Contents lists available at ScienceDirect Journal of Hospitality and Tourism Management journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/jhtm Conceptualising consumer-based service brand equity (CBSBE) and direct service experience in the airline sector Md Moniruzzaman Sarker ∗ , Amrul Asraf Mohd-Any, Yusniza Kamarulzaman Faculty of Business & Accountancy, University of Malaya, 50603 Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia ARTICLE INFO Keywords: Direct service experience CBBE Brand consistency Perceived value Service brand equity Airline service ABSTRACT The intense competition taking place in the airline sector requires a concurrently suitable branding strategy. Although contemporary brand equity models have been acknowledged and tested in the service branding context, they are not quite adaptable to the airline sector. These models are more appropriate for product- dominant brands, as they ignore the crucial roles of direct service experience and brand consistency in creating airline brand equity. Therefore, through a systematic and critical review of the literature, we propose a con- ceptualisation of consumer-based service brand equity (CBSBE) model by emphasising the importance of direct service experience and brand consistency that will equip airline marketing/brand managers to design efective branding strategies. 1. Introduction Air transport service is one of the key aspects of the travel and tourism industry. With more than 4 billion travellers globally in 2017 (Statista, 2018), the airline industry is widely considered as one of the largest and growing sectors (Deloitte, 2018). During 2016, the industry contributed about 732 billion US dollars to the global GDP and trig- gered economic growth worldwide (IATA, 2017). However, despite this development, the industry has been facing stif competitive challenges which are prompting consolidations/mergers or even shut downs (Hussain, 2016; Wang, 2014). Accordingly, these scenarios signal the need for airline companies to rethink their strategies in order to gain competitive advantage and secure stronger brand positions (Adapa & Roy, 2017). In the services marketing literature, branding has been acknowledged to account for a great number of successes of service organisations (Berry, 2000; Jara & Cliquet, 2012; McDonald, de Chernatony, & Harris, 2001). Moreover, successful brands survive amidst the competition, gain long-term fnancial stability, and ensure consumer trust (Jeng, 2016). Therefore, implementing an efective branding strategy is imperative for airline marketers to withstand the intense competition. As extant literature shows that consumer-based brand equity (CBBE) models are narrowly focused on brand equity constructs while ignoring the service experience components, their adaptability to the context of service-dominant brands becomes questionable (Çifci et al., 2016). Berry (2016) remarks that the intangible nature of services is the main hurdle of branding and it should undergo more research to refne the CBBE model for services. He further emphasises that direct experience with the services is the dominant aspect of building a service brand which difers from branding a product. Hence, there is reason to believe that the existing brand equity models are not quite suitable for a ser- vices context like airline. The need for a proper conceptualisation of CBBE model in the airline industry is also evident in Chen and Tseng (2010), Chen and Chang (2008) and Uslu, Durmuş, and Kolivar (2013). They note that despite managerial eforts to measure airline brand equity in practice, a widely accepted CBBE model for airline service in particular is still sparse. Although they developed a brand equity model for airline, their approach ofers little guidance for practitioners. There is no clear mention of how the components of airline service experience afect airline brand awareness, brand image, and perceived quality. Rather, their research only suggests how airline brand equity can be created through brand equity constructs. Previous literature also acknowledged that contemporary studies on airline service are more about passenger travel satisfaction/dis- satisfaction, service quality (Bubalo & Gaggero, 2015; Chen, 2008; Han & Hwang, 2017; Hussain, 2016; Kefallonitis, 2015; Lim & Tkaczynski, 2017; Park, Robertson, & Wu, 2006; Perçin, 2018), airline brand credibility, brand image, and/or brand personality (Cervera-Taulet, Schlesinger, & Yagüe-Guillen, 2013; Dirsehan & Kurtuluş, 2018; Jeng, 2016; Kotsi & Slak Valek, 2017), brand loyalty (Dolnicar, Grabler, Grün, & Kulnig, 2011; Hwang & Hyun, 2017; Mikulić; Šerić, & Matas Milković, 2017), airline alliances (Casanueva, Gallego, Castro, & https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jhtm.2018.11.002 Received 25 April 2018; Received in revised form 27 September 2018; Accepted 23 November 2018 ∗ Corresponding author. E-mail address: mrajib.sarker@gmail.com (M.M. Sarker). Journal of Hospitality and Tourism Management 38 (2019) 39–48 Available online 11 December 2018 1447-6770/ © 2018 CAUTHE - COUNCIL FOR AUSTRALASIAN TOURISM AND HOSPITALITY EDUCATION. Published by Elsevier Ltd All rights reserved. T