that vary in terms of fit with the parent brand. We also explore the process underlying observed effects. These issues are examined with an experiment regarding extensions for a real-world brand. Further, mediated moderation analyses indicate that the moderating effect of brand attachment is mediated by brand image fit, but not by product category fit. Implications of our findings for managers and researchers are also are provided.

The primary objective of this research is to develop a better understanding of consumer’s post-purchase psychological state by examining the influence of sales promotion and emotional brand attachment on post-purchase cognitive dissonance, taking into account the mediating role of impulse buying behavior. The current study addresses several gaps in literature. Firstly, it is hard to find the direct impact of sales promotion and emotional brand attachment on post-purchase cognitive dissonance. Secondly, to the best of our knowledge, few studies have investigated the mediating role of impulse buying behavior in consumer research. A sample of 256 respondents was collected from Pakistani retail consumers. The statistical findings of this study show that sales promotion has a significant positive effect on the impulse buying behavior and post-purchase cognitive dissonance. Furthermore, results indicate that emotional brand attachment has a negative influence on impulse buying behavior but has a significant positive impact on post-purchase cognitive dissonance. Meanwhile, impulse buying behavior is a potential mediator between sales promotion, emotional brand attachment, and post-purchase cognitive dissonance relationships. The moderating role of Gender describes that the positive relationship between sales promotion and post-purchase cognitive dissonance will be stronger for women as compared to men at a higher level of sales promotion.