Luxury Branding in the Hospitality Industry: The Impact of Employee’s Luxury Appearance and Elitism Attitude

Abstract

Some of the luxury consumption literature suggests that luxury consumption is a beneficial social signal for the actor which facilitates social interaction. However, a different stream of recent research suggests that luxury consumption bears social costs to the actor. In the employee–customer interaction context, wearing luxury brands can either benefit or backfire for the employee depending on the situation whether luxury status or warmth is necessary. Based on the gaps in the literature, this study examines the impact of employee conspicuous cues by utilizing luxury consumption and elitism attitude on employee–customer rapport and behavioral intentions. The study results show that employees wearing luxury brands increase customers’ perceived impression management toward the employee. Such perception is strengthened when employees show an elitism attitude. In addition, when employees wear luxury brands, customers are more likely to build rapport with employees when they show a democratic attitude, as they perceive the employees are less likely to involve in impression management than showing an elitism attitude. The results build upon the luxury hospitality literature, aesthetic labor, impression management, and rapport literature.

Keywords

elitism employee–customer rapport impression management luxury appearance

Introduction

Hospitality operators invest a significant amount of effort to support their brand image through strategic brand management. Given that service interactions between employees and customers are a key element to address brand identity (Sirianni et al., 2013), it is vital for hospitality firms to strategically align employee attitude and appearance to brand positioning. This is specifically important for luxury experiences as there has been remarkable growth in luxury markets around the world (Sung et al., 2015), and luxury experiences are strategically focused on creating luxurious, high-end experiences for a growing customer base (Kapferer & Valette-Florence, 2016). In luxury experiences, customers look for both aesthetic appearance and employee attitude cues that affect the experience and the perception of the brand (Venkatesh et al., 2010; Ward & Dahl, 2014). Surprisingly, however, customer–employee brand encounter interactions are not regularly managed nor included in luxury brand strategy research (Sirianni et al., 2013) despite the fact that interactions are paramount in service. In other words, despite the fact that employee aesthetics are acknowledged as an important managerial means of communicating a brand’s values (Venkatesh et al., 2010), the academic literature lacks empirical investigation of employee appearance and attitudinal elements (K. Kim & Baker, 2019; Wu et al., 2020). As such, this research examines the critical research questions of how luxury hospitality firms can leverage their service encounters by managing employee’s appearance and attitude in a way that reinforces luxury brand meaning and experience to their customers.

From a practical standpoint, employee appearance has been managed by many luxury hospitalities firms as an important managerial means to communicate the brand’s core value (Amey, 2015). For example, Park Hyatt in New York developed a partnership with luxury fashion designer Narciso Rodriguez to create women’s staff attire for the hotel (Earle-Levine, 2014). Similarly, the Rosewood in London hotel brand focuses on the tradition and culture heritage of London. They asked Nicholas Oakwell to design vintage-inspired couture employee uniforms to align with the English countryside aristocracy of the 19th century (Amey, 2015). Other luxury hotels are increasingly partnering with upscale fashion designers, such as Christian Dior and Diane von Furstenberg, in creating both employee uniforms and hotel-branded suites (Moxley, 2018). While the practice of employee’s luxury appearance to reflect the brand status exists in practice, the exiting body of scholarly research does not provide adequate amount of knowledge regarding the impact of these practices on employees and customers in service interactions (Wu et al., 2019). Only recently has this been examined with relation to other customers and similarity (Hanks et al., 2020), but the literature is largely silent on how employee conspicuous consumption displayed at work can affect the interaction experience with the customer. This neglect is surprising given that consumers use employee-based cues to make inferences about the service, especially in hospitality and tourism with the high amount of employee–customer interaction (Baker & Magnini, 2016).

In addition to the display of an employee’s luxury appearance, it is also critical to examine the impact of an employee’s luxury attitude. Research has defined unique characteristics to luxury brands that exhibit aspects of elitism, status, and exclusivity (Wirtz et al., 2020). While this has traditionally been viewed as it relates to luxury goods, particularly clothing, less has examined how this perception of luxury elitism interplays with hospitality organizations and employee attitude. In this, the very concepts of being luxurious and elite combat the very elements of hospitable service and therefore warrants the current research. In other words, firms should utilize branded service encounters as service interactions, where the employee behavior is strategically aligned to the brand positioning (Sirianni et al., 2013). For luxury brand in particular, this would suggest that an elitism attitude would align with the brand but perhaps come at the expense of the hospitableness and customer rapport.

While both the appearance of employees and suitable behavior affect the service experience, there are also varying standards based on service level and contexts (Hanks et al., 2020). Firms ranging from casual to luxury all have policies regarding employee aesthetic labor practices (Wu et al., 2020) and service behavior standards (K. Kim & Baker, 2019). Specifically, as luxury brands pursue rarity and exclusivity, its brand alignment strategy should be differentiated from other types of operation in regard to its employee behavior, appearance, and manager during the service interactions with customers (Kapferer & Valette-Florence, 2016). As such, more research is needed to untangle the effects of luxury experiences, specifically related to employee’s luxury consumption appearance, attitude, impression management, and its effect on customers’ motivation to build rapport with employees and behavioral intentions.

To address these gaps, this research aims to examine the impact of employee’s luxury cues on consumer’s attitudes toward the employee and the firm. More specifically, this research investigates the impact of employee’s luxury appearance and employee elitism attitude that are the characteristics of luxury brands on employee–customer rapport and behavioral intention. Furthermore, this study investigates the underlying mechanism that explains the impact of employee’s luxury cues on customer’s behavioral intention through the mediating role of customer’s perception of impression management toward employees. The results build upon the employee appearance, luxury, conspicuous consumption, impression management, and rapport literature.

