Journal articles on the topic 'E-commerce marketing mix'

In recent years, the Internet has changed the way we sell and manufacture products, and manage suppliers, customers, and employees. But, the Internet has also made opaque exchanges and fierce competition. The Internet provides an opportunity for direct communication between the enterprise and consumers, which helps to eliminate the barriers that the media are. Thanks to the Internet, the client has more opportunities: to accurately indicate his expectations, the style of the product he is looking for before moving on to the purchase. This change occurs not only at the level of the supplier and client, but also at the level of marketing tools that enterprises use to promote their goods and services. Our goal is to show the methods of electronic integrated marketing, as well as determine which complex provides more opportunities for electronic marketing.

Original Published AbstractConsidering the importance of marketing strategies in a competitive environment dominated by E-commerce and also limit the effective implementation of research results in terms of marketing mix in e-participation, can manage sales and marketing in order to implement effective marketing strategies and ultimately achieve organizational goals Sector clients and helped the market. Main focus marketing strategies, coordinate activities and allocate appropriate resources to provide marketing operational objectives of the company as a particular product market. Therefore, the main issue related to the realm of marketing strategy, include the specific purpose of determining property markets for a product family or a particular product, then, through the corporate marketing mix according to needs and demands of potential customers in its target market, competitive advantage search And creating synergy are. Considering the importance of marketing strategies in a competitive environment dominated by Electronic markets and also limit the effective implementation of research results in terms of marketing mix in e-participation, can manage sales and marketing in order to implement effective marketing strategies and ultimately achieve organizational goals Sector clients and helped the market. This study usesMcCarthy’s four marketing mix model and Porter’s five competitive forces model to identify strategies for Internetcompanies that respond to the five competitive forces and thereby achieve a competitive advantage. The study provides significant new insights into the development and implementation of e-business strategies that contribute to increased profit. Corrected AbstractE-commerce is growing worldwide and is considered one of the modes and methods of business. This initiative led to the creation of new firms has several advantages over using benefits and this is the motivation for this phenomenon. While e-commerce success in attracting customers for their goods and services, due to systematic scientific principles and techniques that utilize the marketing strategies say . Marketing strategies in electronic markets, it is one of the important issues in the field of new market research has been discussed. But in this very diverse field of view is presented. On the other hand, given that little research has been done in this area , So consider this strategy has increased the importance of, Entering the world of electronic commerce and the use of modern tools and technology in new areas of business, firms will be forced to employ new business strategies, to prepare for their new competitive pressures. The results show that in the domain of e-commerce, two PORTER 'S FIVE COMPETITIVE FORCES AND MCCARTHY ' S FOUR MARKETING MIX MODEL been instrumental in the formulation and development of marketing strategies. And variables used in the model to identify and prioritize and execute marketing strategies in the field of e-commerce is essential. Keywords : marketing, strategies, e-commerce, porter's five competitive forces ,mccarthy's four marketing mix model

The future development of tourism marketing should focus on marketing model for the Chinese market through the use of reasonable technical, find a more accurate, more effective way of marketing to product higher profit margins, but also provide more personalized of the product for consumers, and ultimately achieve long-term growth of tourism economy.This paper discuss the innovation of e-commerce tourism in following four aspects: the innovation of marketing model based on travel agency characteristics, the application of marketing method based on media characteristics, The evaluation innovation of travel agency based on marketing mix model and the innovation of marketing model of travel agency.

In 2014 Indonesia has some young leaders who are well-known as a businessman in the field of e-commerce on the scope of South-East Asia. Therefore, this study aims to Determine the marketing communication strategy of e-commerce in using social networking sites namely Facebook, but anyway the government did not have any collection of data about e- commerce activities. Data source in this study is as much as three informants from community members who use Facebook doing e-commerce for selling sports equipment. The data analysis technique used is the depth interview. The Results Showed that E-commerce in Facebook classified to direct the marketing communications mix Showed Because this study informants that use only the medium of Facebook to promote Reviews their e-commerce activity. E- commerce activities are performed as informants Also inspired by other friends who has already doing e-commerce there. The success of the predecessor as well as has motivated them to Participate in implementing e-commerce activities.

The rapid growth in internet users in Indonesia makes the e-commerce business increasingly fierce by business people. UKM I Sun Vera is one of the UKM that develops e-commerce marketing business of processed aloe vera products, but in the implementation of UKM I Sun Vera still experience some obstacles such as sales promotions carried out less than the maximum, less skilled labor, limited knowledge of applications or online business systems so that consumer purchasing decisions in e-commerce are low on the product I SUN VERA. The purpose of this study was to analyze the effect of aloe vera marketing mix on the purchasing decision of e-commerce UKM I Sun Vera. This study used a survey method with quantitative descriptive analysis namely Structural Equation Modeling (SEM) with LISREL 8.80 software. Sampling technique used on this research is purposive sampling, that involved 110 respondents. Data were collected through e-questionnaire with google form. The results showed that the variable marketing mix of products, prices and processes influence purchasing decisions. UKM I Sun Vera must pay attention to the nutritional content of the product on the packaging and add variety to the product uploaded in online marketing media. Sun Vera I SMEs must also pay attention to the affordability of product prices by making product innovations in various sizes and shapes and by adding online payment alternatives to facilitate consumers in terms of payment such as Dana, Gopay, Alfamart / Indomaret, Cash On Delivery and others.

ABSTRACTConventional market transformation into a digital market is influenced by the development of E-commerce technology. Conventional marketing previously used as a marketing media has diminished with the presence of E-commerce technology, conventional market considered to have a shortage in terms of high costs and narrow market reach. The presence of E-commerce is able to expand the market with internet media as a distribution of information to prospective customers. The results of this study found Avilla Group to deal with competitors. Avilla Group using offline and Online market mix techniques in the process of marketing rooms. The offline market is still maintained for maintenance purposes for some customers who have more trust in offline travel agents. The average occupancy rate of units consists of 40% offline and 60% online. E-commerce marketing on Avilla Group is supported by 2 main systems, which are internal system and the Channel manager. The results of SWOT analysts obtain system development innovation instruments to face competitors can be developed on internal systems, so that the strength and opportunities of the online market can be maximized which has an impact on optimal room occupancy rates.

E-commerce conceivable future trade, consumption, and service is a new digital employer mode. Therefore, in order to decorate the customary natural environment of operation, it is quintessential to get rid of the preferred desktop in the true field, create a social logistics and transportation administration computing device with commodity agents and distributors as the key features, and mix freight logistics, business enterprise approach waft and data waft advertising and marketing, and advertising and marketing organically. The notion of e-commerce logistics looks alongside the enchantment vogue of neighborhood technological knowledge and social demand. It is an integral part of ending e-commerce authentic economic value. All kinds of cell networks clear up the problem of data flow communication; in the technological know-how of telephone network, digital cost solves the bother of capital flow; at present, logistics is however a long-standing problem of e-commerce. Logistics has grown to be the last and entirely bottleneck of e-commerce. If logistics cannot adapt to the enchantment of e-commerce, it may also additionally lead to the slow enchantment of e-commerce. The purpose of this paper is to supply an Internet of things (IoT) e-commerce logistics cloud provider platform based totally absolutely on cell communication, which can be combined with e-commerce and beautify the transport tempo of e-commerce. This paper moreover optimizes the e-commerce logistics system, so that it can combine with e-commerce to increase out the distribution of goods, the distribution tempo of e-commerce is doubled, and e-commerce can in a similar fashion develop rapidly.

Micro, Small, and Medium Enterprises or MSMEs contribute to domestic economic growth. However, in the course of business, MSMEs still have obstacles. From the standpoint of internal, namely aspects of non-financial capacity such as management, personnel, marketing, and production, as well as financial aspects such as access to sources of financing, profitability management, and profit growth. External factors, namely political, economic, social, technological, and health situations, have an impact on the stability of business performance. Advances in technology, supported by infrastructure and ease of regulation, have encouraged the growth and development of digital-based businesses. This business coaching method focused on the activities at XYZ's Crackers Business, an Indonesian MSME. The purpose of this business coaching activity is to develop marketing channels for XYZ businesses. Data was collected through interviews, observations and surveys. The data is then collected and analyzed through Business Model Canvas analysis, SWOT and TOWS Business Model Canvas analysis, PESTEL analysis, market opportunity analysis (STP), Marketing Mix analysis, and Gap analysis. The solution obtained is to improve the business model, namely the channel element in the form of adding an online store through e-commerce.

Brazil has the second largest e-commerce market in the world. One model used in this sector is "collective buying", a feature of which is impulse sales. Consumer behavior can be influenced by several factors, two of which are addressed in this article: the individual impulsivity of consumers and strategies of mix marketing. Impulsive buying is characterized by an unplanned purchase, i.e. the need to acquire the product arises just before the purchase. Consumers respond differently to mixed strategies depending on their degree of impulsivity. Thus, this article aims to analyze the efficacy of different marketing mix strategies for impulsive and non-impulsive consumer purchasing behavior. 137 participants were given a questionnaire containing the Buying Impulsiveness scale from Rook and Fisher (1995), and statements about the marketing strategies used by collective buying sites. Through a regression analysis, three strategies were found to relate more to impulsivity: search for products from well-known brands, search for deals with big discounts and confidence in receiving the product. For e-commerce and researchers, this study elucidates which strategies, from the consumer's perspective, effectively persuade purchasing behavior.DOI: 10.5585/remark.v13i3.2646

One of The main problem faced by rice farmers is the marketing of agricultural products. To overcome these problems, Village Owned Enterprises (BUMDes) form a marketing agency, namely 'Swadesa' with on-line (e-commerce) and off-line (shop) systems. This study aims to analyze the role of Swadesa marketing institutions in improving the income of rice farmers. This research used qualitative and quantitative approaches (mix method). The research was conducted in Panggungharjo Village, Sewon District, Bantul Regency, Yogyakarta in March to October 2017. The results showed that this marketing agency could not run properly, so the purpose to increase farmer's income has not been achieved. Various obstacles that hinder the development of these marketing institutions, among others: lack of capital, lack of human resources (HR), low interest of farmers to sell crops, and digital iliteracy in rice farmers. Operational policies are needed in terms of increasing marketing agency access to capital sources; e-commerce utilization training; and more intensive socialization about the advantages of an on-line based marketing system.

The growth rate of e-commerce in Indonesia is high. The condition could be seen on the competition map between marketplaces in Indonesia. Bukalapak was one of the top three marketplaces in Indonesia that has seen the most significant decrease in visitor numbers in 2019, at 26 percent precisely. Organizations should formulate marketing strategies in accordance with marketing mix determined based on market analysis to survive in the competitive field. This research aims to analyze consumer perceptions of marketing mix and purchase decision on Bukalapak, analyze marketing mix factors that influence purchase decision on Bukalapak, and formulate marketing strategies to hold back the decline in Bukalapak visitor numbers. The research data were analyzed using Structural Equation Modeling and presented descriptively. The results showed that 66 percent of consumers rated products on Bukalapak had excellent features, 72 percent of consumers rated prices on Bukalapak were reasonable, 64 percent of consumers rated payment methods on Bukalapak were in variety, and shipping discount on Bukalapak was attractive. The marketing mix factors that significantly influenced purchase decision on Bukalapak were place and price. Recommended marketing strategies to hold back the decline in Bukalapak visitors were increasing price variations and optimizing mobile application speeds.

E-commerce with the highest number of users in Indonesia is Shopee and last year Shopee managed to break the record for most sales transactions in one day in seven countries. So from that this study intends to find out how consumer motivation and marketing mix that Shopee does contribute to the purchasing decision making process. The population in this study is the millennial city of Karawang city with a sample of 175 respondents. Sampling is done by non-probability sampling technique that is snowball. Data analysis method used is multiple linear regression test. Based on the results of these tests, the motivation variable and marketing mix simultaneously and partially have a positive and significant correlation to the Shopee consumer purchasing decision making process in Karawang with a correlation coefficient of 0.859. The motivation variable contribution and marketing mix amounted to 73.8% of the consumer purchasing decision process and 26.2% was contributed by other variables. Keywords: Motivation, Marketing Mix, Decision Making Process. E-commerce dengan jumlah pengguna tertinggi di Indonesia adalah Shopee dan tahun lalu Shopee berhasil memecahkan rekor untuk sebagian besar transaksi penjualan dalam satu hari di tujuh negara. Maka dari itu penelitian ini bermaksud untuk mengetahui bagaimana motivasi konsumen dan bauran pemasaran yang Shopee berkontribusi terhadap proses pengambilan keputusan pembelian. Populasi dalam penelitian ini adalah kota seribu tahun di kota Karawang dengan sampel 175 responden. Pengambilan sampel dilakukan dengan teknik non-probability sampling yaitu bola salju. Metode analisis data yang digunakan adalah uji regresi linier berganda. Berdasarkan hasil pengujian ini, variabel motivasi dan bauran pemasaran secara simultan dan parsial memiliki korelasi positif dan signifikan terhadap proses pengambilan keputusan pembelian konsumen Shopee di Karawang dengan koefisien korelasi 0,859. Kontribusi variabel motivasi dan bauran pemasaran sebesar 73,8% dari proses keputusan pembelian konsumen dan 26,2% disumbangkan oleh variabel lain. Kata Kunci: Motivasi, Bauran Pemasaran, Proses Keputusan Membeli.

The development of internet technology is increasing. With fast internet technology, Indonesian people's spending patterns are shifting. Shopping activities that used to only be through stores directly, but by using internet technology known as online shopping. Online Shopping can be accessed through digital applications known as e-commerce applications. One of the well-known e-commerce sites in Indonesia is Shopee. In this case, the formulation of the problem in this research is to study the marketing communication strategy undertaken by Shopee and the implementation of Shopee marketing communication. The theoretical foundation used in this research is marketing communication, and SOSTAC analysis. The consideration method used in this study is a qualitative approach. The resource persons in this study are Yoga Pratama, who are Shopee Business Development and Shopee users with different needs. The results of this study indicate that the optimal use of the marketing communication mix consists of advertising (advertising) and sales promotion (sales promotion).Perkembangan teknologi internet semakin hari semakin berkembang pesat. Adanya teknologi internet yang pesat, pola belanja masyarakat Indonesia bergeser. Kegiatan belanja yang dulu hanya bisa melalui toko secara langsung, tetapi dengan menggunakan teknologi internet dikenal dengan istilah online shopping. Belanja secara daring (online) dapat diakses melalui aplikasi digital yang dikenal dengan istilah aplikasi e-commerce. Salah satu e-commerce yang ternama di Indonesia adalah Shopee. Dalam hal ini, terdapat perumusan masalah dalam penelitian ini adalah untuk mengetahui strategi komunikasi pemasaran yang dilakukan oleh Shopee serta pelaksanaan komunikasi pemasaran Shopee. Landasan teori yang digunakan dalam penelitian ini adalah komunikasi pemasaran, dan analisis SOSTAC. Metode pendekatan yang digunakan dalam penelitian ini adalah pendekatan kualitatif. Narasumber dalam penelitian ini adalah Yoga Pratama yang merupakan Business Development Shopee dan pengguna Shopee dengan kebutuhan yang berbeda. Hasil penelitian ini menunjukkan bahwa penggunaan bauran komunikasi pemasaran yang optimal yaitu berupa iklan (advertising) dan promosi penjualan (sales promotion).

This paper aims to identify digital marketing elements, to analyze and to study the industry‘s degree of knowledge regarding digital marketing, as well as the degree of use of digital technology in the marketing mix of small and medium enterprises(SME‘s) in Romania. First of all, the basic concepts of digital marketing will be defined and analyzed: e-bussines, e-commerce and e-marketing, and then, in order to identify the degree of knowledge of these elements as well as the degree of use in the promotion process, a statistical research was carried out which had the following objectives: to determine the degree to which SMEs in Romania know the concepts of digital marketing; to identify whether these organizations have developed digital marketing strategies; to identify whether there are people or groups of people who are responsible for digital marketing activities at the organization level.

Despite rapid and sustained development of electronic commerce, many companies doing e-business are still in the investment and brand-building phase and have yet to show a profit. However, as e-businesses shift their focus from building a customer base to increasing revenue growth and profitability, they should reevaluate their current business strategies, if any, and develop strategies that provide a clear path to profitability. This study uses McCarthy’s four marketing mix model and Porter’s five competitive forces model to identify strategies for Internet companies that respond to the five competitive forces and thereby achieve a competitive advantage. The study provides significant new insights into the development and implementation of e-business strategies that contribute to increased profit.

Pertumbuhan pengguna internet di Indonesia merupakan salah satu yang tertinggi di dunia. Secara langsung, hal tersebut juga memiliki dampat terhadap pertumbuhaan transaksi online melalui e-commerce. Mayoritas pelaku e-commerce merupakan UKM. Hingga saat ini, peran UKM telah terbukti mampu menggerakan roda perekonomian dalam negeri. Marketplace online, sebagai salah satu pilihan e-commerce, memiliki peran yang sentral dalam menarik UKM untuk berperan dalam perdangan online. Namun demikian, masih terdapat beberapa kendala terkait minat pembelian online yang dirasakan oleh konsumen. Kendala tersebut merupakan faktor penghambat pertumbuhan pembelanjaan online. Oleh karena itu, penelitian ini dilakukan untuk dapat mencari faktor-faktor yang secara langsung dapat meningkatkan minat beli konsumen untuk melakukan pembelanjaan online. Penelitian ini dilakukan di Kota Bandung dengan asumsi bahwa Kota Bandung merupakan salah satu kota besar di Indonesia yang telah terbiasa melakukan pembelian online. Berdasarkan hasil penelitian, diperoleh kesimpulan bahwa terdapat tiga dimensi e-marketing mix yang berpengaruh secara positif dan signifikan terhadap minat beli yaitu e-price, e-promotion, dan e-place. Ketiga dimensi tersebut perlu untuk dijadikan prioritas bagi pelaku bisnis online, khususnya pada saluran distribusi digital marketplace, dalam merancang strategi penjualan mereka.

The purpose of this study was to determine the appropriate marketing strategy to increase sales volume at MSME South Tangerang, to find out which Brand Community could improve purchasing decisions at MSME South Tangerang and to find out marketing strategies and Brand Community that could increase sales at MSME South Tangerang. The method used for this research is the mix methods method. The population in this study is the population of all MSMEs in the South Tangerang area, and the sample we use is the MSMEs who are members of a Tangsel community called Tangsel Berkibar which number more than 500 MSME members. Because the population is too large, namely more than 100 people and limited time and personnel, the number of samples taken by the researcher is 50 respondents in that population. Where according to Arikunto (2002: 112) if the population is more than 100 then 5-10% or 20-30% of the population is taken. The statistical analysis used was the classical assumption test and multiple linear regression using the SPSS 26 program.The results obtained were that there was a partially significant influence between E-commerce Marketing on the Sales of South Tangerang MSMEs, there was a partially significant effect between Brand Community and the Sales of Tangerang MSMEs. South and there is a significant influence simultaneously between E-commerce Marketing and Brand Community on the Sales of South Tangerang MSMEs.

