Journal of Marketing and Market Studies 11/2023

Family firms are a diverse group of business entities. Regardless of the differences that exist among particular types of family firms, they share a common feature. It is the term familiness resulting from the interaction between the family system as a whole, the individual family members and the business itself. Although the functioning of family businesses is increasingly well recognised, research areas worthy of in-depth exploration can still be identified. The objective of this paper article is threefold: 1) to systematise knowledge about the familiness of business in the context of customer perception, 2) to identify directions for further scientific research in the area of the relationship between the family nature of the company and customer perception of the company and 3) to develop recommendations for practitioners in the area of family business management. In order to achieve these objectives, the literature scoping review method was used to analyse publications on family entrepreneurship selected from international databases. The research shows that familiness being an important factor positively influencing the perception of a company and its products by consumers is a significant source of competitive advantage. Therefore the factor of familiness should be more highlighted in the marketing communication of these companies. The results of the analysis also indicate that further research should focus on: 1) the relationship between the perception of family businesses and variables such as consumers' age, gender, lifestyle and their value system; 2) the relationship between the perception of family businesses and new trends in consumer behaviour, for example ethnocentrism and deconsumption, 3) the relationship between the perception of family businesses and attitudes towards these entities, 4) the cultural context of the perception of family businesses.

Country-of-origin (COO) phenomenon has gained considerable importance with the recognition that it could function as a weakness or strength, which can cause international companies either to have a competitive edge in the market or to lag behind their competitors. However, even though there has been an immense variety of studies under the COO domain, since the first study was carried out in 1965, the number of studies conducted in the area of services pales compared with those concerning tangible products. This study demonstrates the COO effect in the field of services marketing, and it builds a bridge between the COO literature and novel consumer tendencies, such as acculturation to global consumer culture, consumer affinity along with consumer ethnocentrism and consumer animosity. In order to explore the interactions and the effects of consumers' dispositions toward foreign countries upon the service quality image, all positive and negative consumer dispositions in both the most and the least liked country settings were examined. Results revealed how opposite forces can be interconnected during the process of service quality evaluation.

COVID-19 has impacted the hospitality and tourism business in many countries. The hotel business suffered deeply, financially and in terms of employee welfare. Hotel employees are facing layoffs which can harm their well-being. This study examines the health condition of hotel employees by looking at their job demands, job resources, work engagement, and well-being during the pandemic of COVID-19. For the context of this research we selected Tangerang, Indonesia. Qualitative research with eight in-depth interviews was used for this research. Several job positions were chosen to get broad insights into how much impact had been experienced by the hotel employees. The findings show that job demands have increased significantly due to fewer people working in the hotel. The pressure of working in a non-healthy condition also concerns hotel employees. Employee wellbeing has been neglected indirectly to ensure the hotel can survive.

The purpose of this article is to analyse and to assess selected ESG reporting standards (the international GRI Standards and the European ESRS) in terms of incorporating aspects of the circular economy (CE) and to present directions and opportunities for expanding ESG reporting to include CE indicators. In the article a literature review as well as international and EU documents on the concepts of ESG and CE was used. Available and existing solutions for the use of CE indicators in ESG reporting were analysed in detail. The analysis of the indicators contained in the GRI standard, as well as the ESRS project, showed the need to include four important groups of activities relevant to the CE, such as product dematerialization, technological innovation, repair and remanufacturing. The inclusion of these aspects in the form of the indicators proposed in the article will allow for a more complete implementation of the principles of a circular economy.

The main purpose of the article is to identify the determinants of the generation C consumers' (digital natives) behaviour in the sharing economy area under the crises influence, in particular the global economic crisis caused by the pandemic and then the outbreak of war in Ukraine. The research concept used in the article was based on literature studies on the essence of crises and their impact on the behaviour of young adults as well as qualitative research using the method of focus group interviews (FGI). The first part of the considerations presents the essence of economic crises, which have been an inseparable element of the market economy since the beginning of this economy. In the next part, attention was drawn to the key importance of the economic crisis of 2008 and the global recession in the dissemination of the idea of sharing economy in the world. Then, the results of qualitative research were presented. The obtained empirical material was subjected to the semantic field analysis. The result was the reconstruction of two definitions clarifying the perception of sharing economy phenomenon during the crisis. In addition, postmodern personality types based on Zygmunt Bauman's concept were identified. The use of focus group interviews and the semantic field method allowed to diagnose the perception of the phenomenon by the digital natives generation, as well as the characteristics of its representatives in the context of the postmodern man concept.