Literature Review

Employee Luxury Appearance

Many hospitality firms have aesthetic labor strategies that manage employee appearance (Pounders et al., 2015). Appearance is the overall look and physical characteristics of others (employees) in the service environment (Hanks et al., 2020). In service settings, customers often use employee physical appearance to form impressions and judgments, even before any verbal exchange happens (Sundaram & Webster, 2000). As employee’s appearance has an important impact on sales and marketing initiatives, firms attempt to manage their employee’s appearance to increase attractiveness and their brand identity (Sirianni et al., 2013). Aesthetic labor, which embodies capacities and attributes that enable employees to look good and sound right in their job is particularly emphasized in service industries where appearances matter as frontline employees create the service and brand experience. In fact, previous findings supported that employee aesthetics increase customers’ service experiences and service quality (Tsaur et al., 2015).

In other words, firms engage in intentional display rules of employee appearance and behavior, known as conspicuous consumption. Conspicuous consumption is defined as the behavior and conduct to intentionally display one’s wealth and luxury (Campbell, 1995). Managing employee’s appearance is particularly important for luxury brands as customers expect to enjoy a luxury atmosphere, facilities, aesthetics, and sophisticated services. Among them, employee-based cues allow for powerful inferences about the company. Accordingly, some luxury brands display conspicuous cues as part of their staff’s appearance based on the assumption that displaying luxury items when promoting services or interacting with customers may benefit them (Friedman & Ostrov, 2008; Mende et al., 2018). For example, some hotel chains (i.e., Marriott and InterContinental) collaborate with high-fashion designers to develop custom-made, stylish uniforms for their employees (Trejos, 2015). This is especially important for luxury hospitality organizations as luxury services tend to deliver unique benefits and symbolic value, and tangible objects have high visibility and thus are an effective way to signal luxury to customers (Wirtz et al., 2020). Moreover, employee conspicuous consumption cues influence the customer experience, particularly in luxury contexts, as service employees display personal items, such as accessories, that denote luxury (Wu et al., 2019). Although the hospitality industry is full of aesthetic labor polices (Pinto et al., 2020) as frontline appearance is part of signaling the brand image to customers, one critical question that has not been answered yet is: How customers respond to employee’s luxury appearance? And would customer respond differently depending on the context of the service? In other words, would customers interpret luxury appearance differently for luxury service?

The influence of employee luxury appearance is grounded in signaling theory, which states that individuals engage in behaviors related to social prestige (Ko et al., 2019). In other words, the luxury consumption literature suggests that luxury consumption is a powerful and beneficial social signal for the actor which facilitates social interaction. One of the most distinctive aspects of luxury brands is that it helps people to express and enhance their identity and ideal personality by purchasing and consuming them (Sung et al., 2015). The symbolic properties of brands and products are integral to the expression of a person’s identity and to understand the personalities of others (Solomon, 1983). Consuming luxury products facilitates the acquisition and maintenance of wealth and high social status (Bird et al., 2001). Some research finds that the display of luxury consumption elicits favorable responses from observers. For example, J. Lee et al. (2015) find that individuals wearing luxury clothing were perceived as more suitable for an internship, deemed to merit a higher salary, and received larger charitable donations compared to identical clothing either without a brand or a non-luxury brand label. Stated differently, wearing or displaying luxury products is grounded in signaling theory as it signals luxury status (Su et al., 2021).

In contrast to the perspective of favorable social consequences of luxury consumption, recent research suggests that luxury consumption bears social costs in service relationships. Scott et al. (2013) find that a service provider’s conspicuous consumption weakens customer attitudes and behavioral intentions in service relationships which may eventually harm customer relationship. This is due to the contextual character of service that emphasizes the importance of interpersonal warmth, caring, and courtesy within the interaction with customers. Given that the positive traits of luxury consumption, status, and wealth are highly important in luxury service context, it is critical to know under what condition the employee’s luxury appearance might give certain benefits to the service provider when interacting with the customers. In other words, there is a need to understand whether employee luxury appearance can either benefit or backfire the service provider depending on the situation whether status or warmth is necessary.

Customer’s Perception of Impression Management Toward Employee

People form unprompted impressions about others by automatically classifying them into social categories and inferring related personality traits. This is based on impression management theory, which states that individuals seek to create a favorable image (Shukla et al., 2015). For luxury services, this involves creating an image consistent with luxury values and status. In other words, these are attributes that are visually accessible or easy to understand are frequently dominant for this initial categorization (Skowronski & Carlston, 1989). Observers use various cues related to a target when making inferences about the target, and the responses of observers to a person are driven by certain emotions, cognitions, and behaviors associated with this categorization. In a consumption experience, although individual consumers wear luxury goods for a variety of reasons, research finds observers make attributions that luxury consumption is due to impression management (Cannon & Rucker, 2019). Specifically, grounded in impression management theory, individuals wear luxury goods to reveal a favorable impression of themselves to others. For example, wearing luxury logoed clothing may signal to observers’ impression management motives which then can lower perceptions of hospitality and warmth (Cannon & Rucker, 2019). This is due to the fact that observers penalize actor’s behaviors that deviate from their actual behavior which leads to a bias against impression management concerns (Barden et al., 2005). Given that luxury goods can be a signal that an actor has impression management motives, the individual is attempting to portray a favorable impression of themselves, customers might make attributions that wearing luxury goods is due to impression management:

Hypothesis 1 (H1): Employee’s luxury appearance has a positive impact on consumer’s perception of impression management toward employees.