Kemajuan teknologi informasi, khususnya Internet hampir merubah semua bidang, salah satunya dunia bisnis. Perubahan cara pandang dalam berbisnis ini yang ikut mendukung timbulnya perusahaan e-commerce, dan salah satunya adalah Qoo10. Penelitian ini bertujuan untuk (1) mengetahui strategi komunikasi pemasaran perusahaan, (2) mengetahui bentuk-bentuk komunikasi pemasara perusahaan, dan (3) melihat latarbelakang pemilihan strategi komunikasi pemasaran tersebut. Penelitian ini bersifat kualitatif dengan pendekatan deskriptif evaluatif karena lebih memfokuskan pada aspek kealamiahan data. Pengumpulan data dilakukan dengan cara (1) penelitian perpustakaan, (2) wawancara mendalam dengan informan kunci yang bertujuan untuk memperoleh perspektif tentang strategi komunikasi pemasaran serta sejauh mana pemanfaatan dari fasilitas-fasilitas yang ada pada B2B(Bussiness to Bussiness) e-commerce, dan (3) penelitian lapangan. Untuk menganalisa suatu strategi komunikasi pemasaran, dipengaruhi oleh banyak faktor, yaitu (1) faktor ekstemal dan intemal perusahaan diperlukan untuk menganalisa kekuatan, kelemahan, peluang dan ancaman pada suatu perusahaan atau SWOT analisis, (2) pemilihan target pasar, segmentasi dan memposisikan produk perusahaan atau STP, (3) bauran pemasaran yang digunakan atau marketing mix, (4) promotion mix atau communication tools yang dipergunakan. Berdasarkan hasil wawancara dan penelitian dilapangan, ditemukan bahwa, pentingnya strategi komunikasi pemasaaran yang didukung oleh perencanaan dan strategi pemasaran dengan menganalisis lingkungan (faktor internal dan eksternal). Peranan strategi komunikasi pemasaran yang dihasilkan melalui situasi dan kondisi perusahaan dapat membuat suatu perusahaan tetap eksis dan dapat terus meningkatkan keunggulan dalam bidang bisnisnya.

Abstract: Pekalongan city is one of the produce regions batik. Geographically, small industry and large garment industry compete in the marketing of Pekalongan batik spread and extends beyond Pekalongan. Promotion strategy itself is the best combination of variables advertising, personall selling, promotions and other publicity semuanaya planned to achieve sales program. The type of research is a field research. The approach used in the study is a qualitative approach, the research procedures that produce descriptive data, in the form of words written or spoken of the people and observed behavior. Batik industry in Pekalongan in the implementation of the strategy promotion strategy promotional mix or promotional mix (promotional mix) that is noticed and keep the blend of Personal selling by opening stores or shop and email services for e-commerce, advertising to advertise in several electronic media and newspapers, sales promotion with several exhibitions held in Pekalongan Pekalongan and outside the city, and publicity by utilizing the internet.Abstrak: Kota Pekalongan adalah salah satu daerah penghasil batik. Secara geografis, Industri kecil maupun industri konveksi besar bersaing dalam pemasaran batik Pekalongan yang menyebar dan meluas di luar Kota Pekalongan. Strategi promosi sendiri merupakan kombinasi yang paling baik dari variable-variabel periklanan, personall selling ,promosi dan publisitas yang lain yang semuanaya direncanakan untuk mencapai tujuan program penjualan. Jenis penelitian yang digunakan adalah penelitian lapangan (field research). Pendekatan yang digunakan dalam penelitian adalah pendekatan kualitatif, prosedur penelitian yang menghasilkan data-data deskriptif. Industri batik di pekalongan dalam pelaksanaan strategi promosinya menggunakan strategi bauran promosi atau promotional mix (bauran promosi) yaitu memperhatikan dan menjaga perpaduan antara Personal selling dengan membuka gerai atau toko dan layanan email untuk e-commerce, advertising dengan mengiklankan dibeberapa media elektronik maupun surat kabar, promosi penjualan dengan beberapa pameran yang diadakan di pekalongan maupun diluar kota pekalongan, dan publisitas dengan cara memanfaatkan internet.

Kemajuan teknologi dan Internet mempengaruhi perubahan gaya hidup di Indonesia. Perubahan dari retail ke digital juga sangat kentara saat ini dengan kemajuan sosial media dan E-commerce-nya, salah satunya adalah penggunaan Instagram sebagai media promosi. Mengacu kepada Promotion Mix, promosi yang dilakukan untuk meningkatkan penjualan di Instagram oleh PT Infia Niaga Digital terbagi menjadi konten campaign (promotion sales) dan konten produk (advertising). Tujuan dari penelitian ini adalah untuk mengukur pengaruh konten campaign dan konten produk terhadap penjualan di PT Infia Niaga Digital. Penelitian ini menggunakan Regresi Linear Berganda dimana terdapat dua atau lebih variabel yang mempengaruhi Variabel yang digunakan dalam penelitian ini adalah Insight pada Instagram berupa likes, comment dan impression sebagai variabel dengan adalah Penjualan. Dengan menggunakan aplikasi SPSS, hasil yang didapatkan dari penelitian ini adalah promosi di Instagram dengan marketing mix yaitu konten campaign tidak berpengaruh terhadap penjualan dengan besar pengaruh 3,4% secara simultan sedangkan konten produk juga tidak berpengaruh terhadap penjualan dan berpengaruh terhadap penjualan sebesar 7,7% secara simultan.

The penetration of online booking among hotels has been growing steadily. In order to maintain its market position, online travel agencies (OTAs) are offering small and medium hotels, mainly to those which have not yet adopted e-commerce, their own booking engines for websites or as apps to be integrated on hotels' platforms. Hotels are persuaded by cuts in commission, no commissions and other privileges. The implications of such a decision are of crucial importance to hotels in the struggle for tourists. This article presents a new classification of tourism e-distribution which includes this phenomenon named “delegate distribution”, a partnership strategy of OTA-s with hoteliers drawing on a study on the expansion of delegated distribution in Croatia. The key advantages and disadvantages are also listed, along with a comparison with direct and indirect forms of distribution in terms of inference upon other marketing mix elements.

The main purpose of the article is to determine the main current trends and factors of digitalization of the tourism industry, which have a significant impact on the efficiency and increase the performance of economic entities in the tourism industry of Ukraine. The theoretical and methodological basis of the study consisted of the publications of the economists, who analyzed the problems of formation and prospects for the development of Internet marketing. A monographic method was used to cover the scientists’ views on the research issue. Correlation and regression methods of analysis were tested in determining the factors of digitization. The article systematizes the dynamics of the development of the tourism industry and indicators of the economic activity of tourist enterprises in the global and national context. It is determined that due to the intensification of crises and quarantine measures caused by the spread of СOVID-19, the number and expenditures of tourists on entertainment, the income of tourist enterprises, the number of people employed in the tourism industry have significantly decreased. At the same time, the process of digitalization of the studied industry has accelerated in terms of the growth of investments aimed at the development of marketing startups of a digitalization nature. The evolution of marketing approaches to the digitalization of tourism industry enterprises is theoretically comprehended. The main stages include traditional individual tour operators, e-business, e-commerce, smart tourism. It is concluded that domestic enterprises of the tourism industry lag significantly behind similar business entities in terms of the process of digitalization of economic processes and marketing mix. The factors of digitalization of the marketing activity of tourist enterprises are generalized. The results of factor analysis on the importance of using elements of digitalization in the marketing activities of tourism enterprises of Ukraine are analyzed and visualized. It is determined that the most significant influence on the effectiveness of marketing activities using elements of digitalization in the tourism industry of Ukraine is exerted by such factors as: chatbots based on artificial intelligence, voice search and voice control, virtual reality, augmented reality, internet of things, robots, contactless payments, cyber-security measures, recognition technology, large data sets, artificial intelligence.

This research to determine the competitive position based on the Boston Consulting Group matrix, to find out internal variables including strengths and weaknesses as well as external variables including opportunities and threats and to find out relevant marketing mix strategies to increase the number of visits. The study was conducted at Handara Golf and Resort in Bedugul Bali. Data analysis techniques used are the Boston Consulting Group matrix analysis and SWOT analysis. The analysis shows that using BCG matrix analysis, the company is in the position of dogs with a growth rate of 7.09% and an analysis of market share of 0.17. Using a SWOT analysis shows that the most dominant external opportunity variable with the acquisition of 3.80 results. Where the opportunity indicator is an increase in the number of tourists, growth in online sales, buyers want more images in electronic commerce or e-commerce when buying a product, most of the time on mobile devices is used, social media plays a major role in the distribution of most of the time used on mobile devices, technological advances over the use of social media, per capita income growing in Indonesia, located in the Pacific Ring of Fire, new regulations from Bank Indonesia. While the threat indicator is providing alternative tourist attractions throughout Indonesia to tourists other than in Bali and losing followers in the social media, it can be concluded that companies need to implement a turn-around strategy because external opportunities are more oriented to supporting the company's Handara Golf and Resort Bali.

Learning outcomes The learning outcomes of this case are product innovation, the importance of consumer insights and data in marketing and the role of consumer insights in brand revival. Case overview/synopsis This case study is a fascinating look into how the shift from music compact disc (CDs) to streaming has completely changed consumer behavior. This change in attitude led many music labels down one of two paths as follows: shutting down the business or embracing new business models. The case study aims to bring out essential learning from a company, Saregama, that was on the verge of shutting down because of the losses incurred with the shift in consumer behavior from buying music CDs to streaming music for free on every smart device. This shift led most record companies to become shuttered. However, not all were as fortunate as Saregama, who threaded its way toward profitability. This case analyzes how Saregama turned from a loss-making business unit into a profit center by launching a breakthrough product backed by innovative thinking and strong consumer research. The researcher opted for secondary research based on reports from Deloitte and McKinsey & Company and other credible sources to understand the music streaming market in India. The study also includes excerpts from the interview of Vikram Mehra (MD of Saregama India Ltd.) to various media houses and customer reviews on e-commerce sites. Complexity academic level The case is relevant for learners studying for an undergraduate or graduate program and for discussions for modules such as marketing management and international marketing with a focus on product development and strategy. Applicability the case will provide the following exposure to the learners: the difference between corporate and marketing objectives; Using frameworks such as valuable, rare, inimitable, and organization and SAP-LAP to understand the rationale behind strategic decisions; An understanding of the importance of listening to consumers; Using the right marketing elements such as segmentation, targeting and positioning and marketing mix for a competitive marketing strategy. Supplementary materials Teaching notes are available for educators only. Subject code CSS: 8 Marketing.

PT Kereta Api Indonesia (KAI) is a railway transportation service provider in Indonesia. In 2019, KAI launched railway courier service to support logistic sector, called Rail Express. Despite the advantages of railway courier service in providing low-cost fee and minimum risk of time delay and accident, low market penetration indicates brand awareness in the market is still very low. The main objective of this study is to develop customer-based brand equity strategy for railway courier service, by using Rail Express as the case to carry out the research. This study used a series of qualitative method research to fully comprehend the business situation and propose the solution to the business problem. First, in-depth interviews were conducted to the management and staff of KAI to assess external and internal environments of railway courier service. Second, focus group discussions were conducted to gain consumers’ insight related to brand awareness and brand image of Rail Express. The discussion was attended by 16 participants that represent Rail Express target market of e-commerce buyer and seller. Third, this study used TOWS matrix to generate business solution alternatives based on previous analysis findings. As the result, this study formulated three main strategies to build customer-based brand equity: first, integrated marketing communication to establish brand awareness by increasing brand recall and brand recognition; second, brand repositioning to establish brand image by developing brand associations related to positive image and technology; and third, improvement on existing marketing mix, i.e., product, distribution channel, and price strategies.

Online purchasing decisions are online consumer behavior and are an interesting phenomenon in research. This study aims to prove the concept that online consumer purchasing decisions are influenced by cognitive learning behavior. The main theory underlying this research is consumer behavior and learning. Learning theory is used to analyze consumer learning behavior online with a mix of (crossing) learning theories of behavior and cognitive learning theory. Combination (crossing) between behavioral learning theory, cognitive is called cognitive learning behavior (cognitive learning behavior). This research is a survey. The data used are primary data, with the research instrument in the form of a questionnaire. The subjects of this study are individuals namely online consumers. Online consumers in this study are millennial generation who have made online purchases on one of the e-commerce sites in Indonesia (Matahari.mall, bukalapak, tokopedia, shopee, Zilingo) with this type of product is fashion. In this study 200 respondents were selected. The study consisted of organic stimulation of marketing on the website, online purchasing decisions, cognitive learning, experience preferences. Convenience sampling sampling technique is a sampling method where sampling is based on the availability of elements and the ease of obtaining them. Collecting data with online questionnaires and distributing questionnaires through whatsapp to respondents who are easily contacted by researchers. Data analysis methods with 1) test data quality instruments (validity and reliability), 2) Analysis of Descriptive Statistics and 3) Model Analysis with SEM. The results showed that 1) Organic stimulation of marketing on the website had a positive and significant effect on cognitive learning, 2)experience preference had a positive and significant effect on cognitive learning, 3)cognitive learning had a positive and not significant effect on online purchasing decisions, 4) experience preference had a positive and not significant effect on online purchasing decisions, 5) Organic stimulation of marketing on the website had a positive and significant effect on online purchasing decisions.

The problems and prospects of insurance development in the internet are considered in the article. Considerable attention in the research is paid to the theoretical aspects of the essence of «internet insurance». The main stages of the insurance process through the internet and the key requirements that apply to the insurer and the insured when completing the insurance contract are described. It is determined that for the insurance company key advantages in the organization of virtual business are: lower costs associated with the organization of the company's website; lower transaction costs for customer service operations; expansion of geographical diversification of company insurance products; an opportunity to increase the sale of insurance products at the expense of open access to customers from around the world; customer service on a qualitatively new level – seven days a week, 365 days a year. The analysis of the insurance products market in the internet was conducted. The study found that insurance services offered through the internet in Ukraine include property, personal insurance and liability insurance. The most widespread in Ukraine are such insurance products as insurance for travelling abroad, medical insurance, CASCO, compulsory insurance of civil liability of owners of land vehicles, insurance of property of individuals, etc. The easiest procedure for purchasing a policy among all of these is auto insurance. The key attention is paid to ways of improving the mechanism of providing internet insurance. In the course of the study, specific directions for developing an e-commerce strategy for insurance companies based on SWOT-analysis were improved; developed an algorithm for strategic management of the insurance company and a conceptual model of interaction between the insurer and the insured in the framework of the process of strategic marketing planning in the market of internet services. An important role in the processes of management of the insurer was given to the complex of marketing communications, namely the elements of the marketing mix: «product», «price», «sales», «promotion». It is determined that for entering an insurance company into the market of internet services, the subject of planning is the outline of the main goals regarding sales and income received, as well as the definition of their potential consumers (market segment), the forming of their own image and reputation. Keywords: internet insurance, insurer, on-line insurance, virtual economy, internet services.

Most of the livelihoods of Sukodono Village’s people, Pujer District, Bondowoso Regency are farming; various kinds of agricultural products produced by the residents of Sukodono Village are white AC sweet potato. But, the yield of many white AC sweet potatoes which is not sold well causes decays and makes farmers give up. When I was a field supervisor of KKN Unmuh Jember, the KKN students and I promoted the Nafiah Posdaya which had once been formed. With the hope to overcome the problem of the white AC sweet potato farmers, namely by processing white AC sweet potato into chips and cupcakes manually. Because of the limited manual equipment, the white AC sweet potato used for the basic ingredients of chips and cupcakes is still in small quantities. Also, chips which are produced manually are not crunchy; contain lots of oil, long time production process and small amount of production. To overcome this, product innovation needs to be done by making white ac sweet potato chips with vacuum frying and spinner technology as well as making white ac sweet potato cupcakes with an electric mixer to mix dough and oven it. The problem is those partners do not have the knowledge, skills and capital to develop and be innovation product white ac sweet potato. There are four main activities in the Community Partnership Program dedication activities that are carried out by providing material training and practicing (1) implementing vacuum frying and spinner machines to make white AC sweet potato chips (2) packing with beautiful package (3) making cupcake with basic ingredients from white AC sweet potato (4) marketing model based on E-commerce Web-based Information Technology. The results of this training are crispy white AC sweet potato chips with a distinctive sweet potato taste because the slices are thicker than the other chips and delicious white ac sweet potato cupcake with attractive toping is a promising market opportunity. It is expected that the Community Partnership Program activities can improve the welfare of partners.

Purpose The purpose of this paper is to examine the impact of social commerce (s-commerce) cues (i.e. trust, compatibility, reliability and responsiveness) on repurchase intention in apparel s-commerce along with the mediating effect of customer engagement and the moderating effect of s-commerce navigation. Design/methodology/approach Using the purposive sampling technique, face-to-face survey was administered to Gen-Y social media users in Malaysia. Subsequently, 384 respondents were sampled. Partial least squares-structural equation modeling was used to perform the analyses. Findings S-commerce cues have a positive effect on customer engagement, which in turn leads to repurchase intention of apparel among Gen-Y. Particularly, customer engagement also mediates the relationship between s-commerce cues and repurchase intention. S-commerce navigation is found to moderate the effect of engagement on repurchase intention. Research limitations/implications The findings are derived from the perception of Gen-Y in Malaysia and do not represent the entire population. Future research could investigate the same phenomena across generations and consider heterogeneity issues to provide more insights. Practical implications Apparel s-commerce retailers are suggested to engage with customers more in the e-retail environment to build a lasting relationship. Contextual factors such as ease of navigation should be observed to enhance the desired response of diverse customers today. Originality/value This study adds to the growing body of knowledge on relationship marketing by assessing the impact of customer engagement and navigation on the relationships between s-commerce cues and repurchase intention in the contemporary setting.

Purpose The advent of the internet, digitization and e-commerce has changed the definition of business territory, re-invented direct selling, eradicated middle men and brought the customers and sellers closer. These changes in the business scenario must have had an impact on the intensity and nature of channel conflict which needs to be inspected to structure better channel relationship strategies in the changing context. This paper aims to attempt a systematic investigation into the determinants of channel conflict in today’s context and proposes a composite model by reconciling the research so far in the domain of channel relationships. Design/methodology/approach An exhaustive search was carried for extant research finding in the channels resulting in the identification of 284 research papers beyond the meta-analysis by Geyskens et al. (1999). The next step was to manually scan through each of these papers to identify the studies which involved quantitative analysis including measures of association such as correlations related to conflict and the determinants of conflict. This led to the finalization of 36 research papers for the meta-analysis. Findings This study proffers a model that illustrates ranking of major determinants of channel conflict. The results of the study suggest that determinants can be categorized into three major domains: organizational, interpersonal (communication, cooperation, relationship activities and opportunistic behaviour) and environmental factors (environmental volatility, competitive intensity and product or market volatility). Research limitations/implications The analysis is based on static data in the sense that the correlations do not reflect supplier-channel member interactions in specific conflict situations. It may be argued that conflicts ultimately occur among firms/businesses run by individuals and individual traits may also impact the formation and resolution of conflict. Further, the quality of the measures capturing the constructs was not investigated in many studies. Final limitation pertains to the measurement of conflict. Conflict may not have been measured in a uniform manner in each of the studies analysed. As this study has evaluated extant research through a meta-analysis, it was not possible to identify the correlations between the determinant variables and the three factors (or constructs). Practical implications This study reconciles different research streams in this domain with the visualization of the composite model. It presents a quantitative analysis of the correlations of the determinants of conflict with channel conflict holistically. It creates a base through the composite model to carry forward the academic discussion in this domain holistically. It aims to be a ready reference for understanding the antecedents of conflict along with their significant correlations to enable prioritization of their channel strategies. Social implications This meta-analysis and the suggested model that may be of use to practitioners in terms of prioritizing their activities to reduce channel conflicts through pre-emption. It is hoped that this study enhances the extant understanding of the determinants of channel conflict considerably based on the presented composite model. The results may assist to resolve channel conflicts, create channel synergies, identify optimal channel mix, reduce channel costs, increase channel efficiency and build partnerships in the changing business scenario. Originality/value A holistic view of the determinants of conflict would be of enormous use to practitioners and academics alike. Hence, a detailed study is required to enlist and categorize the determinants causing conflict in channels so that an attempt can be made to resolve channel conflict for better performance of the firms. This meta-analysis study is an attempt to fill this major gap in research in this domain to quantitatively analyse the major determinants of channel conflict on the basis of analysis of research work over the past 15 years.

