When Eroticism Makes Luxury Fashion Brands Fly: Introducing the Construct of Eroticism, Providing a First Measurement and Rank of Luxury Fashion Brands Using a Newly Developed "Brand Erotic Index"

This article introduces a new construct to the field of luxury research, namely eroticism. This construct is, to a limited degree, based on the extant knowledge as very little research seemingly exists on the construct which, otherwise, has been "around" for centuries. Next, the construct is operationalized, measured, and empirically validated. A newly developed index, the Brand Erotic Index is employed to rank luxury brands according to their erotic appeal. Interviews with various experts from different fields (luxury executives, marketing academics, fashion and design experts, and psychologists) allow to explore the relationship between eroticism and luxury fashion (and constitute our qualitative study). Next, in our more quantitative study, we analyze survey data from a sample of 167 participants who were asked to evaluate eroticism. In the second quantitative study, a different sample of 217 respondents rated their brand perception about the erotic appeal of nine luxury fashion brands (LFBs). An exploratory factor analysis suggested that that eroticism is a multi-faceted construct consisting of six distinct sub-constructs. Next, we applied multidimensional scaling (based on brand personality and brand style) and found that distinct positionings for most selected LFBs appear to exist. Our findings should help executives and designers of luxury goods or fashion in transforming the power of eroticism into concrete business and artistic propositions. The findings should also ignite future research.