Moderating the Role of Level of Service: Luxury Versus Economy Firms

Firms utilize aesthetic labor strategies to meet the expectation of the customers. When firms set a grooming policy regarding employee luxury appearance, they should consider whether signaling high status will be a benefit or have negative consequences. Accordingly, there is a need to understand the conditions when wearing luxury brands might give certain benefits to the service provider when interacting with the customers. When people make inferences, they normally incorporate multiple cues related to a target into an overall impression (Anderson, 1981). In other words, impression formation does not solely result from the cues on employees but also contextual cues matter (Blair, 2002). If cues about the target are consistent with the context, initial categorizations will be strengthened by the presence of converging cues but weakened by diverging cues (McCarthy & Skowronski, 2014). Depending on the context, consumers may modify their perception and attitudes toward the employees (Mende et al., 2018). In other words, the service context, such as level of service, may alter customer’s perception toward employee luxury appearance.

Luxury brands are categorized as high product quality, high price, exclusivity, status, and aesthetics (Wirtz et al., 2020). On the other hand, economy brands are characterized by low prices and attending to the basic needs of customers (Ye et al., 2020). As such, both aesthetic appearance and behavioral elements are critically based on the service level of the firm, ranging from economy to luxury. Upscale and luxury brands are known for strict appearance standards for frontline employees to maintain the appropriate organizational image (Pinto et al., 2020). For example, luxury hospitality firms encourage their employees displaying conspicuous cues as part of their staff’s appearance (Trejos, 2015). Such cues would be beneficial for forming a positive relationship with the service provider and at large, with the firm, when it is consistent with their expectation about the context.

Research suggests that observers penalize individuals for statements that deviate from their actual behavior (Barden et al., 2005). Given that level of service operation is one of the most explicit cues of brand positioning, we proposed that if the employee’s luxury appearance is aligned with the brand positioning, they are less likely to perceive it as an impression management strategy. In other words, if employees’ appearance cues and the firms’ contextual cues are consistent, customers may believe wearing luxury goods is a part of the firm’s grooming policy and, therefore, more likely to have positive attitudes toward the service provider who are following the rules and the firm that is trying to provide more luxurious service experience to them. As such, an employee who wears luxury goods versus generic goods should signal to customers the luxury brand strategic alignment. Therefore, we propose that level of service moderates the impact of employee’s luxury appearance on customer’s perception of impression management toward employees. Specifically, customers visiting high level of service firm (i.e., luxury firm) will report lower impression management perception toward the employees wearing luxury brands. In other words, customer’s perception of impression management toward employees will be attenuated when employee’s luxury appearance aligns with the service firm’s luxury brand identity:

Hypothesis 2 (H2): Employee’s luxury appearance and level of service have an interaction effect on consumer’s perception of impression management toward employees.

Employee Luxury Attitude: Elitism

Extant customer service research supports the notion that service providers with friendly and welcoming behavior leads to attracting and retaining loyal and satisfied customers (Gremler & Gwinner, 2008). However, such a notion is not always true. As a brand alignment strategy, high-end retail stores are adopting exclusionary treatments toward their customers (Sinha & Lu, 2019). For example, some of the luxury brand sales associates are instructed to intentionally ignore or demonstrate elitism attitudes as it aligns with luxury elitism and exclusivity (Ward & Dahl, 2014). Supporting such practitioner’s business practices, research reveals that negative customer service experience, such as being rejected or ignored by the service provider, facilitates more positive attitudes and customers’ desire for the brand (Sinha & Lu, 2019; Ward & Dahl, 2014). Mead et al. (2011) reveal that rejected consumers often end up choosing products that are symbolic of their rejecters, in an effort to affiliate with the brand.

While the elitism brand strategy is effective for the goods domain, whether this luxury brand positioning strategy also applies to the hospitality industry where the feeling of warmth and welcoming are the core represented characteristics is unanswered (Sung et al., 2015). In other words, the very nature of hospitality services is to be hospitable (Baker & Magnini, 2016). The luxury brand literature proposes various personality traits representing luxury brands (Sung et al., 2015). The symbolism of luxury brands conveys to a large extent human personality traits, including elitism, opulence, eccentricity, and modernity (Heine, 2010). However, the key to luxury is elitism as it represents the level of status and exclusivity that is displayed by the brand. Elitism is associated with aloofness, aristocracy, donnish, arrogant, and offish (Heine, 2010). At the opposite end of the spectrum is a democratic attitude that is described as warm, casual, authentic, and friendly (Heine, 2010). As such, the examination of luxury elitism attitude and the democratic hospitable attitude warrants investigation, especially considering its importance for the very nature of the industry and based on the lack of empirical research. Specifically, while the goods research finds elitism is important to display (Sung et al., 2015) hospitality, customers may have a negative view of luxury experiences being pretentious.

Role theory explains the concept of suitable behavior. According to role theory, individuals behave in ways that are different and predictable depending on their respective social identities and the situation (Biddle, 1986). Although the key to most luxury definitions is elitism, this is both a blessing and a curse (Kapferer & Valette-Florence, 2016). For example, luxury individuals are more likely to display characteristics of elitism and be discreet in their behavior (Hyun & Han, 2015). However, if customers view luxury experiences as too elitist (Kapferer & Valette-Florence, 2016), this can come at the expense of rapport and behavioral intentions. As such, more research is needed to examine how employee luxury attitude affects impression management with respect to employee’s tangible cues. Therefore, we suggest that while employees’ elitism attitude may increase customer’s perception of impression management toward the employees, when it is combined with employee’s luxury appearance consumption, customers will report lower impression management perception toward the employees as it aligns with the brand characteristic. In other words, the social costs of an employee’s luxury appearance will be attenuated when the employee’s conspicuous cues align with their elitism attitude:

Hypothesis 3 (H3): Employee’s elitism attitude has a positive impact on consumer’s perception of impression management toward employees.