PurposeResearch on online businesses has focused on the adoption of e-commerce and initial purchase behavior; repurchase intention and its antecedents remain underresearched. The present study develops an empirical model to explore the extent to which trust and e-satisfaction mediate the effect of vendor-specific attributes and customer intention to repurchase from the same online platform.Design/methodology/approachThe proposed model is tested and validated in the context of Generation Y in India. A self-administrated online survey was employed, and the students aged between 20 and 35 at universities in Northern India are selected as subject. The data is analyzed using SPSS 20.0 and AMOS 20.0, where structural equation modeling is used to examine the model and test the hypothesis.FindingsThe results of this study suggest that trust mediates fully between security concerns, privacy concerns, and repurchase intention. E-satisfaction mediates between security and ease of use (EOU).Practical implicationsThis study reveals the fact that security, EOU, and privacy concerns are the critical determinants that have the most impact on consumer's purchasing behavior. Gen Y consumers of India need some strong security features, an easy-to-use interface, a trusted privacy policy. Furthermore, it may be beneficial to observe e-satisfaction and trust as a mediator when identifying potential problems; online satisfaction is essential for the group in this study, and the results show that it impacts on the relation between repurchase intention and some determinant of repurchase intentions.Originality/valueThis research determines the impact of security, privacy concerns, EOU on the online repurchasing behavior of Gen Y in India. The mediation effect of e-satisfaction and trust has also been determined.

Purpose The purpose of this paper is to investigate the impact of post-usage usefulness (PUU), experiential value, and apps channel satisfaction on consumer continuance intention in using the smartphone apps retail channel for shopping activities. The study proposes that experiential value mediates both the relationship between PUU and apps channel satisfaction and the relationship between PUU and apps channel continuance intention. Design/methodology/approach A total of 467 valid questionnaires were received from Malaysian experienced smartphone apps shoppers (minimum of six months experience) from pure play apps retailers to empirically test the model. For the assessment of the measurement model and structural relationships, partial least square path modelling approach was performed. Findings The hypotheses testing imply that all direct hypotheses between latent constructs are supported. Experiential value partially mediates the relationship between PUU and apps channel satisfaction and the hypothesis on its mediation role on the relationship between PUU and apps channel continuance intention is rejected. Originality/value Despite the rapid development of information technology, a few research uncovered how businesses can create value through smartphone apps channel. Rather than focussing exclusively on online retailing, physical stores and e-commerce in general as a retail distribution strategy, this study empirically uncovered that value creation process could be achieved through smartphone apps channel.

Abstract Social media contain abundant information about the events or news occurring all over the world. Social media growth has a greater impact on various domains like marketing, e-commerce, health care, e-governance, and politics, etc. Currently, Twitter was developed as one of the social media platforms, and now, it is one of the most popular social media platforms. There are 1 billion user’s profiles and millions of active users, who post tweets daily. In this research, buzz detection in social media was carried out by the semantic approach using the condensed nearest neighbor (SACNN). The Twitter and Tom’s Hardware data are stored in the UC Irvine Machine Learning Repository, and this dataset is used in this research for outlier detection. The min–max normalization technique is applied to the social media dataset, and additionally, missing values were replaced by the normalized value. The condensed nearest neighbor (CNN) is used for semantic analysis of the database, and based on the optimized value provided by the proposed method, the threshold is calculated. The threshold value is used to classify buzz and non-buzz discussions in the social media database. The result showed that the SACNN achieved 99% of accuracy, and relative error is less than the existing methods.

O ano de 2020 começou como qualquer outro. Todos nós tínhamos ideias, projetos e objetivos a cumprir que foram afetados pela pandemia, desencadeada como resultado do COVID-19, e pelas consequentes crises econômicas, políticas e sociais produzidas em todo o mundo.Na área de negócios, a maioria das empresas teve que deixar de lado seus planos estratégicos de 2020 para se adaptar à crise com estratégias emergentes. Os governos, seguindo estratégias bastante variadas, procuraram dar respostas à sua população e aos seus próprios problemas econômicos. No setor da educação, as estratégias de ensino e aprendizagem também tiveram que ser adaptadas e as escolas e universidades enfrentaram o desafio de implementar planos 100% virtuais. Atualmente, os pesquisadores em gestão estratégica enfrentam o desafio de desenvolver estudos objetivos diante das estratégias emergentes e de curto prazo desenvolvidas nessas áreas.Uma publicação recente de Cadernos de Regionalismo ODR (2020), abordou como a pandemia foi tratada por comunidades internacionais ao redor do mundo, como a União Europeia e o Mercosul, entre outras, e como o regionalismo poderia ou não contribuir para o enfrentamento da pandemia. Nesse estudo, as regiões foram divididas em: casos cooperativos, casos semi-cooperativos e casos não cooperativos. Os resultados mostram que onde não houve articulação, os números de mortes e infecções em decorrência da pandemia foram maiores, como por exemplo, nos países membros do Mercosul, uma vez que não foram formados grupos especializados de forma articulada sanitariamente para enfrentar a pandemia como a questão central.Na academia, devemos tentar contribuir analisando quais foram os efeitos e desafios da pandemia Covid-19 nas organizações, bem como as boas práticas para o futuro. Portanto, neste editorial, pretendemos abordar as mudanças pelas quais passam as instituições mundiais diante da crise instalada nos últimos meses, observando as interconexões econômicas internacionais. Sem a pretensão de esgotar o assunto, este editorial analisa os efeitos da pandemia no mundo e os desafios das organizações frente à crise. Efeitos da pandemia no mundo Estamos finalizando o de 2020 com muitas suposições e expectativas, e poucas certezas sobre a dimensão do que realmente foi a crise gerada pela pandemia de Covid-19 para as organizações e para a economia mundial. As consequências provocadas pela pandemia e pelo isolamento social, nunca vividos pela população mundial deste século, trouxe mudanças que perpassaram as fronteiras nacionais. Estima-se que a pandemia do Covid-19 afetou a economia global em U$ 90 trilhões, sendo considerada a pior crise dos últimos 100 anos (Jackson, Weiss, Schwarzenberg, Nelson, 2020). A América Latina foi a região mais duramente atingida. Após alguns anos de crescimento econômico reduzido, as nações americanas se viram na iminência de aplicar procedimentos radicais de isolamento social, que impactaram na oferta de bens e serviços, em especial no setor de turismo. As pressões das instituições nacionais variaram de intensidade, desde muito rígidas no Peru a brandas no Uruguai, apresentando inclusive diferenças entre estados, como no caso do Brasil (Banco Mundial, 2020).Os efeitos da crise foram sentidos rapidamente em vários países, isso porque no curto prazo, o setor de consumo é o que mais contribui para o crescimento econômico. As consequências da parada total ou parcial das atividades produtivas, gerou impactos que refletirão no longo prazo, sendo que para alguns países a crise econômica será mais profunda e duradoura do que para outros. Segundo o Abhijit Surya, analista do Economist Group (2020), Chile e Uruguai devem se recuperar mais rapidamente do que os demais países da América Latina, que provavelmente levarão até 2024 para reequilibrar sua economia. Segundo o Banco Mundial, há previsão de queda no Produto Interno Bruto (PIB) da América Latina de 7,9%, ao passo que a Organização para a Cooperação e Desenvolvimento Econômico (OCDE), calcula redução de 6% no PIB global e queda de 7,6% no caso de uma segunda onda de pandemia até o final de 2020 (OCDE, 2020).Em alguns países, os governos asseguraram uma proporção da receita salarial para funcionários forçados a se licenciar ou ampliaram seus sistemas de previdência para assistir trabalhadores recém-dispensados ou proprietários de pequenos negócios (Cowling, Brown, Rocha, 2020). Segundo a Organização Internacional do Trabalho (OIT), o estímulo fiscal foi de US$ 982 bilhões, sendo 45 bilhões de dólares em países de baixa renda e 937 bilhões em países de renda média baixa. Embora de importância fundamental, essas ações não podem compensar a falta de geração de receitas para empresas e pessoas. Os governos possuem capacidade de assistencialismo e financiamento limitadas, impossibilitando a completa cobertura e assistência da força de trabalho e do empreendedorismo nacional. Inúmeros pequenos negócios foram afetados e milhões de pessoas perderam seus empregos (OIT, 2020).Somada à crise sanitária, seguiu-se em alguns países uma crise política, que trouxe ainda mais insegurança às pessoas e instabilidade ao sistema comercial e financeiro, impactando negativamente nas bolsas de valores, paralisando sistemas de produção, gerando colapso no consumo e grave crise econômica (OCDE, 2020). Em decorrência do novo cenário, muitas mudanças foram impostas sobre as organizações, as mais impactantes foram: interrupção dos negócios, prejuízos às instituições antigas e tradicionais, impactos sobre as cadeias de suprimentos nacionais e internacionais, danos ao capital tecnológico e inovativo, comprometimento de networks e fluxos de conhecimento (Zahra, 2020).Esse evento de grande impacto negativo trouxe à tona os problemas econômicos, políticos, sociais e gerenciais de organizações e nações, colocando à prova a capacidade de solvência das instituições. Na pesquisa de Cowling, Brown e Rocha (2020) no Reino Unido, verificou-se que 8,6% das empresas enfrentaram a crise sem reservas financeiras e somente 39% economizaram recursos para uma crise, nos últimos 5 anos, indicando que 61% pode ficar sem caixa. Constatou-se ainda que as microempresas, a categoria de negócio dominante em economias desenvolvidas ou subdesenvolvidas, eram as que tinham maior probabilidade de estar representadas na classificação de risco imediato e de médio prazo. O risco imediato está relacionado à falta de liquidez, enquanto o risco médio significa ausência de indícios de acumulação de reservas de caixa. Esses problemas ainda podem ser agravados pela falta de ativos físicos e tangíveis a serem usados como garantia para a tomada de empréstimos (Coco, 2000).O impacto do vírus pode ter repercussões potenciais nos mercados financeiros, com maior redução da confiança e redução do crédito. Esses impactos afetam empresas grandes e pequenas, no entanto, o efeito sobre as Micro e Pequenas Empresas (MPEs) é mais severo. Pesquisas do Federal Reserve Bank de New York nos Estados Unidos sugerem que 50% das pequenas empresas estão operando com menos de 15 dias de reserva de caixa e que mesmo as MPEs saudáveis, têm reservas de caixa de menos de dois meses. Em todos os países da OCDE, as MPEs representam a grande maioria das empresas, e dos empregos, no entanto, nas regiões e setores que mais sentiram os impactos da crise, a prevalência de MPEs é ainda maior (OCDE, 2020).Considerando os acontecimentos em curso decorrentes da crise sanitária, que desencadeou em disputas comerciais, a cadeia de abastecimento global dá sinais de que poderá sofrer mudanças no que se refere à realocação da China para outros países como Índia, Vietnã, Camboja, países Africanos e internalização das cadeias produtivas pela Europa, Estados Unidos, Japão e Oriente Médio. Se essas hipóteses se confirmarem, certamente os padrões de internacionalização dos empreendimentos sofrerão alterações, como a localização dos negócios, os parceiros comerciais, a rede colaborativa, as cadeias de fornecimento e de valor e as formas de obtenção dos recursos. A decisão de investir em território próprio ou de países vizinhos pode dar início ao processo de desglobalização (Zahra, 2020).Apesar da crescente tendência de retorno das empresas aos países de origem, e busca pela regionalização, com a conquista de mercados mais próximos e mais estáveis, alguns países em desenvolvimento, como o Brasil, por exemplo, movem grandes esforços para a entrada na OCDE (Brasil, 2020), além de capitanear o acordo comercial entre o Mercosul e a União Europeia e o acordo da Associação Europeia de Comércio Livre (AECL), que congrega a Suíça, Noruega, Islândia e Liechtenstein. Se as parcerias se firmarem, com grandes chances de se concretizar pelo apoio da presidência do Conselho da União Europeia, os países do Mercosul tendem a iniciar uma política de internacionalização para qualificação de suas empresas, para exportação direta ou indireta para outros países. O Brasil também vai sediar um dos quatro escritórios da Organização Mundial do Turismo (OMT) no mundo, fator que deve contribuir para desenvolver o turismo na América Latina (Agência Brasil, 2020).Considerando que países de economias importantes, tais como Europa, Japão, Oriente Médio, Índia, estão incentivando empresas a relocalizar seus investimentos, alterando a geografia econômica das cadeias globais, surgem oportunidades para economias de países emergentes. Logo, há urgência na atração, promoção e retenção de investimento para exportação (Gasser, 2020). Até porque, o maior acordo comercial do mundo, a Parceria Econômica Regional Abrangente (RCEP, na sigla em inglês), foi celebrado recentemente (novembro de 2020) em Hanói, entre dez membros da Associação de Nações do Sudeste Asiático, além de China, Japão, Coreia do Sul, Austrália e Nova Zelândia e prevê a eliminação das tarifas de importação pelos próximos 20 anos. Essas nações somam quase um terço da população mundial e 29% do PIB mundial (Smith, 2020). Assim, o caminho da regionalização das cadeias, a partir do fortalecimento de blocos econômicos entre países e avanço de acordos comerciais em cadeias regionais, aumenta as oportunidades de exportação para pequenos e médios empresários, que formam a grande massa de sustentação empresarial dos países menos desenvolvidos. Os desafios das organizações frente à crise Em um curtíssimo espaço de tempo as organizações precisaram criar métodos e ferramentas para se adequar ao novo contexto. Muitas empresas passaram a realizar seus atendimentos de maneira remota. Aderir ao home office foi a maneira de cumprir os protocolos de segurança e de proteção da saúde coletiva. Ocorre que muitas organizações enfrentaram dificuldades pelo fato de seus funcionários não serem familiarizados com tecnologias, ou porque muitas empresas não possuem viabilidade para promover o trabalho remoto. O lockdown adotado repentinamente em grande parte dos países deixou as organizações sem um plano de contingências para a continuidade do atendimento. A pandemia também criou um grande ruído devido às barreiras de comunicação, que por falta de adequação e clareza não conseguiram instruir adequadamente os funcionários (Joshi, Bhaskar, Gupta, 2020).Nunca as pessoas tiveram que exercitar a resiliência e gerar novas competências de modo tão acelerado, ao ter que atender demandas adicionais de tempo para educar e cuidar dos filhos, ao mesmo tempo em que passaram a exercer o trabalho de forma remota. Outros trabalhadores de setores considerados essenciais, tais como saúde e assistência social, segurança e alguns do atacado e do varejo foram instados a continuar trabalhando no período do isolamento social, estes passaram por outro tipo de desafio, como a sensação de insegurança diante da ameaça que se apresentava. As experiências das pessoas que adotaram o teletrabalho e as novas tecnologias que se tornaram de uso comum podem fornecer o ponto de inflexão para mudanças na forma como trabalhamos (Blundell, Costa Dias, Joyce, Xu, 2020). É certo que novos hábitos tomarão o lugar dos costumes antigos e as velhas práticas darão lugar a procedimentos modernos, conectados às ferramentas digitais e novas soluções tecnológicas.No setor privado em geral, as pessoas responderam mais rápido aos estímulos, todavia a pandemia exigiu de todas as instituições, incluindo as do setor público, respostas imediatas, relegando a segundo plano a ordem e o status quo vigentes até então (Pilkington Kumar, 2020). Essas transformações também foram responsáveis por externalidades positivas, como por exemplo, a adoção de plataformas digitais de gerenciamento informacionais em substituição ao uso de documentos financeiros físicos. Essas inovações geraram relações comerciais mais eficientes e seguras (Alabdullah, Ahmed, Nor, 2020). Da mesma forma, as empresas passaram a usar plataformas de treinamento para seus colaboradores, que obtiveram ganhos ao poder manter o equilíbrio entre vida pessoal e profissional, trabalhar em horários flexíveis e economizar em deslocamentos. As empresas, por outro lado, ganham com a redução dos custos e aumento de produtividade dos funcionários (Joshi, Bhaskar, Gupta, 2020).Na pesquisa do Serviço Brasileiro de Apoio às Micro e Pequenas Empresas (SEBRAE) com 6.080 MPE brasileiras, verificou-se que várias delas efetivaram mudanças em seus processos de funcionamento, realizando entregas ou atendimento on-line (41,9%), adequando a estrutura para atendimento em tempo reduzido (41,2%), ou por home office (15,3%), com rodízio de funcionários (21,6%), ou no sistema drive thru (5,9%) (SEBRAE, 2020). Considerando o universo de 17,2 milhões de MPEs, 5,3 milhões delas mudaram seu modo de trabalho no período da pandemia, e essas mudanças podem se tornar permanentes a partir das novas necessidades emergentes. Apesar de 522,7 mil empresas terem encerrado suas atividades no Brasil (IBGE, 2020a), para 37,9% dos empresários pesquisados pelo IBGE (2020b), o impacto da pandemia foi avaliado como pequeno ou pouco significativo, e 28,6% perceberam efeitos positivos da pandemia em seus negócios.Quanto às respostas das empresas às pressões ambientais, a análise aponta que algumas empresas estavam mais bem preparadas para mitigar o impacto da crise. Essas empresas diversificaram as cadeias de abastecimento, reduziram os riscos relacionadas à oferta com a obtenção de insumos de várias fontes, construíram relacionamentos fortes com fornecedores, com vistas à redução de dependência de um só fornecedor, além de formar estoques como proteção contra a interrupção de fornecimento da cadeia. Na mesma linha, desenvolveram agilidade em suas redes de produção e distribuição para rapidamente reconfigurar e manter o fornecimento para a demanda global, e investiram no planejamento da cadeia de suprimentos e soluções de controle para prever e responder aos problemas da cadeia de abastecimento (Deloitte, 2020).Por outro lado, há empresas que dependem de um fornecedor único de produtos essenciais, que em alguns casos pode protegê-los do choque, mas em outros pode torná-los vulneráveis, especialmente se esses fornecedores estiverem localizados em área de infecção (OCDE, 2020). Essas empresas não têm a visão suficiente em toda a rede de fornecimento estendida para ver seus riscos, não têm os sistemas para entender o status de seu inventário, para projetar rupturas de estoque de materiais diretos e otimizar a produção, ou para projetar falta de estoque de produtos acabados para otimizar a alocação do cliente, e não têm redes de logística flexíveis para garantir o fluxo de mercadorias de forma lucrativa (Deloitte, 2020).Embora muitas empresas tenham dificuldades para melhorar seus processos, várias delas dependem de investimento e ambiente externo favorável ao empreendedorismo. Empresas situadas em países em desenvolvimento precisam do aporte de seus governos para corrigir falhas estruturais, regulatórias, tributárias, de fomento e incentivos econômico-financeiros, que permitam a atividade empresarial tanto em território nacional quanto internacional. Para que as MPEs possam exportar, o apoio para a digitalização e internacionalização é fundamental, uma vez que todas as economias desenvolvidas digitalizaram completamente suas operações. O fortalecimento do e-commerce e marketing digital pode ser o primeiro passo para a internacionalização dessas empresas (Gasser, 2020; Thorstensen, 2020).Mas o percurso para a conquista de mercados externos requer estratégias consistentes. A construção da imagem da empresa e do produto associados à qualidade e conformidade geram a credibilidade necessária para adentrar em mercados antes mais resistentes a novos entrantes. Com a mudança dos mercados globais, países grandes compradores estão mais abertos e receptivos. Todavia, uma série de requisitos são necessários, tais como: a) preços atrativos (para tanto é necessário haver redução de tarifas), b) ajustes às barreiras técnicas e sanitárias (adequação às normas), c) Políticas de sustentabilidade (selos verdes), d) convergência regulatória (unificação das acreditações para aceitação nos países compradores mais exigentes). Por fim, é preciso criar uma cultura exportadora, onde exista a cooperação entre empresas, governo e sociedade, de modo a promover e desenvolver o ecossistema de internacionalização e exportação.Com a mudança de dinâmica dos mercados globais, surge a oportunidade para novos países adentrarem nas cadeias produtivas e comerciais mundiais. Todavia é preciso observar as cadeias de valor priorizadas em cada mercado. Grandes compradores como a União Europeia valorizam certificações como a ISO, economia circular (verde) e a digitalização das operações. Países asiáticos adotaram a digitalização total e apesar de terem formado o maior bloco comercial do mundo, que abarcará 40% de todas as relações comerciais entre aqueles países e agregados, ainda resta oportunidades para empresas de países em desenvolvimento estabelecerem negociações com esses países (Thorstensen, 2020).Enfim, aos poucos vamos percebendo as reações do mercado e até certo otimismo com o futuro por parte das organizações que resistiram à crise (Nery, 2020). Embora os reflexos ainda sejam sentidos por muitas delas, as últimas pesquisas da OCDE (2020) mostram melhoria na confiança dos empreendedores do mundo todo. Nesse novo cenário, o que deve prevalecer é a busca pela informação e assimilação das mudanças econômicas, políticas, sociais, ambientais, técnicas e tecnológicas, combinadas com esforços para as respostas rápidas e adequações organizacionais emergentes. Conclusões O ano de 2020 se desenvolveu não apenas com uma praga na saúde, mas também com incertezas e preocupações que obscureceram as possibilidades de planejamento e execução de estratégias de longo prazo em muitas empresas, governos, organizações educacionais e centros de pesquisa. Assim, deixa-nos com a sensação de ter enfrentado uma situação difícil e inesperada, da qual, ainda hoje, o seu impacto futuro a nível económico, político e social não pode ser estimado com certeza. No entanto, tivemos que aprender, muitas vezes pela força, e a resiliência apareceu como uma habilidade inestimável para indivíduos e organizações.A falta de certeza com a qual imaginamos o ano de 2021 continuará a adaptação e as estratégias de resposta rápida em todas as áreas de nossas vidas. As empresas terão que continuar surfando nas crises econômicas das diferentes regiões do mundo, tentando descontinuar áreas e mercados não lucrativos para promover outros economicamente atrativos. Dependendo das políticas públicas a serem priorizadas, os governos as acompanharão ou confrontarão na tentativa de manter sua estabilidade política, econômica e social em níveis aceitáveis. Nos países ibero-americanos, onde a proximidade e a sociabilidade com outras pessoas é um aspecto importante da vida pessoal e social, o impacto do home office, o distanciamento social e a solidão serão percebidos a curto ou médio prazo.A Revista Ibero-americana de Estratégia (RIAE), com o número especial dedicado à crise pandêmica, chamada que será divulgada no próximo ano, espera contribuir ao proporcionar um melhor entendimento de como, em que condições e em que medida a crise influenciou e continuará a influenciar as organizações. Dessa forma, a equipe editorial espera poder acompanhar nossos leitores das áreas empresarial e acadêmica para contribuir com novas ideias e discussões frente aos desafios futuros que surgirão no campo estratégico.

