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The cost (and the value) of customer attire: linking high- and low-end dress styles to service quality and prices offered by service employees

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Abstract

This study tests the impact of customer dress on the price of goods and services offered and on service quality. Mystery shoppers visited stores in three different business contexts. For each context, 30 mystery shoppers paid three visits each, once in sloppy, once in casual, and once in fashionable attire. Supporting research hypotheses, dress had conflicting effects on employees: customers wearing fashionable/casual clothing received better service than those dressed sloppily, while the latter were offered goods and services at lower prices. The findings imply that organizations should reconsider their customer discrimination policies, and engage customers in developing accepted dress codes.

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Acknowledgments

The authors wish to thank the students in the first author’s research seminar (2010–2011) for their contribution to the data collection process.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Business Administration, Ruppin Academic Center, 40250, Emek Hefer, Israel

    Iris Vilnai-Yavetz & Shaked Gilboa

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  1. Iris Vilnai-Yavetz
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  2. Shaked Gilboa
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Correspondence to Iris Vilnai-Yavetz.

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Vilnai-Yavetz, I., Gilboa, S. The cost (and the value) of customer attire: linking high- and low-end dress styles to service quality and prices offered by service employees. Serv Bus 8, 355–373 (2014). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11628-013-0199-5

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11628-013-0199-5

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