Hypothesis 4 (H4): Employee’s luxury appearance and employee’s elitism attitude have an interaction effect on consumer’s perception of impression management toward employees.

Employee–Customer Rapport

The employee does not simply provide the service, but in hospitality organizations, employee rapport building is crucial (K. Kim & Baker, 2019). Employee–customer rapport refers to customer’s perceptions of having pleasant interactions with service employees (Gremler & Gwinner, 2000). Rapport is characterized by two dimensions: personal connection and enjoyable interaction (Gremler & Gwinner, 2000). Personal connection refers to the customer’s perception of a strong bond with employees, and an enjoyable interaction refers to the evaluation of the encounter enjoyment (Gremler & Gwinner, 2000). Luxury consumption can play an important role in the facilitation of social interactions as it signals one’s wealth and social status (Cannon & Rucker, 2019). More specifically, given that high status is perceived as having the ability to carry out their desired action, high status confers greater competence and intelligence (J. Lee et al., 2015). However, the research is largely silent on how luxury consumption affects perceptions and behaviors associated with warmth or rapport (Cannon & Rucker, 2019).

People tend to develop emotional bonds with others who share similar characteristics and thus seek others who share common interests (Ashforth & Mael, 1989). One study finds that luxury passengers feel closer when surrounded by others who display a luxury appearance. Conversely, they feel less close when surrounded by others who are dissimilar in luxury appearance (Hyun & Han, 2015). Research in psychology finds that luxury and wealth cues increase a target’s inferred competence but decrease perceived warmth, kindness, and empathy (Scott et al., 2013) which is a key element in developing rapport. In fact, social costs involved in employee’s luxury consumption weakens customer attitudes and behavioral intentions in service relationships which may eventually harm customer relationships (Mende et al., 2018). Moreover, previous research supports that observers infer lower warmth toward people who attempt to manage the impression of their image (Barden et al., 2005) and less likely to engage with people who are trying to impress others, In other words, if customers perceive employee’s luxury appearance is due to impression management, it may come at the expense of perceived rapport. Therefore, an employee’s luxury appearance may produce negative attributions related to building rapport with the customers:

Hypothesis 5 (H5): Consumer’s perception of impression management toward employee mediates the relationship between employee’s luxury appearance and employee–customer rapport.

Behavioral Intention

It is important to distinguish between luxury consumers’ behaviors for luxury products (J. H. Lee & Hwang, 2011) and luxury hospitality experiences. Based on impression management, consumer inferences about a luxury brand will affect their behavioral intentions toward the firm (Scott et al., 2013). For consumers who believe employee’s luxury appearance is due to impression management motives, it can decrease the intent to visit. That said, consumers may penalize employees who attempt to manage their impression by lowering their behavioral intention toward the firm. Conversely, if customers believe that employees are only wearing or acting in a luxury manner as a way to comply with the luxury brand identity, it can alleviate their perception of impression management and, consequently, increase behavioral intentions.

Hypothesis 6 (H6): Impression management mediates the relationship between an employee’s luxury appearance and behavioral intention.

Method

Study 1

Research design and sample

This study employs a scenario-based experiment that allows for a high level of control, the ability to manipulate variables individually, and to uncover the causal relationships. A 2 (Employee’s luxury appearance: luxury brand vs. no brand) × 2 (Level of operation: 2-start vs. 5-star) between-subject factorial experiment was utilized (Figure 1). A total of 230 respondents were recruited from Amazon Mechanical Turk, which is one of the largest national online marketing panel that features a diverse nationwide pool of consumers and provides high-quality data (Buhrmester et al., 2011). As this study aims to explore the role of employee’s luxury appearance, to recruit eligible samples, several screening and accuracy questions were asked at the beginning of the survey to ensure respondents are familiar with the experimental stimuli brand (i.e., TAG Heuer and Montblanc). Those who failed to answer one of the multiple screening questions were eliminated from further analysis (K. Kim & Baker, 2020). In addition, to ensure the quality of the data, workers who participated in the survey needed to have “master” qualifications and demonstrate accuracy on specific types of human intelligence tasks (MTurk HITs; K. Kim & Baker, 2020). In terms of the procedures, participants were randomly assigned to a scenario and asked to fill out a questionnaire. Participants were given a scenario whereby they go on a vacation in a hotel and start interacting with the front desk agent. More than 60% of the respondents visit a hotel more than 4 times a year, demonstrating the suitability of the sample as having experience as hotel guests. Gender (Male = 56.1%) and age (M = 32.46 years) of the participants were well-distributed among the sample. In all, 70% of the respondents were Caucasian, and more than half (65.6%) earned more than US$50,000 per year.

Experimental stimuli and measures

A pilot test was conducted before the main study to check for the salience of employee’s luxury appearance manipulation stimuli. Participants recognized the brand TAG Heuer and Montblanc and rated them as highly representative of luxury consumption. Based on the successful pretest results, we continued to use the same experimental stimuli in the main study. Employee’s luxury appearance was manipulated at two levels: luxury brand label versus no brand label. This was based on the previous studies where luxury consumption was operationalized in the form of brand labels (Cannon & Rucker, 2019; Nelissen & Meijers, 2011) by showing the photo as well as verbally stating the brand label. A watch and pen were chosen for the object of the employee’s luxury appearance, as they are easily observable cues for customers during the interaction with the employee. In the luxury brand label condition, employees wore a highly recognizable luxury brand TAG Heuer watch (Garcia et al., 2019) and a Montblanc pen while helping the customer’s check-in process. On the contrary, in no brand label condition, the employee wore a watch with no visible label and used a generic hotel logo pen for the check-in. Both the color and the design of the watch and pen were identical except for the label (see Appendix A). To manipulate the level of operation, two levels were provided. In the two-star hotel condition, participants stayed in a two-star economy hotel and encountered a normal economy hotel atmosphere and basic facilities. In the five-star hotel condition, participants stayed in a five-star luxury hotel and encountered a luxurious atmosphere and sophisticated facilities. To control potential variables that may affect our dependent variable, the service quality (e.g., good and attentive service, enjoyable meal) was consistently provided in all conditions.