The study aimed to identify a shift from an oil economy to a knowledge economy by using electronic commerce for small projects, which is what the vision of the Kingdom 2030 seeks. However, small projects suffer from the inability to market in a way that allows them to succeed and advance the national economy, and to enter into global competition. The study was prepared to clarify the role of e-commerce for small enterprises in this transformation. The study relied on the descriptive-analytical approach and the distribution of a questionnaire to collect primary data and statistically analyze it, in which some of the statistical methods used in the SPSS program were used. The study concluded that electronic commerce is able to achieve marketing opportunities for small projects, and that small projects need to re-engineer their marketing operations (especially the marketing mix) in order to be able to apply electronic commerce, and indicated that electronic commerce is able to transform into a knowledge economy. A set of recommendations was proposed to activate e-commerce for small projects, including providing financial support, attention to bringing and training skilled workers trained in the proper application of e-commerce technology, re-engineering the marketing mix in a manner that allows the proper application of electronic commerce.

E-commerce with the highest number of users in Indonesia is Shopee and last year Shopee managed to break the record for most sales transactions in one day in seven countries. So from that this study intends to find out how consumer motivation and marketing mix that Shopee does contribute to the purchasing decision making process. The population in this study is the millennial city of Karawang city with a sample of 175 respondents. Sampling is done by non-probability sampling technique that is snowball. Data analysis method used is multiple linear regression test. Based on the results of these tests, the motivation variable and marketing mix simultaneously and partially have a positive and significant correlation to the Shopee consumer purchasing decision making process in Karawang with a correlation coefficient of 0.859. The motivation variable contribution and marketing mix amounted to 73.8% of the consumer purchasing decision process and 26.2% was contributed by other variables. Keywords: Motivation, Marketing Mix, Decision Making Process. E-commerce dengan jumlah pengguna tertinggi di Indonesia adalah Shopee dan tahun lalu Shopee berhasil memecahkan rekor untuk sebagian besar transaksi penjualan dalam satu hari di tujuh negara. Maka dari itu penelitian ini bermaksud untuk mengetahui bagaimana motivasi konsumen dan bauran pemasaran yang Shopee berkontribusi terhadap proses pengambilan keputusan pembelian. Populasi dalam penelitian ini adalah kota seribu tahun di kota Karawang dengan sampel 175 responden. Pengambilan sampel dilakukan dengan teknik non-probability sampling yaitu bola salju. Metode analisis data yang digunakan adalah uji regresi linier berganda. Berdasarkan hasil pengujian ini, variabel motivasi dan bauran pemasaran secara simultan dan parsial memiliki korelasi positif dan signifikan terhadap proses pengambilan keputusan pembelian konsumen Shopee di Karawang dengan koefisien korelasi 0,859. Kontribusi variabel motivasi dan bauran pemasaran sebesar 73,8% dari proses keputusan pembelian konsumen dan 26,2% disumbangkan oleh variabel lain. Kata Kunci: Motivasi, Bauran Pemasaran, Proses Keputusan Membeli.

<p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify; margin: 0in 0.6in 0pt 0.5in; mso-layout-grid-align: none;"><span style="font-size: 10pt;"><span style="font-family: Times New Roman;">This paper provides an example of utilizing survey data to develop the initial media and method (Advertising, PR, Interactive, Word of mouth) mix.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">&nbsp; </span>Utilizing K-Means Cluster analysis and discriminant analysis to profile the clusters three segments were identified based on media consumption.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">&nbsp; </span>Differences in the segments were also found to exist regarding the perceptions of the benefits and concerns regarding e-commerce.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">&nbsp; </span>This indicated that in addition to different media/method mixes, different message strategies are also appropriate for the segments. The segments were then profiled utilizing Multiple Correspondence Analysis to determine the relationship between the segments and the demographic variables and also between the segments and shopping behavior</span></span></p>

We draw insights from Activity Theory within the field of human-computer interaction to quantitatively measure a mobile in-store experience (MIX), which includes the suite of shopping activities and retail services that a consumer can engage in when using their mobile device in brick-and-mortar stores. We developed and validated a nine-item, formative MIX index using survey data collected from fashion consumers in the United States (n = 1,267), United Kingdom (n = 370), Germany (n = 362), and France (n = 219). As survey measures of consumer engagement in omnichannel retailing using a mobile device, the index items with stronger factor loadings described in-store shopping activities whereas those with weaker factor loadings described activities related to behavioral targeting and social networking. These results suggest that retailers should give consumers the autonomy to independently find, evaluate and purchase merchandise in brick-and-mortar stores, thereby enabling them to co-create personalized shopping experiences as active participants within an omnichannel retail servicescape. Our findings also suggest that retailers should provide consumers with more authentic ways to build community and brand affiliations than mobile marketing and social media promotions. In-store activities should not simply be a migration of pre-existing e-commerce capabilities onto mobile devices. An engaging mobile in-store experience should be an amalgam of physical and digital activities that produce a seamless shopping journey and leverage the unique properties of mobile devices – ultra-portability, location sensitivity, untetheredness, and personalization. Retail executives can use the validated MIX index to prepare strategic investments in mobile technology applications and capabilities for retail stores within their omnichannel operations. The nine-item MIX index is also well-suited for consumer surveys, which also makes it an attractive measure of consumer engagement in omnichannel retailing for future academic research.

Purpose The purpose of this paper is to examine the antecedents of consumers’ omnichannel (OC) adoption intention and explore how consumers’ personality trait affects their OC adoption behavior. Design/methodology/approach A total of 227 Korean consumers were invited to participate in a survey study, and partial least squares–structural equation modeling was performed to analyze the measurement and structural models. Findings The results show that three consumer groups by “Need for Cognition (NFC)” show different response to four identified OC attribute/benefits. Finally, the authors hypothesize and find that shed light on the possible ways to differentiate OC marketing for different target consumers and provide implications for practice and further research. Research limitations/implications This study provides empirical evidence that OC is an expanded retail format of e-commerce, which is predominantly affected by how information on the cross-channel marketing mix/retail strategies is delivered to consumers. From communication perspective, findings suggest that retail communication strategy need more careful attention in dealing with individual difference of consumers. In addition, the significant role of NFC on consumers’ OC adoption process validates the importance of customization and differentiation in retailers’ message to different consumer groups. In order to do so, comprehensive analysis on consumer database may be necessary to develop personalized OC service. In-depth analysis of consumer profile may enable more specific methods for marketing and managing consumers in the OC context. Although the study provides additional empirical findings for consumers’ perception on selected characteristics of OC (i.e. delivery approach of information and service in OC and institutional mechanism of OC), there may be additional extrinsic motivation factors which affect consumers’ OC adoption behavior. Extrinsic factors such as web design, convenience, assortment, moving saving which trigger positive perception of OC, may be important determinants to consider. Furthermore, situational factor such as social media (Huseyinoglu et al., 2018) and behavioral factors such as platform use habit (Chen, 2018) may also be significant in assessing consumers’ OC adoption behavior. Finally, this study has been conducted on a particular culture setting, and the generalizability of study findings, particularly about the role of NFC may need to be improved by cross-culture evaluation. Practical implications NFC-high and medium consumers are likely to use the four OC service options in future, while a larger proportion of the NFC-low consumers shows negative response to the OC service usage. This evidently shows that innovative features of OC service are not homogenously adopted by consumers, and subject to their experience and intrinsic difference, adoption rate was found to vary. This suggests that companies need to pay careful attention in implementing innovative OC service, and may approach communication of information strategically for different consumer groups. For high-NFC consumers with previous BOPIS experience, retailers may effectively engage them by enhancing and expanding the BOPIS service features, yet for low-NFC consumers, raising awareness and initiating interest among unexperienced consumers may be more imminent issue. Indirect communication using peripheral cues may be necessary to draw less motivated consumer group. Social implications The OC retailers may need to set the scope and range of information into in-depth information and simplified/unified information, and address the different type of information to different consumer groups in order to facilitate consumers’ OC adoption. For consumers with medium and high NFC, it may be necessary to provide in-depth, detailed information relevant to product quality and promotional items consistently both in on/offline channels to gain their trust. Consumers with low NFC are found to prefer unified and simplified messages on information for price, delivery, inventory in on/offline channels. Originality/value This study addresses the perceived value of unique and fundamental features and specificity of OC service by consumers with different personality trait. The authors develop consumers’ OC adoption model based on the theory of reasoned action, which depicts relationship between four extrinsic motivation factors and consumers’ intention for the OC usage, which is further differentiated by an intrinsic factor. We segment consumers based on individual difference of “NFC” and investigate how different consumer groups value different aspect of the selected OC attributes and benefits. Findings validate the importance of customization and differentiation in retailers’ message to different consumer groups and in facilitating consumers’ OC adoption.

In light of the COVID-19 pandemic, where income has become precarious and Internet use has soared, the influencer industry has to strategise over new ways to sustain viewer attention, maintain income flows, and innovate around formats and messaging, to avoid being excluded from continued commercial possibilities. In this article, we review the press coverage of the influencer markets in Australia, Japan, and Korea, and consider how the industry has been attempting to navigate their way through the pandemic through deviations and detours. We consider the narratives and groups of influencers who have been included and excluded in shaping the discourse about influencer strategies in the time of COVID-19. The distinction between inclusion and exclusion has been a crucial mechanism to maintain the social normativity, constructed with gender, sexuality, wealth, able-ness, education, age, and so on (Stäheli and Stichweh, par. 3; Hall and Du Gay 5; Bourdieu 162). The influencer industry is the epitome of where the inclusion-exclusion binary is noticeable. It has been criticised for serving as a locus where social norms, such as femininity and middle-class identities, are crystallised and endorsed in the form of visibility and attention (Duffy 234; Abidin 122). Many are concerned about the global expansion of the influencer industry, in which young generations are led to clickbait and sensational content and normative ways of living, in order to be “included” by their peer groups and communities and to avoid being “excluded” (Cavanagh). However, COVID-19 has changed our understanding of the “normal”: people staying home, eschewing social communications, and turning more to the online where they can feel “virtually” connected (Lu et al. 15). The influencer industry also has been affected by COVID-19, since the images of normativity cannot be curated and presented as they used to be. In this situation, it is questionable how the influencer industry that pivots on the inclusion-exclusion binary is adjusting to the “new normal” brought by COVID-19, and how the binary is challenged or maintained, especially by exploring the continuities and discontinuities in industry. Methodology This cross-cultural study draws from a corpus of articles from Australia, Japan, and Korea published between January and May 2020, to investigate how local news outlets portrayed the contingencies undergone by the influencer industry, and what narratives or groups of influencers were excluded in the process. An extended discussion of our methodology has been published in an earlier article (Abidin et al. 5-7). Using the top ranked search engine of each country (Google for Australia and Japan, Naver for Korea), we compiled search results of news articles from the first ten pages (ten results per page) of each search, prioritising reputable news sites over infotainment sites, and by using targeted keyword searches: for Australia: ‘influencer’ and ‘Australia’ and ‘COVID-19’, ‘coronavirus’, ‘pandemic’; for Japan: ‘インフルエンサー’ (influensā) and ‘コロナ’ (korona), ‘新型コロ ナ’ (shin-gata korona), ‘コロナ禍’ (korona-ka); for Korea: ‘인플루언서’ (Influencer) and ‘코로나’ (corona) and ‘팬데믹’ (pandemic). 111 articles were collected (42 for Australia, 31 for Japan, 38 for Korea). In this article, we focus on a subset of 60 articles and adopt a grounded theory approach (Glaser and Strauss 5) to manually conduct open, axial, and close coding of their headline and body text. Each headline was translated by the authors and coded for a primary and secondary ‘open code’ across seven categories: Income loss, Backlash, COVID-19 campaign, Misinformation, Influencer strategy, Industry shifts, and Brand leverage. The body text was coded in a similar manner to indicate all the relevant open codes covered in the article. In this article, we focus on the last two open codes that illustrate how brands have been working with influencers to tide through COVID-19, and what the overall industry shifts were on the three Asia-Pacific country markets. Table 1 (see Appendix) indicates a full list of our coding schema. Inclusion of the Normal in Shifting Brand Preferences In this section, we consider two main shifts in brand preferences: an increased demand for influencers, and a reliance on influencers to boost viewer/consumer traffic. We found that by expanding digital marketing through Influencers, companies attempted to secure a so-called “new normal” during the pandemic. However, their marketing strategies tended to reiterate the existing inclusion-exclusion binary and exacerbated the lack of diversity and inequality in the industry. Increased Demand for Influencers Across the three country markets, brokers and clients in the influencer industry increased their demand for influencers’ services and expertise to sustain businesses via advertising in the “aftermath of COVID-19”, as they were deemed to be more cost-efficient “viral marketing on social media” (Yoo). By outsourcing content production to influencers who could still produce content independently from their homes (Cheik-Hussein) and who engage with audiences with their “interactive communication ability” (S. Kim and Cho), many companies attempted to continue their business and maintain their relationships with prospective consumers (Forlani). As the newly enforced social distancing measures have also interrupted face-to-face contact opportunities, the mass pivot towards influencers for digital marketing is perceived to further professionalise the industry via competition and quality control in all three countries (Wilkinson; S. Kim and Cho; Yadorigi). By integrating these online personae of influencers into their marketing, the business side of each country is moving towards the new normal in different manners. In Australia, businesses launched campaigns showcasing athlete influencers engaging in meaningful activities at home (e.g. yoga, cooking), and brands and companies reorganised their marketing strategies to highlight social responsibilities (Moore). On the other hand, for some companies in the Japanese market, the disruption from the pandemic was a rare opportunity to build connections and work with “famous” and “prominent” influencers (Yadorigi), otherwise unavailable and unwilling to work for smaller campaigns during regular periods of an intensely competitive market. In Korea, by emphasising their creative ability, influencers progressed from being “mere PR tools” to becoming “active economic subjects of production” who now can play a key role in product planning for clients, mediating companies and consumers (S. Kim and Cho). The underpinning premise here is that influencers are tech-savvy and therefore competent in creating media content, forging relationships with people, and communicating with them “virtually” through social media. Reliance on Influencers to Boost Viewer/Consumer Traffic Across several industry verticals, brands relied on influencers to boost viewership and consumer traffic on their digital estates and portals, on the premise that influencers work in line with the attention economy (Duffy 234). The fashion industry’s expansion of influencer marketing was noticeable in this manner. For instance, Korean department store chains (e.g. Lotte) invited influencers to “no-audience live fashion shows” to attract viewership and advertise fashion goods through the influencers’ social media (Y. Kim), and Australian swimwear brand Vitamin A partnered with influencers to launch online contests to invite engagement and purchases on their online stores (Moore). Like most industries where aspirational middle-class lifestyles are emphasised, the travel industry also extended partnerships with their current repertoire of influencers or international influencers in order to plan for the post-COVID-19 market recovery and post-border reopening tourism boom (Moore; Yamatogokoro; J. Lee). By extension, brands without any prior relationships with influencers, whcih did not have such histories to draw on, were likely to have struggled to produce new influencer content. Such brands could thus only rely on hiring influencers specifically to leverage their follower base. The increasing demand for influencers in industries like fashion, food, and travel is especially notable. In the attention economy where (media) visibility can be obtained and maintained (Duffy 121), media users practice “visibility labor” to curate their media personas and portray branding themselves as arbiters of good taste (Abidin 122). As such, influencers in genres where personal taste can be visibly presented—e.g. fashion, travel, F&B—seem to have emerged from the economic slump with a head start, especially given their dominance on the highly visual platform of Instagram. Our analysis shows that media coverage during COVID-19 repeated the discursive correlation between influencers and such hyper-visible or visually-oriented industries. However, this dominant discourse about hyper-visible influencers and the gendered genres of their work has ultimately reinforced norms of self-presentation in the industry—e.g. being feminine, young, beautiful, luxurious—while those who deviate from such norms seem to be marginalised and excluded in media coverage and economic opportunities during the pandemic cycle. Including Newness by Shifting Format Preferences We observed the inclusion of newness in the influencer scenes in all three countries. By shifting to new formats, the previously excluded and lesser seen aspects of our lives—such as home-based content—began to be integrated into the “new normal”. There were four main shifts in format preferences, wherein influencers pivoted to home-made content, where livestreaming is the new dominant format of content, and where followers preferred more casual influencer content. Influencers Have Pivoted to Home-Made Content In all three country markets, influencers have pivoted to generating content based on life at home and ideas of domesticity. These public displays of homely life corresponded with the sudden occurrence of being wired to the Internet all day—also known as “LAN cable life” (랜선라이프, lan-seon life) in the Korean media—which influencers were chiefly responsible for pioneering (B. Kim). While some genres like gaming and esports were less impacted upon by the pivot, given that the nature and production of the content has always been confined to a desktop at home (Cheik-Hussein), pivots occurred for the likes of outdoor brands (Moore), the culinary industry (Dean), and fitness and workout brands (Perelli and Whateley). In Korea, new trends such as “home cafes” (B. Kim) and DIY coffees—like the infamous “Dalgona-Coffee” that was first introduced by a Korean YouTuber 뚤기 (ddulgi)—went viral on social media across the globe (Makalintal). In Japan, the spike in influencers showcasing at-home activities (Hayama) also encouraged mainstream TV celebrities to open social media accounts explicitly to do the same (Kamada). In light of these trends, the largest Multi-Channel Network (MCN) in Japan, UUUM, partnered with one of the country’s largest entertainment industries, Yoshimoto Kogyo, to assist the latter’s comedian talents to establish a digital video presence—a trend that was also observed in Korea (Koo), further underscoring the ubiquity of influencer practices in the time of COVID-19. Along with those creators who were already producing content in a domestic environment before COVID-19, it was the influencers with the time and resources to quickly pivot to home-made content who profited the most from the spike in Internet traffic during the pandemic (Noshita). The benefits of this boost in traffic were far from equal. For instance, many others who had to turn to makeshift work for income, and those who did not have conducive living situations to produce content at home, were likely to be disadvantaged. Livestreaming Is the New Dominant Format Amidst the many new content formats to be popularised during COVID-19, livestreaming was unanimously the most prolific. In Korea, influencers were credited for the mainstreaming and demotising (Y. Kim) of livestreaming for “live commerce” through real-time advertorials and online purchases. Livestreaming influencers were solicited specifically to keep international markets continuously interested in Korean products and cultures (Oh), and livestreaming was underscored as a main economic driver for shaping a “post-COVID-19” society (Y. Kim). In Australia, livestreaming was noted among art (Dean) and fitness influencers (Dean), and in Japan it began to be adopted among major fashion brands like Prada and Chloe (Saito). While the Australian coverage included livestreaming on platforms such as Instagram, Facebook, YouTube, Twitch, and Douyin (Cheik-Hussein; Perelli and Whateley; Webb), the Japanese coverage highlighted the potential for Instagram Live to target young audiences, increase feelings of “trustworthiness”, and increase sales via word-of-mouth advertising (Saito). In light of reduced client campaigns, influencers in Australia had also used livestreaming to provide online consulting, teaching, and coaching (Perelli and Whateley), and to partner with brands to provide masterclasses and webinars (Sanders). In this era, influencers in genres and verticals that had already adopted streaming as a normative practice—e.g. gaming and lifestyle performances—were likely to have had an edge over others, while other genres were excluded from this economic silver lining. Followers Prefer More Casual Influencer Content In general, all country markets report followers preferring more casual influencer content. In Japan, this was offered via the potential of livestreaming to deliver more “raw” feelings (Saito), while in Australia this was conveyed through specific content genres like “mental or physical health battles” (Moore); specific aesthetic choices like appearing “messier”, less “curated”, and “more unfiltered” (Wilkinson); and the growing use of specific emergent platforms like TikTok (Dean, Forlani, Perelli, and Whateley). In Korea, influencers in the photography, travel, and book genres were celebrated for their new provision of pseudo-experiences during COVID-19-imposed social distancing (Kang). Influencers on Instagram also spearheaded new social media trends, like the “#wheredoyouwannago_challenge” where Instagram users photoshopped themselves into images of famous tourist spots around the world (Kang). Conclusion In our study of news articles on the impact of COVID-19 on the Australian, Japanese, and Korean influencer industries during the first wave of the pandemic, influencer marketing was primed to be the dominant and default mode of advertising and communication in the post-COVID-19 era (Tate). In general, specific industry verticals that relied more on visual portrayals of lifestyles and consumption—e.g. fashion, F&B, travel—to continue partaking in economic recovery efforts. However, given the gendered genre norms in the industry, this meant that influencers who were predominantly feminine, young, beautiful, and luxurious experienced more opportunity over others. Further, influencers who did not have the resources or skills to pivot to the “new normals” of creating content from home, engaging in livestreaming, and performing their personae more casually were excluded from these new economic opportunities. Across the countries, there were minor differences in the overall perception of influencers. There was an increasingly positive perception of influencers in Japan and Korea, due to new norms and pandemic-related opportunities in the media ecology: in Korea, influencers were considered to be the “vanguard of growing media commerce in the post-pandemonium era” (S. Kim and Cho), and in Japan, influencers were identified as critical vehicles during a more general consumer shift from traditional media to social media, as TV watching time is reduced and home-based e-commerce purchases are increasingly popular (Yadogiri). However, in Australia, in light of the sudden influx of influencer marketing strategies during COVID-19, the market seemed to be saturated more quickly: brands were beginning to question the efficiency of influencers, cautioned that their impact has not been completely proven for all industry verticals (Stephens), and have also begun to reduce commissions for influencer affiliate programmes as a cost-cutting measure (Perelli and Whateley). While news reports on these three markets indicate that there is some level of growth and expansion for various influencers and brands, such opportunities were not experienced equally, with some genres and demographics of influencers and businesses being excluded from pandemic-related pivots and silver linings. Further, in light of the increasing commercial opportunities, pressure for more regulations also emerged; for example, the Korean government announced new investigations into tax avoidance (Han). Not backed up by talent agencies or MCNs, independent influencers are likely to be more exposed to the disciplinary power of shifting regulatory practices, a condition which might have hindered their attempt at diversifying their income streams during the pandemic. Thus, while it is tempting to focus on the privileged and novel influencers who have managed to cling on to some measure of success during the pandemic, scholarly attention should also remember those who are being excluded and left behind, lest generations, cohorts, genres, or subcultures of the once-vibrant influencer industry fade into oblivion. References Abidin, Crystal. “#In$tagLam: Instagram as a repository of taste, a burgeoning marketplace, a war of eyeballs.” Mobile Media Making in an Age of Smartphones. Eds. Marsha Berry and Max Schleser. New York: Palgrave Pivot, 2014. 119-128. <https://doi.org/10.1057/9781137469816_11>. 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IntroductionIn Nancy Meyers’s 2015 film The Intern a particular kind of masculinity is celebrated through the material accoutrements of Ben Whittaker (Robert De Niro). A retired 70-year-old manager, Ben takes up a position as a “senior” Intern in an online clothing distribution company run by Jules Ostin (Anne Hathaway). Jules’s company, All About Fit, is the embodiment of the Gen Y creative workplace operating in an old Brooklyn warehouse. Ben’s presence in this environment is anachronistic and yet also stylishly retro in an industry where “vintage” is a mode of dress but also offers alternative ethical values (Veenstra and Kuipers). The alternative that Ben offers is figured through his sartorial style, which mobilises a specific kind of retro masculinity made available through his senior white male body. This paper investigates how and why retro masculinity is materialised and embodied as both a set of values and a set of objects in The Intern.Three particular objects are emblematic of this retro masculinity and come to stand in for a body of desirable masculine values: the business suit, the briefcase, and the handkerchief. In the midst of an indie e-commerce garment business, Ben’s old-fashioned wardrobe registers a regular middle class managerial masculinity from the past that is codified as solidly reliable and dependable. Sherry Turkle reminds us that “material culture carries emotions and ideas of startling intensity” (6), and these impact our thinking, our emotional life, and our memories. The suit, briefcase, and handkerchief are material reminders of this reliable masculine past. The values they evoke, as presented in this film, seem to offer sensible solutions to the fast pace of twenty-first century life and its reconfigurations of family and work prompted by feminism and technology.The film’s fetishisation of these objects of retro masculinity could be mistaken for nostalgia, in the way that vintage collections elide their political context, and yet it also registers social anxiety around gender and generation amid twenty-first century social change. Turner reminds us of the importance of film as a social practice through which “our culture makes sense of itself” (3), and which participates in the ongoing negotiation of the meanings of gender. While masculinity is often understood to have been in crisis since the advent of second-wave feminism and women’s mass entry into the labour force, theoretical scrutiny now understands masculinity to be socially constructed and changing, rather than elemental and stable; performative rather than innate; fundamentally political, and multiple through the intersection of class, race, sexuality, and age amongst other factors (Connell; Butler). While Connell coined the term “hegemonic masculinity,” to indicate “masculinity which occupies the hegemonic position in a given pattern of gender relations” (76), it is always intersectional and contestable. Ben’s hegemonic position in The Intern might be understood in relation to what Buchbinder identifies as “inadequate” or “incompetent” masculinities, which offer a “foil for another principal character” (232), but this movement between margin and hegemony is always in process and accords with the needs that structure the story, and its attendant social anxieties. This film’s fetishising of Ben’s sartorial style suggests a yearning for a stable and recognisable masculine identity, but in order to reinstall these meanings the film must ignore the political times from which they emerge.The construction of retro masculinity in this case is mapped onto Ben’s body as a “senior.” As Gilleard notes, ageing bodies are usually marked by a narrative of corporeal decline, and yet for men of hegemonic privilege, non-material values like seniority, integrity, wisdom, and longevity coalesce to embody “the accumulation of cultural or symbolic capital in the form of wisdom, maturity or experience” (1). Like masculinity, then, corporeality is understood to be a set of unstable signifiers produced through particular cultural discourses.The Business SuitThe business suit is Ben Whittaker’s habitual work attire, so when he comes out of retirement to be an intern at the e-commerce company he re-adopts this professional garb. The solid outline of a tailored and dark-coloured suit signals a professional body that is separate, autonomous and impervious to the outside world, according to Longhurst (99). It is a body that is “proper,” ready for business, and suit-ed to the professional corporate world, whose values it also embodies (Edwards 42). In contrast, the costuming code of the Google generation of online marketers in the film is defined as “super cas[ual].” This is a workplace where the boss rides her bicycle through the open-space office and in which the other 219 workers define their individuality through informal dress and decoration. In this environment Ben stands out, as Jules comments on his first day:Jules: Don’t feel like you have to dress up.Ben: I’m comfortable in a suit if it’s okay.Jules: No, it’s fine. [grins] Old school.Ben: At least I’ll stand out.Jules: I don’t think you’ll need a suit to do that.The anachronism of a 70-year-old being an intern is materialised through Ben’s dress code. The business suit comes to represent Ben not only as old school, however, but as a “proper” manager.As the embodiment of a successful working woman, entrepreneur Jules Ostin appears to be the antithesis of the business-suit model of a manager. Consciously not playing by the book, her company is both highly successful, meeting its five-year objectives in only nine months, and highly vulnerable to disasters like bedbugs, delivery crises, and even badly wrapped tissue. Shaped in her image, the company is often directly associated with Jules herself, as Ben continually notes, and this comes to include the mix of success, vulnerability, and disaster. In fact, the success of her company is the reason that she is urged to find a “seasoned” CEO to run the company, indicating the ambiguous, simultaneous guise of success and disaster.This relationship between individual corporeality and the corporate workforce is reinforced when it is revealed that Ben worked as a manager for 40 years in the very same warehouse, reinforcing his qualities of longevity, reliability, and dependability. He oversaw the printing of the physical telephone book, another quaint material artefact of the past akin to Ben, which is shown to have literally shaped the building where the floor dips over in the corner due to the heavy printers. The differences between Ben and Jules as successive generations of managers in this building operate as registers of social change inflected with just a little nostalgia. Indeed, the name of Jules’s company, All About Fit, seems to refer more to the beautifully tailored “fit” of Ben’s business suit than to any of the other clothed bodies in the company.Not only is the business suit fitted to business, but it comes to represent a properly managed body as well. This is particularly evident when contrasted with Jules’s management style. Over the course of the film, as she endures a humiliating series of meetings, sends a disastrous email to the wrong recipient, and juggles her strained marriage and her daughter’s school schedule, Jules is continuously shown to teeter on the brink of losing control. Her bodily needs are exaggerated in the movie: she does not sleep and apparently risks “getting fat” according to her mother’s research; then when she does sleep it is in inappropriate places and she snores loudly; she forgets to eat, she cries, gets drunk and vomits, gets nervous, and gets emotional. All of these outpourings are in situations that Ben remedies, in his solid reliable suited self. As Longhurst reminds us,The suit helps to create an illusion of a hard, or at least a firm and “proper,” body that is autonomous, in control, rational and masculine. It gives the impression that bodily boundaries continually remain intact and reduce potential embarrassment caused by any kind of leakage. (99)Ben is thus suited to manage situations in ways that contrast to Jules, whose bodily emissions and emotional dramas reinforce her as feminine, chaotic, and emotionally vulnerable. As Gatens notes of our epistemological inheritance, “women are most often understood to be less able to control the passions of the body and this failure is often located in the a priori disorder or anarchy of the female body itself” (50). Transitioning these philosophical principles to the 21st-century workplace, however, manifests some angst around gender and generation in this film.Despite the film’s apparent advocacy of successful working women, Jules too comes to prefer Ben’s model of corporeal control and masculinity. Ben is someone who makes Jules “feel calm, more centred or something. I could use that, obviously,” she quips. After he leads the almost undifferentiated younger employees Jason, Davis, and Lewis on a physical email rescue, Jules presents her theory of men amidst shots at a bar to celebrate their heist:Jules: So, we were always told that we could be anything, do anything, and I think guys got, maybe not left behind but not quite as nurtured, you know? I mean, like, we were the generation of You go, Girl. We had Oprah. And I wonder sometimes how guys fit in, you know they still seem to be trying to figure it out. They’re still dressing like little boys, they’re still playing video games …Lewis: Well they’ve gotten great.Davis: I love video games.Ben: Oh boy.Jules: How, in one generation, have men gone from guys like Jack Nicholson and Harrison Ford to … [Lewis, Davis, and Jason look down at themselves]Jules: Take Ben, here. A dying breed. Look and learn boys, because if you ask me, this is what cool is.Jules’s excessive drinking in this scene, which is followed by her vomiting into a rubbish bin, appears to reinforce Ben’s stable sobriety, alongside the culture of excess and rapid change associated with Jules through her gender and generation.Jules’s adoption of Ben as the model of masculinity is timely, given that she consistently encounters “sexism in business.” After every meeting with a potential CEO Jules complains of their patronising approach—calling her company a “chick site,” for example. And yet Ben echoes the sartorial style of the 1960s Mad Men era, which is suffused with sexism. The tension between Ben’s modelling of old-fashioned chivalry and those outdated sexist businessmen who never appear on-screen remains linked, however, through the iconography of the suit. In his book Mediated Nostalgia, Lizardi notes a similar tendency in contemporary media for what he calls “presentist versions of the past […] that represent a simpler time” (6) where viewers are constructed as ”uncritical citizens of our own culture” (1). By heroising Ben as a model of white middle-class managerial masculinity that is nostalgically enduring and endearing, this film betrays a yearning for such a “simpler time,” despite the complexities that hover just off-screen.Indeed, most of the other male characters in the film are found wanting in comparison to the retro masculinity of Ben. Jules’s husband Matt appears to be a perfect modern “stay-at-home-dad” who gives up his career for Jules’s business start-up. Yet he is found to be having an affair with one of the school mums. Lewis’s clothes are also condemned by Ben: “Why doesn’t anyone tuck anything in anymore?” he complains. Jason does not know how to speak to his love-interest Becky, expecting that texting and emailing sad emoticons will suffice, and Davis is unable to find a place to live. Luckily Ben can offer advice and tutelage to these men, going so far as to house Davis and give him one of his “vintage” ties to wear. Jules endorses this, saying she loves men in ties.The BriefcaseIf a feature of Ben’s experienced managerial style is longevity and stability, then these values are also attached to his briefcase. The association between Ben and his briefcase is established when the briefcase is personified during preparations for Ben’s first day: “Back in action,” Ben tells it. According to Atkinson, the briefcase is a “signifier of executive status […] entwined with a ‘macho mystique’ of concealed technology” (192). He ties this to the emergence of Cold War spy films like James Bond and traces it to the development of the laptop computer. This mix of mobility, concealment, glamour, and a touch of playboy adventurousness in a mass-produced material product manifested the values of the corporate world in latter 20th-century work culture and rendered the briefcase an important part of executive masculinity. Ben’s briefcase is initially indicative of his anachronistic position in All About Fit. While Davis opens his canvas messenger bag to reveal a smartphone, charger, USB drive, multi-cable connector, and book, Ben mirrors this by taking out his glasses case, set of pens, calculator, fliptop phone, and travel clock. Later in the film he places a print newspaper and leather bound book back into the case. Despite the association with a pre-digital age, the briefcase quickly becomes a product associated with Ben’s retro style. Lewis, at the next computer console, asks about its brand:Ben: It’s a 1973 Executive Ashburn Attaché. They don’t make it anymore.Lewis: I’m a little in love with it.Ben: It’s a classic Lewis. It’s unbeatable.The attaché case is left over from Ben’s past in executive management as VP for sales and advertising. This was a position he held for twenty years, during his past working life, which was spent with the same company for over 40 years. Ben’s long-serving employment record has the same values as his equally long-serving attaché case: it is dependable, reliable, ages well, and outlasts changes in fashion.The kind of nostalgia invested in Ben and his briefcase is reinforced extradiagetically through the musical soundtracks associated with him. Compared to the undifferentiated upbeat tracks at the workplace, Ben’s scenes feature a slower-paced sound from another era, including Ray Charles, Astrud Gilberto, Billie Holiday, and Benny Goodman. These classics are a point of connection with Jules, who declares that she loves Billie Holiday. Yet Jules is otherwise characterised by upbeat, even frantic, timing. She hates slow talkers, is always on the move, and is renowned for being late for meetings and operating on what is known as “Jules Standard Time.” In contrast, like his music, Ben is always on time: setting two alarm clocks each night, driving shorter and more efficient routes, seeing things at just the right time, and even staying at work until the boss leaves. He is reliable, steady, and orderly. He restores order both to the office junk desk and to the desk of Jules’s personal assistant Becky. These characteristics of order and timeliness are offered as an alternative to the chaos of 21st-century global flows of fashion marketing. Like his longevity, time is measured and managed around Ben. Even his name echoes that veritable keeper of time, Big Ben.The HandkerchiefThe handkerchief is another anachronistic object that Ben routinely carries, concealed inside his suit rather than flamboyantly worn on the outside pocket. A neatly ironed square of white hanky, it forms a notable part of Ben’s closet, as Davis notices and enquires about:Davis: Okay what’s the deal with the handkerchief? I don’t get that at all.Ben: It’s essential. That your generation doesn’t know that is criminal. The reason for carrying a handkerchief is to lend it. Ask Jason about this. Women cry Davis. We carry it for them. One of the last vestiges of the chivalrous gent.Indeed, when Jules’s personal assistant Becky bursts into tears because her skills and overtime go unrecognised, Ben is able to offer the hanky to Jason to give her as a kind of white flag, officially signaling a ceasefire between Becky and Jason. This scene is didactic: Ben is teaching Jason how to talk to a woman with the handkerchief as a material prop to prompt the occasion. He also offers advice to Becky to keep more regular hours, and go out and have fun (with Jason, obviously). Despite Becky declaring she “hates girls who cry at work,” this reaction to the pressures of a contemporary work culture that is irregular, chaotic, and never-ending is clearly marking gender, as the handkerchief also marks a gendered transaction of comfort.The handkerchief functions as a material marker of the “chivalrous gent” partly due to the number of times women are seen to cry in this film. In one of Ben’s first encounters with Jules she is crying in a boardroom, when it is suggested that she find a CEO to manage the company. Ben is clearly embarrassed, as is Jules, indicating the inappropriateness of such bodily emissions at work and reinforcing the emotional currency of women in the workplace. Jules again cries while discussing her marriage crisis with Ben, a scene in which Ben comments it is “the one time when he doesn’t have a hanky.” By the end of the film, when Jules and Matt are reconciling, she suggests: “It would be great if you were to carry a handkerchief.” The remaking of modern men into the retro style of Ben is more fully manifested in Davis who is depicted going to work on the last day in the film in a suit and tie. No doubt a handkerchief lurks hidden within.ConclusionThe yearning that emerges for a masculinity of yesteryear means that the intern in this film, Ben Whittaker, becomes an internal moral compass who reminds us of rapid social changes in gender and work, and of their discomfits. That this should be mapped onto an older, white, heterosexual, male body is unsurprising, given the authority traditionally invested in such bodies. Ben’s retro masculinity, however, is a fantasy from a fictional yesteryear, without the social or political forces that render those times problematic; instead, his material culture is fetishised and stripped of political analysis. Ben even becomes the voice of feminism, correcting Jules for taking the blame for Matt’s affair. Buchbinder argues that the more recent manifestations in film and television of “inadequate or incomplete” masculinity can be understood as “enacting a resistance to or even a refusal of the coercive pressure of the gender system” (235, italics in original), and yet The Intern’s yearning for a slow, orderly, mature, and knowing male hero refuses much space for alternative younger models. Despite this apparently unerring adulation of retro masculinity, however, we are reminded of the sexist social culture that suits, briefcases, and handkerchiefs materialise every time Jules encounters one of the seasoned CEOs jostling to replace her. The yearning for a stable masculinity in this film comes at the cost of politicising the past, and imagining alternative models for the future.ReferencesAtkinson, Paul. “Man in a Briefcase: The Social Construction of the Laptop Computer and the Emergence of a Type Form.” Journal of Design History 18.2 (2005): 191-205. Buchbinder, David. “Enter the Schlemiel: The Emergence of Inadequate of Incompetent Masculinities in Recent Film and Television.” Canadian Review of American Studies 38.2 (2008): 227-245.Butler, Judith. Gender Trouble. New York: Routledge, 1990.Connell, R.W. Masculinities. 2nd ed. Cambridge: Polity Press, 2005.Edwards, Tim. Fashion in Focus: Concepts, Practices and Politics. London: Routledge, 2010.Gatens, Moira. Imaginary Bodies: Ethics, Power and Corporeality. New York: Routledge, 1996.Gilleard, Chris, and Paul Higgs. Ageing, Corporeality and Embodiment. London: Anthem, 2014.Lizardi, Ryan. Mediated Nostalgia: Individual Memory and Contemporary Mass Media. London: Lexington Books, 2015.Longhurst, Robyn. Bodies: Exploring Fluid Boundaries. London: Routledge, 2001.Meyers, Nancy, dir. The Intern. Warner Bros. Pictures, 2015.Turkle, Sherry. “The Things That Matter.” Evocative Objects: Things We Think With. Ed. Sherry Turkle. Cambridge MA: MIT Press, 2007.Turner, Graeme. Film as Social Practice. 3rd ed. London: Routledge, 2002.Veenstra, Aleit, and Giselinde Kuipers. “It Is Not Old-Fashioned, It Is Vintage: Vintage Fashion and the Complexities of 21st Century Consumption Practices.” Sociology Compass 7.5 (2013): 355-365.