All measurement items were adopted from previous studies to ensure validity and reliability and measured on a 7-point Likert-type scale. To test the effect of the experimental manipulations, employee’s luxury appearance was measured with six items (Mende et al., 2018; α = .97), and the level of operation was measured with two items (α = .80). Impression management was measured with six items (Cannon & Rucker, 2019; α = .98), employee–customer rapport (personal connection) was measured with five items (Gremler & Gwinner, 2000; α = .93), and the behavioral intention was measured with two items (Wang & Mattila, 2015). As a control variable, lay belief about luxury consumption was measured with three items (Cannon & Rucker, 2019; α = .84). Lay belief about luxury consumption was added as a control variable as previous research revealed that an individual’s lay belief about luxury consumption can either attenuate or accelerate bias toward other’s luxury consumption (Cannon & Rucker, 2019). The reliability tests showed high internal reliability with Cronbach alpha values ranging from .80 to .98. Please see Appendix B for full items for all constructs.

Manipulation checks

A two-way ANOVA test was conducted with two manipulations as the independent variables and manipulation check questions as the dependent variable. The results show only a significant main effect of each manipulation on their respective manipulation check questions, and the means were in the intended direction as follows: employee’s luxury appearance, F(1, 184) = 86.23, p < .01, M_luxurybrand = 5.73 versus M_nobrand = 3.44, level of operation, F(1, 184) = 106.92, p < .01, M_2-star = 2.84 versus M_5-star = 5.34. In addition, realism check questions (i.e., “The scenario is realistic”) were asked to determine whether respondents perceived the situation as realistic. Respondents perceived the given scenario (M = 5.48, SD=1.13) as realistic. There was no significant interaction effect between two manipulations on manipulation check questions. Taken together, these results indicate successful manipulations.

Impression management

To examine the main effect of employee’s luxury appearance as well as the interaction effect of employee’s luxury appearance and level of operation on impression management, we conducted a two-way ANCOVA, controlling for lay belief about luxury consumption. The result from the ANCOVA of the main effect of employee’s luxury appearance was significant, F(1, 184) = 66.76, p < .001 (Table 1). Perception of impression management was higher under luxury brand label condition (M = 5.38, SE=.18) than no brand label condition (M = 3.37, SE=.17), supporting H1. However, there was no significant interaction effect between employee’s luxury appearance and level of operation on impression management, failing to support H2.

Table 1.

ANCOVA Result of Study 1.

Source	Impression Management
Source	F(1, 184)	p value
Lay belief	1.94	.165
Employee’s luxury appearance	66.76	.000
Level of operation	.796	.373
Employee’s luxury appearance × Level of operation	.443	.506

Note. ANCOVA = Analysis of covariance.

Mediation analysis: Rapport and behavioral intention

With the significant paths of ANCOVA result, a series of bootstrap tests of mediation (Model 4; Hayes, 2013) were conducted to examine the mediation effect of customer’s perception of impression management between the link of employee’s luxury appearance and employee–customer rapport as well as behavioral intention. Impression management mediated the relationship between employee’s luxury appearance and employee–customer rapport (95% CI = [.1085, .4633]) and behavioral intention (95% CI = [.0844, .4649]), supporting H5 and H6. That said, customers are less likely to build rapport with employees as well as less likely to visit the company when employees wear luxury brands, as it triggers the perception of impression management toward the employees.

Study 2

Research design and sample

A 2 (Employee’s luxury appearance: Luxury Brand vs. No Brand) × 2 (Employee luxury attitude: Elitism vs. Democrat) scenario-based between-subject factorial experiment was utilized (Figure 2). A total of 196 participants were recruited using the MTurk survey panel. Similar to Study 1, the participants were randomly assigned to a scenario whereby they go on a vacation in a hotel and start interacting with the front desk agent, and are asked to fill out a questionnaire. More than 70% of the respondents visit a hotel more than 4 times a year, demonstrating the suitability of the sample as having experience as hotel guests. The gender and age of participants were well-distributed among the sample, 65% of the respondents were Caucasian, and more than half earned more than US$50,000 per year.

Experimental stimuli and measures

Manipulation of employee’s luxury appearance and other controlling conditions (i.e., good and attentive service, enjoyable meal) was the same as Study 1. To manipulate employee luxury attitude, two levels (elitism vs. democratic) were provided based on Heine (2010). In the elitism condition, the employee treated the customer in an elegant and noble manner, and the tone of voice, body language, and facial expression the employee used seemed to be a perfectionist and flawless. While helping customers to check-in and explaining about the hotel facilities, the employee was distant and reserved. On the contrary, in the democratic condition, the employee treated the customer in a casual and relaxed manner and tone of voice, body language, and facial expressions the employee used seemed to be authentic and natural. While helping customers to check-in and explaining about the hotel facilities, the employee was approachable and open to the customer.

Manipulation checks

A two-way ANOVA test was conducted with two manipulations as the independent variable and manipulation check questions as the dependent variable. The results show only a significant main effect of each manipulation on their respective manipulation check questions, and the means were in the intended direction as followed: Employee’s luxury appearance, F(1, 194) = 75.95, p < .01, M_luxurybrand = 5.63 versus M_Nobrand = 3.67, employee attitude, F(1, 194) = 31.28, p<.01, M_Elitism= 5.60 versus M_Democratic = 4.78. Also, respondents perceived the given scenario (M = 5.76, SD = 1.03) as realistic. There was no significant interaction effect between two manipulations on manipulation check questions. Taken together, these results indicate successful manipulations.

Impression management

To examine the main effect of employee’s luxury appearance as well as the interaction effect of employee’s luxury appearance and employee attitude on impression management, we conducted a two-way ANCOVA, controlling for lay belief about luxury consumption. The main effect of employee’s luxury appearance on impression management was significant, F(1, 191) = 29.34, p < .001, supporting H1 (Table 2). Perception of impression management was higher under luxury brand label condition (M = 5.24, SE = .16) than no brand label condition (M = 4.08, SE = .14). In addition, there was a significant main effect of employee attitude on impression management, F(1, 191) = 8.52, p < .01, supporting H3. Perception of impression management was higher under the elitism condition (M = 4.97, SE = .15) than democratic condition (M = 4.34, SE = .15). The results from the ANCOVA of the interaction effect between employee’s luxury appearance and attitude was significant, F(1,191) = 4.53, p < .05, supporting H4. The simple main effect shows the difference in impression management as a result of employee attitude was significant under no brand label condition, F(1, 191) = 16.33, p < .001; M_Elitism= 4.62 versus M_democrat= 3.54, but was not significant under luxury brand label condition, F(1,191) = .224, p = .637; M_Elitism = 5.32 versus M_democrat= 5.15 (Figure 3). More specifically, there were no significant differences between employee’s elitism behavior and democratic behavior on impression management when employees are wearing luxury brands. However, respondents were more likely to perceive impression management when the employee shows elitism attitude compared to democratic attitude when employees are not wearing luxury brands. That being said, while wearing a luxury brand triggers impression management regardless of the luxury attitudes of the employees, an employee’s elitism attitude was a more significant trigger of impression management than the employee democratic attitude when the employee is not wearing luxury brands.

Table 2.

ANCOVA Results of Study 2.

Source	Impression Management
Source	F(1, 191)	p value
Lay belief	8.08	.005
Employee’s luxury appearance	29.34	.000
Employee attitude	8.52	.004
Employee’s Luxury Appearance × Employee Attitude	4.53	.035

Note. ANCOVA = Analysis of covariance.

Mediation analysis: Rapport and behavioral intention

With the significant paths of ANCOVA result, a series of bootstrap tests of mediation (Model 4; Hayes, 2013) were conducted to examine the mediation effect of customer’s perception of impression management toward employees. Similar to the result of Study 1, impression management mediated the relationship between employee’s luxury appearance and employee–customer rapport (95% CI = [.1558, .4796]). However, it did not mediate the relationship between an employee’s luxury appearance and behavioral intention (95% CI = [−.0164, .2044]). In addition, impression management mediated the relationship between employee elitism attitude and employee–customer rapport (95% CI = [.0741, .3330]), supporting H5 but not the relationship between employee elitism attitude and behavioral intention (95% CI = [−.0139, .1478]), failing to support H6.

Bootstrap tests of moderated mediation (Model 7; Hayes, 2013) were conducted to examine the mediation effect of impression management on the relationship between interaction effect of employee’s luxury appearance and employee attitude on employee–customer rapport and behavioral intention. Impression management mediated the employee’s luxury appearance and employee attitude interaction on employee–customer rapport (95% CI = [−.4575, −.0391]). The indirect effect of employee’s luxury appearance × employee attitude interaction on employee–customer rapport via impression management was significant under no brand condition (ab = .23, 95% CI=[.0786, .4530]). However, impression management did not mediate the relationship under the luxury brand condition (ab = .04, 95% CI = [−.0394, .1312]). When employees wear no brand, customers are less likely to build rapport with employees when they show elitism attitude as they perceive the employees are involving in impression management compared to democratic attitude. On the contrary, when employees wear luxury brands, customers are more likely to build rapport with employees when they show a democratic attitude as they perceive the employees are less likely to involve in impression management than elitism attitude. However, impression management did not mediate the employee’s luxury appearance and employee attitude interaction on behavioral intention.

Discussion of Results

A body of luxury consumption literature suggests that luxury consumption is a powerful and beneficial social signal for the actor who facilitates social interaction. In contrast to the perspective of favorable social consequences of luxury consumption, a different stream of research suggests that luxury consumption bears social costs to the actor (Mende et al., 2018). That being said, wearing luxury brands can either benefit or backfire the service provider depending on the situation whether elitism or warmth is necessary. Therefore, this study examines the impact of employee’s luxury cues by utilizing luxury appearance and elitism attitude on impression management and subsequently employee–customer rapport and behavioral intention. Both Study 1 and Study 2 provide evidence that employee luxury appearance bears social costs in a service environment. Respondents were less likely to build rapport with employees and less likely to revisit the company when employees wearing luxury brands compared to wearing no brands. We also reveal that negative reactions from the customers are driven by inferences of impression management intention. Contrary to our expectation, the level of operation did not attenuate the social costs of luxury appearance of employees. The potential explanation for the insignificant effect of level of operation may lie in the fact that an employee’s luxury appearance is a strong cue that dominates the formation of an impression on individual than the contextual condition.