Babies and toddlers are amassing huge followings on social media, achieving microcelebrity status, and raking in five figure sums. In East Asia, many of these lucrative “micro­-microcelebrities” rise to fame by inheriting exposure and proximate microcelebrification from their social media Influencer mothers. Through self-branding techniques, Influencer mothers’ portrayals of their young’ children’s lives “as lived” are the canvas on which (baby) products and services are marketed to readers as “advertorials”. In turning to investigate this budding phenomenon, I draw on ethnographic case studies in Singapore to outline the career trajectory of these young children (under 4yo) including their social media presence, branding strategies, and engagement with their followers. The chapter closes with a brief discussion on some ethical considerations of such young children’s labour in the social media age.Influencer MothersTheresa Senft first coined the term “microcelebrity” in her work Camgirls as a burgeoning online trend, wherein people attempt to gain popularity by employing digital media technologies, such as videos, blogs, and social media. She describes microcelebrities as “non-actors as performers” whose narratives take place “without overt manipulation”, and who are “more ‘real’ than television personalities with ‘perfect hair, perfect friends and perfect lives’” (Senft 16), foregrounding their active response to their communities in the ways that maintain open channels of feedback on social media to engage with their following.Influencers – a vernacular industry term albeit inspired by Katz & Lazarsfeld’s notion of “personal influence” that predates Internet culture – are one type of microcelebrity; they are everyday, ordinary Internet users who accumulate a relatively large following on blogs and social media through the textual and visual narration of their personal lives and lifestyles, engage with their following in “digital” and “physical” spaces, and monetize their following by integrating “advertorials” into their blog or social media posts and making physical appearances at events. A pastiche of “advertisement” and “editorial”, advertorials in the Influencer industry are highly personalized, opinion-laden promotions of products/services that Influencers personally experience and endorse for a fee. Influencers in Singapore often brand themselves as having “relatability”, or the ability to persuade their followers to identify with them (Abidin). They do so by make consciously visible the backstage (Goffman) of the usually “inaccessible”, “personal”, and “private” aspects of mundane, everyday life to curate personae that feel “authentic” to fans (Marwick 114), and more accessible than traditional celebrity (Senft 16).Historically, the Influencer industry in Singapore can be traced back to the early beginnings of the “blogshop” industry from the mid-2000s and the “commercial blogging” industry. Influencers are predominantly young women, and market products and services from diverse industries, although the most popular have been fashion, beauty, F&B, travel, and electronics. Most prominent Influencers are contracted to management agencies who broker deals in exchange for commission and assist in the production of their vlogs. Since then, the industry has grown, matured, and expanded so rapidly that Influencers developed emergent models of advertorials, with the earliest cohorts moving into different life stages and monetizing several other aspects of their personal lives such as the “micro-microcelebrity” of their young children. What this paper provides is an important analysis of the genesis and normative practices of micro-microcelebrity commerce in Singapore from its earliest years, and future research trajectories in this field.Micro-Microcelebrity and Proximate MicrocelebrificationI define micro-microcelebrities as the children of Influencers who have themselves become proximate microcelebrities, having derived exposure and fame from their prominent Influencer mothers, usually through a more prolific, deliberate, and commercial form of what Blum-Ross defines as “sharenting”: the act of parents sharing images and stores about their children in digital spaces such as social networking sites and blogs. Marwick (116-117), drawing from Rojek’s work on types of celebrity – distinguishes between two types of microcelebrity: “ascribed microcelebrity” where the online personality is made recognizable through the “production of celebrity media” such as paparazzi shots and user-produced online memes, or “achieved microcelebrity” where users engage in “self-presentation strateg[ies]”, such as fostering the illusion of intimacy with fans, maintaining a persona, and selective disclosure about oneself.Micro-microcelebrities lie somewhere between the two: In a process I term “proximate microcelebrification”, micro-microcelebrities themselves inherit celebrity through the preemptive and continuous exposure from their Influencer mothers, many beginning even during the pre-birth pregnancy stages in the form of ultrasound scans, as a form of “achieved microcelebrity”. Influencer mothers whose “presentational strategies” (cf. Marshall, “Promotion” 45) are successful enough (as will be addressed later) gain traction among followers, who in turn further popularize the micro-microcelebrity by setting up fan accounts, tribute sites, and gossip forums through which fame is heightened in a feedback loop as a model of “ascribed microcelebrity”.Here, however, I refrain from conceptualizing these young stars as “micro-Influencers” for unlike Influencers, these children do not yet curate their self-presentation to command the attention of followers, but instead are used, framed, and appropriated by their mothers for advertorials. In other words, Influencer mothers “curate [micro-microcelebrities’] identities into being” (Leaver, “Birth”). Following this, many aspects of their micro-microcelebrities become rapidly commodified and commercialized, with advertisers clamoring to endorse anything from maternity hospital stays to nappy cream.Although children of mommybloggers have the prospect to become micro-microcelebrities, both groups are conceptually distinct. Friedman (200-201) argues that among mommybloggers arose a tension between those who adopt “the raw authenticity of nonmonetized blogging”, documenting the “unglamorous minutiae” of their daily lives and a “more authentic view of motherhood” and those who use mommyblogs “primarily as a source of extra income rather than as a site for memoir”, focusing on “parent-centered products” (cf. Mom Bloggers Club).In contrast, micro-microcelebrities and their digital presence are deliberately commercial, framed and staged by Influencer mothers in order to maximize their advertorial potential, and are often postured to market even non-baby/parenting products such as fast food and vehicles (see later). Because of the overt commerce, it is unclear if micro-microcelebrity displays constitute “intimate surveillance”, an “almost always well-intentioned surveillance of young people by parents” (Leaver, “Born” 4). Furthermore, children are generally peripheral to mommybloggers whose own parenting narratives take precedence as a way to connect with fellow mothers, while micro-microcelebrities are the primary feature whose everyday lives and digital presence enrapture followers.MethodologyThe analysis presented is informed by my original fieldwork with 125 Influencers and related actors among whom I conducted a mixture of physical and digital personal interviews, participant observation, web archaeology, and archival research between December 2011 and October 2014. However, the material presented here is based on my digital participant observation of publicly accessible and intentionally-public digital presence of the first four highly successful micro-microcelebrities in Singapore: “Baby Dash” (b.2013) is the son of Influencer xiaxue, “#HeYurou” (b.2011) is the niece of Influencer bongqiuqiu, “#BabyElroyE” (b.2014) is the son of Influencer ohsofickle, and “@MereGoRound” (b.2015) is the daughter of Influencer bongqiuqiu.The microcelebrity/social media handles of these children take different forms, following the platform on which their parent/aunt has exposed them on the most. Baby Dash appears in all of xiaxue’s digital platforms under a variety of over 30 indexical, ironic, or humourous hashtags (Leaver, “Birth”) including “#pointylipped”, #pineappledash”, and “#面包脸” (trans. “bread face”); “#HeYurou” appears on bongqiuqiu’s Instagram and Twitter; “#BabyElroyE” appears on ohsofickle’s Instagram and blog, and is the central figure of his mother’s new YouTube channel; and “@MereGoRound” appears on all of bongqiuqiu’s digital platforms but also has her own Instagram account and dedicated YouTube channel. The images reproduced here are screenshot from Influencer mothers’ highly public social media: xiaxue, bongqiuqiu, and ohsofickle boast 593k, 277k, and 124k followers on Instagram and 263k, 41k, and 17k followers on Twitter respectively at the time of writing.Anticipation and Digital EstatesIn an exclusive front-pager (Figure 1) on the day of his induced birth, it was announced that Baby Dash had already received up to SGD25,000 worth of endorsement deals brokered by his Influencer mother, xiaxue. As the first micro-microcelebrity in his cohort (his mother was among the pioneer Influencers), Baby Dash’s Caesarean section was even filmed and posted on xiaxue’s YouTube channel in three parts (Figure 2). xiaxue had announced her pregnancy on her blog while in her second trimester, following which she consistently posted mirror selfies of her baby bump.Figure 1 & 2, screenshot April 2013 from ‹instagram.com/xiaxue›In her successful attempt at generating anticipation, the “bump” itself seemed to garner its own following on Twitter and Instagram, with many followers discussing how the Influencer dressed “it”, and how “it” was evolving over the weeks. One follower even compiled a collage of xiaxue’s “bump” chronologically and gifted it to the Influencer as an art image via Twitter on the day she delivered Baby Dash (Figure 3 & 4). Followers also frequently speculated and bantered about how her baby would look, and mused about how much they were going to adore him. Figure 3 & 4, screenshot March 2013 from ‹twitter.com/xiaxue› While Lupton (42) has conceptualized the sharing of images that precede birth as a “rite of passage”, Influencer mothers who publish sonograms deliberately do so in order to claim digital estates for their to-be micro-microcelebrities in the form of “reserved” social media handles, blog URLs, and unique hashtags for self-branding. For instance, at the 3-month mark of her pregnancy, Influencer bongqiuqiu debuted her baby’s dedicated hashtag, “#MereGoRound” in a birth announcement on her on Instagram account. Shortly after, she started an Instagram account, “@MereGoRound”, for her baby, who amassed over 5.5k followers prior to her birth. Figure 5 & 6, screenshot March 2015 from instagram.com/meregoround and instagram.com/bongqiuqiuThe debut picture features a heavily pregnant belly shot of bongqiuqiu (Figure 5), creating much anticipation for the arrival of a new micro-microcelebrity: in the six months leading up to her birth, various family, friends, and fans shared Instagram images of their gifts and welcome party for @MereGoRound, and followers shared congratulations and fan art on the dedicated Instagram hashtag. During this time, bongqiuqiu also frequently updated followers on her pregnancy progress, not without advertising her (presumably sponsored) gynecologist and hospital stay in her pregnancy diaries (Figure 6) – like Baby Dash, even as a foetus @MereGoRound was accumulating advertorials. Presently at six months old, @MereGoRound boasts almost 40k followers on Instagram on which embedded in the narrative of her growth are sponsored products and services from various advertisers.Non-Baby-Related AdvertorialsPrior to her pregnancy, Influencer bongqiuqiu hopped onto the micro-microcelebrity bandwagon in the wake of Baby Dash’s birth, by using her niece “#HeYurou” in her advertorials. Many Influencers attempt to naturalize their advertorials by composing their post as if recounting a family event. With reference to a child, parent, or partner, they may muse or quip about a product being used or an experience being shared in a bid to mask the distinction between their personal and commercial material. bongqiuqiu frequently posted personal, non-sponsored images engaging in daily mundane activities under the dedicated hashtag “#HeYurou”.However, this was occasionally interspersed with pictures of her niece holding on to various products including storybooks (Figure 8) and shopping bags (Figure 9). At first glance, this might have seemed like any mundane daily update the Influencer often posts. However, a close inspection reveals the caption bearing sponsor hashtags, tags, and campaign information. For instance, one Instagram post shows #HeYurou casually holding on to and staring at a burger in KFC wrapping (Figure 7), but when read in tandem with bongqiuqiu’s other KFC-related posts published over a span of a few months, it becomes clear that #HeYurou was in fact advertising for KFC. Figure 7, 8, 9, screenshot December 2014 from ‹instagram.com/bongqiuqiu›Elsewhere, Baby Dash was incorporated into xiaxue’s car sponsorship with over 20 large decals of one of his viral photos – dubbed “pineapple Dash” among followers – plastered all over her vehicle (Figure 10). Followers who spot the car in public are encouraged to photograph and upload the image using its dedicated hashtag, “#xiaxuecar” as part of the Influencer’s car sponsorship – an engagement scarcely related to her young child. Since then, xiaxue has speculated producing offshoots of “pineapple Dash” products including smartphone casings. Figure 10, screenshot December 2014 from ‹instagram.com/xiaxue›Follower EngagementSponsors regularly organize fan meet-and-greets headlined by micro-microcelebrities in order to attract potential customers. Photo opportunities and the chance to see Baby Dash “in the flesh” frequently front press and promotional material of marketing campaigns. Elsewhere on social media, several Baby Dash fan and tribute accounts have also emerged on Instagram, reposting images and related media of the micro-microcelebrity with overt adoration, no doubt encouraged by xiaxue, who began crowdsourcing captions for Baby Dash’s photos.Influencer ohsofickle postures #BabyElroyE’s follower engagement in a more subtle way. In her YouTube channel that debut in the month of her baby’s birth, ohsofickle produces video diaries of being a young, single, mother who is raising a child (Figure 11). In each episode, #BabyElroyE is the main feature whose daily activities are documented, and while there is some advertising embedded, ohsofickle’s approach on YouTube is much less overt than others as it features much more non-monetized personal content (Figure 12). Her blog serves as a backchannel to her vlogs, in which she recounts her struggles with motherhood and explicitly solicits the advice of mothers. However, owing to her young age (she became an Influencer at 17 and gave birth at 24), many of her followers are teenagers and young women who respond to her solicitations by gushing over #BabyElroyE’s images on Instagram. Figure 11 & 12, screenshot September 2015 from ‹instagram.com/ohsofickle›PrivacyAs noted by Holloway et al. (23), children like micro-microcelebrities will be among the first cohorts to inherit “digital profiles” of their “whole lifetime” as a “work in progress”, from parents who habitually underestimate or discount the privacy and long term effects of publicizing information about their children at the time of posting. This matters in a climate where social media platforms can amend privacy policies without user consent (23), and is even more pressing for micro-microcelebrities whose followers store, republish, and recirculate information in fan networks, resulting in digital footprints with persistence, replicability, scalability, searchability (boyd), and extended longevity in public circulation which can be attributed back to the children indefinitely (Leaver, “Ends”).Despite minimum age restrictions and recent concerns with “digital kidnapping” where users steal images of other young children to be re-posted as their own (Whigham), some social media platforms rarely police the proliferation of accounts set up by parents on behalf of their underage children prominently displaying their legal names and life histories, citing differing jurisdictions in various countries (Facebook; Instagram), while others claim to disable accounts if users report an “incorrect birth date” (cf. Google for YouTube). In Singapore, the Media Development Authority (MDA) which governs all print and digital media has no firm regulations for this but suggests that the age of consent is 16 judging by their recommendation to parents with children aged below 16 to subscribe to Internet filtering services (Media Development Authority, “Regulatory” 1). Moreover, current initiatives have been focused on how parents can impart digital literacy to their children (Media Development Authority, “Empowered”; Media Literacy Council) as opposed to educating parents about the digital footprints they may be unwittingly leaving about their children.The digital lives of micro-microcelebrities pose new layers of concern given their publicness and deliberate publicity, specifically hinged on making visible the usually inaccessible, private aspects of everyday life (Marshall, “Persona” 5).Scholars note that celebrities are individuals for whom speculation of their private lives takes precedence over their actual public role or career (Geraghty 100-101; Turner 8). However, the personae of Influencers and their young children are shaped by ambiguously blurring the boundaries of privacy and publicness in order to bait followers’ attention, such that privacy and publicness are defined by being broadcast, circulated, and publicized (Warner 414). In other words, the publicness of micro-microcelebrities is premised on the extent of the intentional publicity rather than simply being in the public domain (Marwick 223-231, emphasis mine).Among Influencers privacy concerns have aroused awareness but not action – Baby Dash’s Influencer mother admitted in a national radio interview that he has received a death threat via Instagram but feels that her child is unlikely to be actually attacked (Channel News Asia) – because privacy is a commodity that is manipulated and performed to advance their micro-microcelebrities’ careers. As pioneer micro-microcelebrities are all under 2-years-old at present, future research warrants investigating “child-centred definitions” (Third et al.) of the transition in which they come of age, grow an awareness of their digital presence, respond to their Influencer mothers’ actions, and potentially take over their accounts.Young LabourThe Ministry of Manpower (MOM) in Singapore, which regulates the employment of children and young persons, states that children under the age of 13 may not legally work in non-industrial or industrial settings (Ministry of Manpower). However, the same document later ambiguously states underaged children who do work can only do so under strict work limits (Ministry of Manpower). Elsewhere (Chan), it is noted that national labour statistics have thus far only focused on those above the age of 15, thus neglecting a true reflection of underaged labour in Singapore. This is despite the prominence of micro-microcelebrities who are put in front of (video) cameras to build social media content. Additionally, the work of micro-microcelebrities on digital platforms has not yet been formally recognized as labour, and is not regulated by any authority including Influencer management firms, clients, the MDA, and the MOM. Brief snippets from my ethnographic fieldwork with Influencer management agencies in Singapore similarly reveal that micro-microcelebrities’ labour engagements and control of their earnings are entirely at their parents’ discretion.As models and actors, micro-microcelebrities are one form of entertainment workers who if between the ages of 15 days and 18 years in the state of California are required to obtain an Entertainment Work Permit to be gainfully employed, adhering to strict work, schooling, and rest hour quotas (Department of Industrial Relations). Furthermore, the Californian Coogan Law affirms that earnings by these minors are their own property and not their parents’, although they are not old enough to legally control their finances and rely on the state to govern their earnings with a legal guardian (Screen Actors Guild). However, this similarly excludes underaged children and micro-microcelebrities engaged in creative digital ecologies. Future research should look into safeguards and instruments among young child entertainers, especially for micro-micrcocelebrities’ among whom commercial work and personal documentation is not always distinct, and are in fact deliberately intertwined in order to better engage with followers for relatabilityGrowing Up BrandedIn the wake of moral panics over excessive surveillance technologies, children’s safety on the Internet, and data retention concerns, micro-microcelebrities and their Influencer mothers stand out for their deliberately personal and overtly commercial approach towards self-documenting, self-presenting, and self-publicizing from the moment of conception. As these debut micro-microcelebrities grow older and inherit digital publics, personae, and careers, future research should focus on the transition of their ownership, engagement, and reactions to a branded childhood in which babies were postured for an initimate public.ReferencesAbidin, Crystal. “Communicative Intimacies: Influencers and Perceived Interconnectedness.” Ada: A Journal of Gender, New Media, & Technology. Forthcoming, Nov 2015.Aiello, Marianne. “Mommy Blog Banner Ads Get Results.” Healthcare Marketing Advisor 17 Nov. 2010. HealthLeaders Media. 