The study results show that employees wearing luxury brands in their workplace increase customers ’ perceived impression management toward the employee, especially when employees show elitism behavior. In addition, when employees wear luxury brands, customers are more likely to build rapport with employees when they show a democratic attitude as they perceive the employees are less likely to involve in impression management than showing an elitism attitude. This is contrary to the previous literature in luxury consumption that being arrogant and rejecting customers in luxury retail stores would positively increase behavioral intention toward the firm (Ward & Dahl, 2014). It may also be important as a differentiating factor between product and service industries (Wirtz et al., 2020) as a hospitable attitude is paramount in services (Baker & Magnini, 2016). In addition, results find that an employee’s luxury appearance was a more significant trigger of impression management than the employee elitism attitude. This is grounded in the fact that tangible appearance elements can be the most effective to signal luxury (Wirtz et al., 2020). Customers were more likely to perceive impression management toward employees when the employee shows elitism attitude compared to democratic attitude only when employees are not wearing luxury brands. In other words, whether the employees show elitism attitude or democratic attitude, the formation of impression management was dominantly influenced by the visual cues, which is employees wearing luxury brand products.

Theoretical Implications

As an original work to examine the social costs of employee’s luxury appearance on the service interaction in the hospitality industry, this research expands upon the literature in several ways. First, this research contributes to the luxury branding literature. Surprisingly, the majority of research on luxury examines luxury goods and not luxury service experiences. Contrary to luxury goods literature, where the elitism-like attitude, being rejected or ignored by the service provider facilitates more positive attitudes and customers’ desire for the brand (Sinha & Lu, 2019; Ward & Dahl, 2014), our research finds that elitism attitude of employees has a devastating effect on employee–customer rapport and customer’s behavioral intention toward the company. As such, this study finds that luxury goods and services are distinct contexts and therefore should be treated from a different angle (Wirtz et al., 2020). While luxury goods refer to rarity and exclusivity, luxury experiences are an important area for specific experience-based research. As such, the research contributes theoretically to the luxury services literature through the examination of hospitality luxury service and the impact of an aesthetic appearance and luxury elitist attitude.

Second, the research contributes to the aesthetic labor and conspicuous consumption literature. Despite the fact that employee aesthetic appearances are important managerial practices (Wu et al., 2020), there is a dearth of literature that examines the impact of the aesthetic appearance of customer perceptions (K. Kim & Baker, 2019). Specifically, the findings build upon the aesthetic labor and appearance theories, such as signaling theory, conspicuous consumption theory, and impression management theory. In other words, while many firms are attempting to integrate luxury brands into employee and the hotel’s appearance, there is a lack of research that examines how employee luxury appearance signals luxury consumption. This is important as conspicuous consumption has not been examined with luxury services, and research is needed to examine the effects of different segments and customers (Wirtz et al., 2020). The results find that employees wearing and using luxury items significantly affects impression management and signals the luxury brand image. As such, the results build upon what we do not know surrounding the impact of employee luxury conspicuous consumption cues during service experiences.

Third, the results build upon the importance of employee attitude across different service experiences, specifically related to elitism versus democratic attitude. Elitism is a key characteristic of the luxury good brand literature (Sung et al., 2015). However, an elitism attitude is not representative of the very nature of hospitableness. As such, the results build upon the gaps in the luxury literature by examining the impact of employee elitism versus democratic warmth attitude. The luxury goods literature supports negative attitudes such as rejecting or being arrogant to the customers as it facilitates customers’ desire for the brand (Ward & Dahl, 2014). On the contrary, this study finds that in the hospitality and tourism industry, employee attitude that is aligned with the luxury characteristics (i.e., elitism) backfires on the relationship with the customer.

Fourth, the results build upon the rapport and behavior research, particularly related to different service luxury experiences. In the domain of luxury consumption, individuals who wear luxury brands are conferred greater status (J. Lee et al., 2015). However, the research is largely silent on how luxury consumption affects perceptions and behaviors associated with warmth or rapport (Cannon & Rucker, 2019). Therefore, this research builds upon the gaps surrounding the rapport research, as rapport is a critical factor that directly affects the interaction between customers and employees, and surprisingly little research examines the antecedents of rapport (K. Kim & Baker, 2019), particularly related to both appearance and attitude element. As the definition of luxury includes elitism, it is critical to understand the boundary conditions of luxury, elitism, and rapport. This is especially critical in hospitality organizations, as customer–employee rapport is a key variable to service delivery. Results find that when an employee uses luxury items and presents a warm (democratic) attitude, there is a higher level of rapport. Conversely, when there is no brand and there is an elitism attitude, there is a lower level of rapport.

Practical Implications

Practically, our research has several important implications for hospitality firms and managers. First, our findings provide meaningful implications for appearance standards. Hospitality guests expect an immaculate vacation experience and appearance matters, in both the services cape and with employees (Apium, 2021). Organizations should pay careful attention to the embodiment of a brand’s values when designing service aesthetics, such as how the employee should look. In other words, dress codes and appearance standards should be communicated to employees and customers based on the image the firm wants to convey. In the luxury sector, in particular, firms seek to have employees wear personal accessories that reflect brand status, such as by wearing conspicuous luxury items like luxury accessories (Wu et al., 2019).

Second, firms may want to increase alignment between the hospitality brand and other luxury brands. Tying luxury retail brands into hotel experiences is a current trend, as these hotels are increasingly popular with luxury travelers. Successful brand partnerships include Armani in Milan, Ferragamo Lugarno Collection, Tommy Hilfiger in Miami Beach, and Louis Vuitton in the Maldives (Moxley, 2018). As such, aligning luxury hotel brands, luxury products, and luxury experiences may be very beneficial to hoteliers. According to the Forbes Travel Guide, elements of luxury are one of the main evaluation criteria where every aspect of the experience, including employee appearance, should reflect luxury (Godfrey, 2020).

Third, it is important to consider how luxury appearance and attitude may come at the cost of rapport. However, our results find that brands should be used with caution when designing luxury brand cues. While employee luxury appearance strategy may be initiated as a strategy to align it with brand image, employees wearing luxury goods may have a penalty for building rapport with the customers, as it may increase employee’s intention for favorable impression management. Therefore, when developing the appearance standards, the company should avoid employees wearing accessories or outfits explicitly showing the logo or the luxury brand. Instead, the company can still show the luxurious dignity of employees by polishing the appearance of the employees.

Fourth, practical implications suggest management of employee attitude, particularly related to elitism versus democratic attitude. The luxury product literature finds that an elitism attitude can assist in positive customer behaviors, as exclusivity can be beneficial with products. However, the results of this research find that in hospitality experiences, such as hotel visits, this does not hold true. In other words, the very nature of hospitality services should be to be hospitable. As such, the attitude of employees is critical in how customers evaluate the overall experience. In particular, employees should seek to have a warm (democratic) and hospitable attitude, as opposed to an elitism attitude, despite the fact that elitism is representative of luxury goods. To do so, firms can revise training policies and include role-play and service scenarios that focus on warm and democratic hospitable service compared to elitist attitudes. This can be communicated through service performance rules, particularly related to service procedures and scripts.

Finally, firms should also be cognizant of how policies may affect implicit bias and discrimination. Our findings have implications for organizational guidelines of employee appearance and aesthetic standards. Most service firms implement dress codes and appearance policies to instruct employees how to “dress the part” (Mende et al., 2018). However, appearance standards can be linked to discrimination (Magnini et al., 2013), including gender and racial stereotyping (K. J. Kim et al., 2017). While appearance matters, it is critical to be cognizant of how appearance and aesthetic labor can affect employment decisions and customer perceptions (Magnini et al., 2013). As such, rules regarding luxury appearance need to be cognizant of how it represents the brand but also if it then has a bias to underrepresented minority groups. This is important to consider both in terms of Title VII appearance-based policies and in terms of nonconscious bias.

Limitations and Suggestions for Future Research

The current research has limitations as well as several other opportunities for further research that could encourage theory building across theoretical perspectives. While the research utilized an experimental design, which has a high amount of internal validity, future research should also seek to increase external validity through survey questionnaires and in-depth qualitative customer and employee feedback regarding luxury services. In addition, this research examined key variables of aesthetic labor by focusing on the employee’s luxury appearance and elitism behavior. Given that there many other employee cues that may affect employee–customer rapport in a service setting, future research should also delve deeper into other appearance and aesthetic characteristics related to luxury services, such as attractiveness, ethnicity, and dress code standards. Also, although we controlled for lay belief about luxury consumption, the future study may want to examine an individual’s value perception toward money or other contextual factors (i.e., employees’ grooming, style, and professionalism) that may affect impression formation toward employees. Furthermore, while this study revealed the mediating role of impression management that explains why customers are less likely to build rapport with the employees and revisit the company when employees show luxury consumption cues, future research should investigate other potential mechanism explaining the penalty effect of employee’s luxury consumption such as value or fairness perception. Finally, there is a dearth of luxury services research, so future research should build upon the current luxury good and product research and seek to understand the unique aspects of luxury service compared to luxury goods as well as future research with scale development and scale refinement related to luxury hospitality services and consumption.

Footnotes

Appendix A

Appendix B

Constructs and Scale items.

Constructs and scale items	α
Employee’s luxury appearance
The watch that staff was wearing in the scenario seem expensive/conspicuous/luxurious	.97
The pen that the staff used in the scenario seem expensive/ conspicuous/luxurious	.97
Level of operation
The hotel you visited was a 5-star luxury hotel	.80
The hotel you visited was a 2-star economy hotel	.80
Employee luxury attitude
The attitude of the employee was elegant/noble/distant/reserved/perfectionist/flawless	.80
Customer’s perceived impression management
The service provider is most likely wearing his watch to impress other people/show off/gain the approval of others (1 = not at all; 7 = very much)	.90
The service provider is most likely use his pen to impress other people/show off/gain the approval of others (1 = not at all; 7 = very much)	.90
Employee-customer rapport
I feel like there is a “bond” between this employee and myself	.93
I look forward to seeing this person when I visit the restaurant
I strongly care about this employee
This person has taken a personal interest in me
I have a close relationship with this person
Behavioral intention
How interested are you to dine at this restaurant again?	.88
How likely are you to eat at this restaurant in the future?	.88
Participant’s lay beliefs about luxury consumption
In general, people consume luxury bands to impress other people	.84
In general, people consume luxury brands to show off
In general, people consume luxury brands to gain the approval of others

Declaration of Conflicting Interests

The author(s) declared no potential conflicts of interest with respect to the research, authorship, or publication of this article.

Funding

The author(s) received no financial support for the research, authorship, or publication of this article.

ORCID iDs

Kawon Kim

Melissa A. Baker

Author Biographies

Kawon Kim, Ph.D. is an Assistant Professor at the School of Hotel, Restaurant, and Tourism Management in the College of Hospitality, Sports and Retail Management at the University of South Carolina. Her teaching focuses on foodservice and event management, and human resources management. Her main stream of research focuses on social and interpersonal influence in a service setting.

Melissa A. Baker, Ph.D. is an Associate Professor at the Department of Hospitality & Tourism Management in the Isenberg School of Management at the University of Massachusetts Amherst. She is a multi-award winning teacher focusing on service experience management, food and beverage management, and human resources management. Her research focuses on service experience management with a concentration on service failure and recovery and appearance and impression formation.

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