16 Aug. 2015 ‹http://healthleadersmedia.com/content/MAR-259215/Mommy-Blog-Banner-Ads-Get-Results›.Azzarone, Stephanie. “When Consumers Report: Mommy Blogging Your Way to Success.” Playthings 18 Feb. 2009. 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Protecting Your Kids in the Digital Age.” Documents 2015. 16 Aug. 2015 ‹http://www.mda.gov.sg/Documents/Newsletter/Issue08/Pages/02.aspx.html›.Media Literacy Council. “Clique Click: Bringing Up Children in the Digital Age.” Resources 2014. 16 Aug. 2015 ‹http://www.medialiteracycouncil.sg/Lists/Resources/Attachments/176/Clique%20Click.pdf›.Ministry of Manpower. “Employing Young Persons and Children.” Employment 26 May 2014. 16 Aug. 2015 ‹http://www.mom.gov.sg/employment-practices/young-persons-and-children›.Mom Bloggers Club. “Eight Proven Ways to Monetize Your Mom Blog.” Mom Bloggers Club 19 Nov. 2009. 15 Aug. 2015 ‹http://www.mombloggersclub.com/page/eight-proven-ways-to-monetize?id=988554%3APage%3A345278&page=3#comments›.Morrison, Aimee. “‘Suffused by Feeling and Affect:’ The Intimate Public of Personal Mommy Blogging.” Biography 34.1 (2011): 37-55.Nash, Meredith. “Shapes of Motherhood: Exploring Postnatal Body Image through Photographs.” Journal of Gender Studies (2013): 1-20. ‹http://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/09589236.2013.797340#.VdDsvZ2qqko›.Rojek, Chris. 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The term “coffee palace” was primarily used in Australia to describe the temperance hotels that were built in the last decades of the 19th century, although there are references to the term also being used to a lesser extent in the United Kingdom (Denby 174). Built in response to the worldwide temperance movement, which reached its pinnacle in the 1880s in Australia, coffee palaces were hotels that did not serve alcohol. This was a unique time in Australia’s architectural development as the economic boom fuelled by the gold rush in the 1850s, and the demand for ostentatious display that gathered momentum during the following years, afforded the use of richly ornamental High Victorian architecture and resulted in very majestic structures; hence the term “palace” (Freeland 121). The often multi-storied coffee palaces were found in every capital city as well as regional areas such as Geelong and Broken Hill, and locales as remote as Maria Island on the east coast of Tasmania. Presented as upholding family values and discouraging drunkenness, the coffee palaces were most popular in seaside resorts such as Barwon Heads in Victoria, where they catered to families. Coffee palaces were also constructed on a grand scale to provide accommodation for international and interstate visitors attending the international exhibitions held in Sydney (1879) and Melbourne (1880 and 1888). While the temperance movement lasted well over 100 years, the life of coffee palaces was relatively short-lived. Nevertheless, coffee palaces were very much part of Australia’s cultural landscape. In this article, I examine the rise and demise of coffee palaces associated with the temperance movement and argue that coffee palaces established in the name of abstinence were modelled on the coffee houses that spread throughout Europe and North America in the 17th and 18th centuries during the Enlightenment—a time when the human mind could be said to have been liberated from inebriation and the dogmatic state of ignorance. The Temperance Movement At a time when newspapers are full of lurid stories about binge-drinking and the alleged ill-effects of the liberalisation of licensing laws, as well as concerns over the growing trend of marketing easy-to-drink products (such as the so-called “alcopops”) to teenagers, it is difficult to think of a period when the total suppression of the alcohol trade was seriously debated in Australia. The cause of temperance has almost completely vanished from view, yet for well over a century—from 1830 to the outbreak of the Second World War—the control or even total abolition of the liquor trade was a major political issue—one that split the country, brought thousands onto the streets in demonstrations, and influenced the outcome of elections. Between 1911 and 1925 referenda to either limit or prohibit the sale of alcohol were held in most States. While moves to bring about abolition failed, Fitzgerald notes that almost one in three Australian voters expressed their support for prohibition of alcohol in their State (145). Today, the temperance movement’s platform has largely been forgotten, killed off by the practical example of the United States, where prohibition of the legal sale of alcohol served only to hand control of the liquor traffic to organised crime. Coffee Houses and the Enlightenment Although tea has long been considered the beverage of sobriety, it was coffee that came to be regarded as the very antithesis of alcohol. When the first coffee house opened in London in the early 1650s, customers were bewildered by this strange new drink from the Middle East—hot, bitter, and black as soot. But those who tried coffee were, reports Ellis, soon won over, and coffee houses were opened across London, Oxford, and Cambridge and, in the following decades, Europe and North America. Tea, equally exotic, entered the English market slightly later than coffee (in 1664), but was more expensive and remained a rarity long after coffee had become ubiquitous in London (Ellis 123-24). The impact of the introduction of coffee into Europe during the seventeenth century was particularly noticeable since the most common beverages of the time, even at breakfast, were weak “small beer” and wine. Both were safer to drink than water, which was liable to be contaminated. Coffee, like beer, was made using boiled water and, therefore, provided a new and safe alternative to alcoholic drinks. There was also the added benefit that those who drank coffee instead of alcohol began the day alert rather than mildly inebriated (Standage 135). It was also thought that coffee had a stimulating effect upon the “nervous system,” so much so that the French called coffee une boisson intellectuelle (an intellectual beverage), because of its stimulating effect on the brain (Muskett 71). In Oxford, the British called their coffee houses “penny universities,” a penny then being the price of a cup of coffee (Standage 158). Coffee houses were, moreover, more than places that sold coffee. Unlike other institutions of the period, rank and birth had no place (Ellis 59). The coffee house became the centre of urban life, creating a distinctive social culture by treating all customers as equals. Egalitarianism, however, did not extend to women—at least not in London. Around its egalitarian (but male) tables, merchants discussed and conducted business, writers and poets held discussions, scientists demonstrated experiments, and philosophers deliberated ideas and reforms. For the price of a cup (or “dish” as it was then known) of coffee, a man could read the latest pamphlets and newsletters, chat with other patrons, strike business deals, keep up with the latest political gossip, find out what other people thought of a new book, or take part in literary or philosophical discussions. Like today’s Internet, Twitter, and Facebook, Europe’s coffee houses functioned as an information network where ideas circulated and spread from coffee house to coffee house. In this way, drinking coffee in the coffee house became a metaphor for people getting together to share ideas in a sober environment, a concept that remains today. According to Standage, this information network fuelled the Enlightenment (133), prompting an explosion of creativity. Coffee houses provided an entirely new environment for political, financial, scientific, and literary change, as people gathered, discussed, and debated issues within their walls. Entrepreneurs and scientists teamed up to form companies to exploit new inventions and discoveries in manufacturing and mining, paving the way for the Industrial Revolution (Standage 163). The stock market and insurance companies also had their birth in the coffee house. As a result, coffee was seen to be the epitome of modernity and progress and, as such, was the ideal beverage for the Age of Reason. By the 19th century, however, the era of coffee houses had passed. Most of them had evolved into exclusive men’s clubs, each geared towards a certain segment of society. Tea was now more affordable and fashionable, and teahouses, which drew clientele from both sexes, began to grow in popularity. Tea, however, had always been Australia’s most popular non-alcoholic drink. Tea (and coffee) along with other alien plants had been part of the cargo unloaded onto Australian shores with the First Fleet in 1788. Coffee, mainly from Brazil and Jamaica, remained a constant import but was taxed more heavily than tea and was, therefore, more expensive. Furthermore, tea was much easier to make than coffee. To brew tea, all that is needed is to add boiling water, coffee, in contrast, required roasting, grinding and brewing. According to Symons, until the 1930s, Australians were the largest consumers of tea in the world (19). In spite of this, and as coffee, since its introduction into Europe, was regarded as the antidote to alcohol, the temperance movement established coffee palaces. In the early 1870s in Britain, the temperance movement had revived the coffee house to provide an alternative to the gin taverns that were so attractive to the working classes of the Industrial Age (Clarke 5). Unlike the earlier coffee house, this revived incarnation provided accommodation and was open to men, women and children. “Cheap and wholesome food,” was available as well as reading rooms supplied with newspapers and periodicals, and games and smoking rooms (Clarke 20). In Australia, coffee palaces did not seek the working classes, as clientele: at least in the cities they were largely for the nouveau riche. Coffee Palaces The discovery of gold in 1851 changed the direction of the Australian economy. An investment boom followed, with an influx of foreign funds and English banks lending freely to colonial speculators. By the 1880s, the manufacturing and construction sectors of the economy boomed and land prices were highly inflated. Governments shared in the wealth and ploughed money into urban infrastructure, particularly railways. Spurred on by these positive economic conditions and the newly extended inter-colonial rail network, international exhibitions were held in both Sydney and Melbourne. To celebrate modern technology and design in an industrial age, international exhibitions were phenomena that had spread throughout Europe and much of the world from the mid-19th century. According to Davison, exhibitions were “integral to the culture of nineteenth century industrialising societies” (158). In particular, these exhibitions provided the colonies with an opportunity to demonstrate to the world their economic power and achievements in the sciences, the arts and education, as well as to promote their commerce and industry. Massive purpose-built buildings were constructed to house the exhibition halls. In Sydney, the Garden Palace was erected in the Botanic Gardens for the 1879 Exhibition (it burnt down in 1882). In Melbourne, the Royal Exhibition Building, now a World Heritage site, was built in the Carlton Gardens for the 1880 Exhibition and extended for the 1888 Centennial Exhibition. Accommodation was required for the some one million interstate and international visitors who were to pass through the gates of the Garden Palace in Sydney. To meet this need, the temperance movement, keen to provide alternative accommodation to licensed hotels, backed the establishment of Sydney’s coffee palaces. The Sydney Coffee Palace Hotel Company was formed in 1878 to operate and manage a number of coffee palaces constructed during the 1870s. These were designed to compete with hotels by “offering all the ordinary advantages of those establishments without the allurements of the drink” (Murdoch). Coffee palaces were much more than ordinary hotels—they were often multi-purpose or mixed-use buildings that included a large number of rooms for accommodation as well as ballrooms and other leisure facilities to attract people away from pubs. As the Australian Town and Country Journal reveals, their services included the supply of affordable, wholesome food, either in the form of regular meals or occasional refreshments, cooked in kitchens fitted with the latest in culinary accoutrements. These “culinary temples” also provided smoking rooms, chess and billiard rooms, and rooms where people could read books, periodicals and all the local and national papers for free (121). Similar to the coffee houses of the Enlightenment, the coffee palaces brought businessmen, artists, writers, engineers, and scientists attending the exhibitions together to eat and drink (non-alcoholic), socialise and conduct business. The Johnson’s Temperance Coffee Palace located in York Street in Sydney produced a practical guide for potential investors and businessmen titled International Exhibition Visitors Pocket Guide to Sydney. It included information on the location of government departments, educational institutions, hospitals, charitable organisations, and embassies, as well as a list of the tariffs on goods from food to opium (1–17). Women, particularly the Woman’s Christian Temperance Union (WCTU) were a formidable force in the temperance movement (intemperance was generally regarded as a male problem and, more specifically, a husband problem). Murdoch argues, however, that much of the success of the push to establish coffee palaces was due to male politicians with business interests, such as the one-time Victorian premiere James Munro. Considered a stern, moral church-going leader, Munro expanded the temperance movement into a fanatical force with extraordinary power, which is perhaps why the temperance movement had its greatest following in Victoria (Murdoch). Several prestigious hotels were constructed to provide accommodation for visitors to the international exhibitions in Melbourne. Munro was responsible for building many of the city’s coffee palaces, including the Victoria (1880) and the Federal Coffee Palace (1888) in Collins Street. After establishing the Grand Coffee Palace Company, Munro took over the Grand Hotel (now the Windsor) in 1886. Munro expanded the hotel to accommodate some of the two million visitors who were to attend the Centenary Exhibition, renamed it the Grand Coffee Palace, and ceremoniously burnt its liquor licence at the official opening (Murdoch). By 1888 there were more than 50 coffee palaces in the city of Melbourne alone and Munro held thousands of shares in coffee palaces, including those in Geelong and Broken Hill. With its opening planned to commemorate the centenary of the founding of Australia and the 1888 International Exhibition, the construction of the Federal Coffee Palace, one of the largest hotels in Australia, was perhaps the greatest monument to the temperance movement. Designed in the French Renaissance style, the façade was embellished with statues, griffins and Venus in a chariot drawn by four seahorses. The building was crowned with an iron-framed domed tower. New passenger elevators—first demonstrated at the Sydney Exhibition—allowed the building to soar to seven storeys. According to the Federal Coffee Palace Visitor’s Guide, which was presented to every visitor, there were three lifts for passengers and others for luggage. Bedrooms were located on the top five floors, while the stately ground and first floors contained majestic dining, lounge, sitting, smoking, writing, and billiard rooms. There were electric service bells, gaslights, and kitchens “fitted with the most approved inventions for aiding proficients [sic] in the culinary arts,” while the luxury brand Pears soap was used in the lavatories and bathrooms (16–17). In 1891, a spectacular financial crash brought the economic boom to an abrupt end. The British economy was in crisis and to meet the predicament, English banks withdrew their funds in Australia. There was a wholesale collapse of building companies, mortgage banks and other financial institutions during 1891 and 1892 and much of the banking system was halted during 1893 (Attard). Meanwhile, however, while the eastern States were in the economic doldrums, gold was discovered in 1892 at Coolgardie and Kalgoorlie in Western Australia and, within two years, the west of the continent was transformed. As gold poured back to the capital city of Perth, the long dormant settlement hurriedly caught up and began to emulate the rest of Australia, including the construction of ornately detailed coffee palaces (Freeman 130). By 1904, Perth had 20 coffee palaces. When the No. 2 Coffee Palace opened in Pitt Street, Sydney, in 1880, the Australian Town and Country Journal reported that coffee palaces were “not only fashionable, but appear to have acquired a permanent footing in Sydney” (121). The coffee palace era, however, was relatively short-lived. Driven more by reformist and economic zeal than by good business sense, many were in financial trouble when the 1890’s Depression hit. Leading figures in the temperance movement were also involved in land speculation and building societies and when these schemes collapsed, many, including Munro, were financially ruined. Many of the palaces closed or were forced to apply for liquor licences in order to stay afloat. Others developed another life after the temperance movement’s influence waned and the coffee palace fad faded, and many were later demolished to make way for more modern buildings. The Federal was licensed in 1923 and traded as the Federal Hotel until its demolition in 1973. The Victoria, however, did not succumb to a liquor licence until 1967. The Sydney Coffee Palace in Woolloomooloo became the Sydney Eye Hospital and, more recently, smart apartments. Some fine examples still survive as reminders of Australia’s social and cultural heritage. The Windsor in Melbourne’s Spring Street and the Broken Hill Hotel, a massive three-story iconic pub in the outback now called simply “The Palace,” are some examples. Tea remained the beverage of choice in Australia until the 1950s when the lifting of government controls on the importation of coffee and the influence of American foodways coincided with the arrival of espresso-loving immigrants. As Australians were introduced to the espresso machine, the short black, the cappuccino, and the café latte and (reminiscent of the Enlightenment), the post-war malaise was shed in favour of the energy and vigour of modernist thought and creativity, fuelled in at least a small part by caffeine and the emergent café culture (Teffer). Although the temperance movement’s attempt to provide an alternative to the ubiquitous pubs failed, coffee has now outstripped the consumption of tea and today’s café culture ensures that wherever coffee is consumed, there is the possibility of a continuation of the Enlightenment’s lively discussions, exchange of news, and dissemination of ideas and information in a sober environment. References Attard, Bernard. “The Economic History of Australia from 1788: An Introduction.” EH.net Encyclopedia. 5 Feb. (2012) ‹http://eh.net/encyclopedia/article/attard.australia›. Blainey, Anna. “The Prohibition and Total Abstinence Movement in Australia 1880–1910.” Food, Power and Community: Essays in the History of Food and Drink. Ed. Robert Dare. Adelaide: Wakefield Press, 1999. 142–52. Boyce, Francis Bertie. “Shall I Vote for No License?” An address delivered at the Convention of the Parramatta Branch of New South Wales Alliance, 3 September 1906. 3rd ed. Parramatta: New South Wales Alliance, 1907. Clarke, James Freeman. Coffee Houses and Coffee Palaces in England. Boston: George H. Ellis, 1882. “Coffee Palace, No. 2.” Australian Town and Country Journal. 17 Jul. 1880: 121. Davison, Graeme. “Festivals of Nationhood: The International Exhibitions.” Australian Cultural History. Eds. S. L. Goldberg and F. B. Smith. Cambridge: Cambridge UP, 1989. 158–77. Denby, Elaine. Grand Hotels: Reality and Illusion. London: Reaktion Books, 2002. Ellis, Markman. The Coffee House: A Cultural History. London: Weidenfeld & Nicolson, 2004. Federal Coffee Palace. The Federal Coffee Palace Visitors’ Guide to Melbourne, Its Suburbs, and Other Parts of the Colony of Victoria: Views of the Principal Public and Commercial Buildings in Melbourne, With a Bird’s Eye View of the City; and History of the Melbourne International Exhibition of 1880, etc. Melbourne: Federal Coffee House Company, 1888. Fitzgerald, Ross, and Trevor Jordan. Under the Influence: A History of Alcohol in Australia. Sydney: Harper Collins, 2009. Freeland, John. The Australian Pub. Melbourne: Sun Books, 1977. Johnson’s Temperance Coffee Palace. International Exhibition Visitors Pocket Guide to Sydney, Restaurant and Temperance Hotel. Sydney: Johnson’s Temperance Coffee Palace, 1879. Mitchell, Ann M. “Munro, James (1832–1908).” Australian Dictionary of Biography. Canberra: National Centre of Biography, Australian National U, 2006-12. 5 Feb. 2012 ‹http://adb.anu.edu.au/biography/munro-james-4271/text6905›. Murdoch, Sally. “Coffee Palaces.” Encyclopaedia of Melbourne. Eds. Andrew Brown-May and Shurlee Swain. 5 Feb. 2012 ‹http://www.emelbourne.net.au/biogs/EM00371b.htm›. Muskett, Philip E. The Art of Living in Australia. New South Wales: Kangaroo Press, 1987. Standage, Tom. A History of the World in 6 Glasses. New York: Walker & Company, 2005. Sydney Coffee Palace Hotel Company Limited. Memorandum of Association of the Sydney Coffee Palace Hotel Company, Ltd. Sydney: Samuel Edward Lees, 1879. Symons, Michael. One Continuous Picnic: A Gastronomic History of Australia. Melbourne: Melbourne UP, 2007. Teffer, Nicola. Coffee Customs. Exhibition Catalogue. Sydney: Customs House, 2005.

The use of the term authenticity in the social science literature can be rather eclectic at best and unscrupulous at worst. (Vanini, 74)We live in an age of authenticity, according to Charles Taylor, an era which prizes the finding of one’s life “against the demands of external conformity” (67–68). Taylor’s argument is that, correctly practiced, authenticity need not result in individualism or tribalism but rather a generation of people “made more self-responsible” (77).Philip Vanini has surveyed the turn toward authenticity in sociology. He has parsed the word authenticity, and argued that it has been used in three ways—factual, original, and sincere. A failure to attend to these distinctives, mixed with a “paucity of systematic empirical research” has resulted in abstract speculation (75). This article responds to Taylor’s analysis and Vanini’s challenge.My argument utilises Vanini’s theoretical frame—authenticity as factual, original, and sincere—to analyse empirical data gathered in the study of recent religious innovation occurring amongst a set of (“alternative worship”) Christian communities in the United Kingdom. I am drawing upon longitudinal research I have conducted, including participant observation in digital forums from 1997 to the present, along with semi-structured interviews conducted in the United Kingdom in 2001 and 2012.A study of “alternative worship” was deemed significant given such communities’s interaction with contemporary culture, including their use of dance music, multi-media, and social media (Baker, Taylor). Such approaches contrast with other contemporary religious approaches to culture, including a fundamentalist retreat from culture or the maintenance of a “high” culture, and thus inherited patterns of religious expression (Roberts).I argue that the discourse of “alternative worship” deploy authenticity-as-originality as essential to their identity creation. This notion of authenticity is used by these communities to locate themselves culturally (as authentically-original in contemporary cultures), and thus simultaneously to define themselves as marginal from mainstream religious expression.Intriguingly, a decade later, “alternative worship” was appropriated by the mainstream. A new organisation—Fresh Expressions—emerged from within the Church of England, and the Methodist Church in Britain that, as it developed, drew on “alternative worship” for legitimation. A focus on authenticity provides a lens by which to pay particular attention to the narratives offered by social organisations in the processes of innovation. How did the discourse deployed by Fresh Expressions in creating innovation engage “alternative worship” as an existing innovation? How did these “alternative worship” groups, who had found generative energy in their location as an alternative—authentically-original—expression, respond to this appropriation by mainstream religious life?A helpful conversation partner in teasing out the complexity of these moves within contemporary religious innovation is Sarah Thornton. She researched trends in dance clubs, and rave music in Britain, during a similar time period. Thornton highlighted the value of authenticity, which she argued was deployed in club cultures to create “subcultural capital” (98-105). She further explored how the discourses around authenticity were appropriated over time through the complex networks within which popular culture flows (Bennett; Collins; Featherstone; McRobbie; Willis).This article will demonstrate that a similar pattern—using authenticity-as-originality to create “subcultural capital”—was at work in “alternative worship.” Further, the notions of authenticity as factual, original, and sincere are helpful in parsing the complex networks that exist within the domains of religious cultures. This analysis will be two-fold, first as the mainstream appropriates, and second as the “alternative” responds.Thornton emerged “post-Birmingham.” She drew on the scholarship associated with the Centre for Contemporary Cultural Studies, glad of their turn toward popular culture. Nevertheless she considered her work to be distinct. Thornton posited the construction of “taste cultures” through distinctions created by those inside a particular set of signs and symbols. She argued for a networked view of society, one that recognised the complex roles of media and commerce in constructing distinctions and sought a more multi-dimensional frame by which to analyse the interplay between mainstream and marginal.In order to structure my investigation, I am suggesting three stages of development capture the priority, yet complexity, of authenticity in contemporary religious innovation: generation, appropriation, complexification.Generation of Authenticity-as-OriginalityThornton (26, italics original) writes:authenticity is arguably the most important value ascribed to popular music … Music is perceived as authentic when it rings true or feels real, when it has credibility and comes across as genuine. In an age of endless representations and global mediation, the experience of musical authenticity is perceived as a cure both for alienation … and dissimulation.Thornton is arguing that in this manifestation of youth culture, authenticity is valued. Further, authenticity is a perception, attached to phrases like “rings true” and “feels real.” Therefore, authenticity is hard to measure. Perhaps this move is deliberate, an attempt by those inside the “taste culture” to preserve their “subcultural capital,”—their particular sets of distinctions.Thornton’s use of authentic slides between authenticity-as-sincerity and authenticity-as-originality. For example, in the above quote, the language of “true” and “real” is a referencing of authenticity-as-sincerity. However, as Thornton analysed the appropriation of club culture by the mainstream, she is drawing, without stating it clearly, on both authenticity-as-sincerity and authenticity-as-originality.At around the time that Thornton was analysing club cultures, a number of Christian religious groups in the United Kingdom began to incorporate features of club culture into their worship services. Churches began to experiment with services beginning at club times (9.00 pm), the playing of dance music, and the use of “video-jockeying.” According to Roberts many of these worshipping communities “had close links to this movement in dance culture” (15).A discourse of authenticity was used to legitimise such innovation. Consider the description of one worship experience, located in Sheffield, England, known as Nine o’Clock Service (Fox 9-10, italics original).We enter a round, darkened room where there are forty-two television sets and twelve large video screens and projections around the walls—projections of dancing DNA, dancing planets and galaxies and atoms … this was a very friendly place for a generation raised on television and images … these people … are doing it themselves and in the center of the city and in the center of their society: at worship itself.This description makes a number of appeals to authenticity. The phrase “a generation raised on television and images” implies another generation not raised in digitally rich environments. A “subcultural” distinction has been created. The phrase “doing it themselves” suggests that this ‘digital generation’ creates something distinct, an authentic expression of their “taste culture.” The celebration of “doing it for themselves” resonates with Charles Taylor’s analysis of an age of authenticity in which self-discovery is connected with artistic creation (62).The Nine o’Clock Service gained nationwide attention, attracting attendances of over 600 young people. Rogerson described it as “a bold and imaginative attempt at contextual theology … people were attracted to it in the first instance for aesthetic and cultural reasons” (51). The priority on the aesthetic and the cultural, in contrast to the doctrinal, suggests a valuing of authenticity-as-originality.Reading Rogerson alongside Taylor teases out a further nuance in regard to the application of authenticity. Rogerson described the Nine o’Clock Service as offering “an alternative way of living in a materialist and acquisitive world” (50). This resonates with Charles Taylor’s argument that authenticity can be practiced in ways that make people “more self-responsible” (77). It suggests that the authenticity-as-originality expressed by the Nine o’Clock Service not only appealed culturally, but also offered an ethic of authenticity. We will return to this later in my argument.Inspired by the Nine o’Clock Service, other groups in the United Kingdom began to offer a similar experience. According to Adrian Riley (6):The Nine O’clock Service … was the first worshipping community to combine elements of club culture with passionate worship … It pioneered what is commonly known as “alternative worship” … Similar groups were established themselves albeit on a smaller scale.The very term “alternative worship” is significant. Sociologist of religion Abby Day argued that “boundary-marking [creates] an identity” (50). Applying Day, the term “alternative” is being used to create an identity in contrast to the existing, mainstream church. The “digitally rich” are indeed “doing it for themselves.” To be “alternative” is to be authentically-original: to be authentically-original means a participant cannot, by definition, be mainstream.Thornton argued that subcultures needed to define themselves against in order to maintain themselves as “hip” (119). This seems to describe the use of the term “alternative.” Ironically, the mainstream is needed, in order to define against, to create identity by being authentically-original (Kelly).Hence the following claim by an “alternative worship” organiser (Interview G, 2001):People were willing to play around and to say, well who knows what will happen if we run this video clip or commercial next to this sixteenth century religious painting and if we play, you know, Black Flag or some weird band underneath it … And what will it feel like? Well let’s try it and see.Note the link with music (Black Flag, an American hard core punk band formed in 1976), so central to Thornton’s understanding of authenticity in popular youth cultures. Note also the similarity between Thornton’s ascribing of value in words like “rings true” and “feels real,” with words like “feel like” and “try and see.” The word “weird” is also significant. It is deployed as a signifier of authenticity, a sign of “subcultural capital.” It positions them as “alternative,” defined in (musical) distinction from the mainstream.In sum, my argument is that authenticity-as-originality is present in “alternative worship”: in the name, in the ethos of “doing it themselves,” and in the deploying of “subcultural capital” in the legitimation of innovation. All of this has been clarified through conversation with Thornton’s empirical research regarding the value of authenticity in club culture. My analysis of “alternative worship” as a religious innovation is consistent with Taylor’s claim that we inhabit an age of authenticity, one that can be practiced by “people who are made more self-responsible” (77).Mainstream AppropriationIn 2004, the Church of England produced Mission Shaped Church (MSC), a report regarding its future. It included a chapter that described recent religious innovation in England, grouped under twelve headings (alternative worship and base ecclesial communities, café, cell, network and seeker church models, multiple and mid week congregations, new forms of traditional churches, school and community-based initiatives, traditional church plants, youth congregations). The first innovation listed is “alternative worship.”The incoming Archbishop, Rowan Williams, drew on MSC to launch a new organisation. Called Fresh Expressions, over five million pounds was provided by the Church of England to fund an organisation to support this religious innovation.Intriguingly, recognition of authenticity in these “alternative” innovations was evident in the institutional discourse being created. When I interviewed Williams, he spoke of his commitment as a Bishop (Interview 6, 2012):I decided to spend a certain amount of quality time with people on the edge. Consequently when I was asked initially what are my priorities [as Archbishop] I said, “Well, this is what I’ve been watching on the edge … I really want to see how that could impact on the Church of England as a whole.In other words, what was marginal, what had until then generated identity by being authentic in contrast to the mainstream, was now being appropriated by the mainstream “to impact on the Church of England as a whole.” MSC was aware of this complexity. “Alternative worship” was described as containing “a strong desire to be different and is most vocal in its repudiation of existing church” (45). Nevertheless, it was appropriated by the mainstream.My argument has been that “alternative worship” drew on a discourse of authenticity-as-originality. Yet when we turn to analyse mainstream appropriation, we find the definitions of authenticity begin to slide. Authenticity-as-originality is affirmed, while authenticity-as-sincerity is introduced. The MSC affirmed the “ways in which the Church of England has sought to engage with the diverse cultures and networks that are part of contemporary life” (80). It made explicit the connection between originality and authenticity. “Some pioneers and leaders have yearned for a more authentic way of living, being, doing church” (80). This can be read as an affirmation of authenticity-as-originality.Yet MSC also introduced authenticity-as-sincerity as a caution to authenticity-as-originality. “Fresh expressions should not be embraced simply because they are popular and new, but because they are a sign of the work of God and of the kingdom” (80). Thus Fresh Expressions introduced authenticity-as-sincerity (sign of the work of God) and placed it alongside authenticity-as-originality. In so doing, in the shift from “alternative worship” to Fresh Expressions, a space is both conflated (twelve expressions of church) and contested (two notions of authenticity). Conflated, because MSC places alternative worship as one innovation alongside eleven others. Contested because of the introduction of authenticity-as-sincerity alongside the affirming of authenticity-as-originality. What is intriguing is to return to Taylor’s argument for the possibility of an ethic of authenticity in which “people are made more self-responsible” (77). Perhaps the response in MSC arises from the concern described by Taylor, the risk in an age of authenticity of a society that is more individualised and tribal (55-6). To put it in distinctly ecclesiological terms, how can the church as one, holy, catholic and apostolic be carried forward if authenticity-as-originality is celebrated at, and by, the margins? Does innovation contribute to more atomised, self-absorbed and fragmented expressions of church?Yet Taylor is adamant that authenticity can be embraced without an inevitable slide in these directions. He argued that humans share a "horizon of significance" in common (52), in which one’s own "identity crucially depends on [one’s] dialogical relations with others" (48). We have already considered Rogerson’s claim that the Nine o’Clock Service offered “an alternative way of living in a materialist and acquisitive world” (50). It embraced a “strong political dimension, and a concern for justice at local and international level” (46). In other words, “alternative worship’s” authenticity-as-originality was surely already an expression of “the kingdom,” one in which “people [were] made more self-responsible” (77) in the sharing of (drawing on Taylor) a "horizon of significance" in the task of identity-formation-in-relationships (52).Yet the placing in MSC of authenticity-as-sincerity alongside authenticity-as-originality could easily have been read by those in “alternative worship” as a failure to recognise their existing practicing of the ethic of authenticity, their embodying of “the kingdom.”Consequent ComplexificationMy research into “alternative worship” is longitudinal. After the launch of Fresh Expressions, I included a new set of interview questions, which sought to clarify how these “alternative worship” communities were impacted upon by the appropriation of “alternative worship” by the mainstream. The responses can be grouped into three categories: minimal impact, a sense of affirmation and a contested complexity.With regard to minimal impact, some “alternative worship” communities perceived the arrival of Fresh Expressions had minimal impact on their shared expression of faith. The following quote was representative: “Has had no impact at all actually. Apart from to be slightly puzzled” (Interview 3, 2012).Others found the advent of Fresh Expressions provided a sense of affirmation. “Fresh expressions is … an enabling concept. It was very powerful” (Focus group 2, 2012). Respondents in this category felt that their innovations within alternative worship had contributed to, or been valued by, the innovation of Fresh Expressions. Interestingly, those whose comments could be grouped in this category had significant “subcultural capital” invested in this mainstream appropriation. Specifically, they now had a vocational role that in some way was connected to Fresh Expressions. In using the term “subcultural capital” I am again drawing on Thornton (98–105), who argued that in the complex networks through which culture flows, certain people, for example DJ’s, have more influence in the ascribing of authenticity. This suggests that “subcultural” capital is also present in religious innovation, with certain individuals finding ways to influence, from the “alternative worship” margin, the narratives of authenticity used in the complex interplay between alternative worship and Fresh Expressions.For others the arrival of Fresh Expressions had resulted in a contested complexity. The following quote was representative: “It’s a crap piece of establishment branding …but then we’re just snobs” (Focus group 3, 2012). This comment returns us to my initial framing of authenticity-as-originality. I would argue that “we’re just snobs” has a similar rhetorical effect as “Black Flag or some weird band.” It is an act of marginal self-location essential in the construction of innovation and identity.This argument is strengthened given the fact that the comment was coming from a community that itself had become perhaps the most recognizable “brand” among “alternative worship.” They have developed their own logo, website, and related online merchandising. This would suggest the concern is not the practice of marketing per se. Rather the concern is that it seems “crap” in relation to authenticity-as-originality, in a loss of aesthetic quality and a blurring of the values of innovation and identity as it related to bold, imaginative, aesthetic, and cultural attempts at contextual theology (Rogerson 51).Returning to Thornton, her research was also longitudinal in that she explored what happened when a song from a club, which had defined itself against the mainstream and as “hip,” suddenly experienced mainstream success (119). What is relevant to this investigation into religious innovation is her argument that in club culture, “selling out” is perceived to have happened only when the marginal community “loses its sense of possession, exclusive ownership and familiar belonging” (124–26).I would suggest that this is what is happening within “alternative worship” in response to the arrival of Fresh Expressions. Both “alternative worship” and Fresh Expressions are religious innovations. But Fresh Expressions defined itself in a way that conflated the space. It meant that the boundary marking so essential to “alternative worship” was lost. Some gained from this. Others struggled with a loss of imaginative and cultural creativity, a softening of authenticity-as-originality.More importantly, the discourse around Fresh Expressions also introduced authenticity-as-sincerity as a value that could be used to contest authenticity-as-originality. Whether intended or not, this also challenged the ethic of authenticity already created by these “alternative worship” communities. Their authenticity-as-originality was already a practicing of an ethic of authenticity. They were already sharing a "horizon of significance" with humanity, entering into “dialogical relations with others" that were a contemporary expression of the church as one, holy, catholic and apostolic (Taylor 52, 48). ConclusionIn this article I have analysed the discourse around authenticity as it is manifest within one strand of contemporary religious innovation. Drawing on Vanini, Taylor, and Thornton, I have explored the generative possibilities as media and culture are utilised in an “alternative worship” that is authentically-original. I have outlined the consequences when authenticity-as-originality is appropriated by the mainstream, specifically in the innovation known as Fresh Expressions and the complexity when authenticity-as-sincerity is introduced as a contested value.The value of authenticity has been found to exist in a complex relationship with the ethics of authenticity within one domain of contemporary religious innovation.ReferencesBaker, Jonny. “Alternative Worship and the Significance of Popular Culture.” Honours paper: U of London, 2000.Bennett, Andy. Popular Music and Youth Culture: Music, Identity, and Place. 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