The impact of collective brand personification on happiness and brand loyalty Dominique Braxton Department of Marketing, Loyola Marymount University, Los Angeles, California, USA, and Loraine Lau-Gesk Department of Marketing, University of California Irvine, Irvine, California, USA Abstract Purpose – Frontline service providers are a key touchpoint in a customer’s overall experience with a brand. Though they are recognized as important contributors to brand experiences, service providers have received relatively little attention in both experienced marketing and branding research. This paper aims to illuminate the importance of understanding factors that contribute to the role services providers play within the environmental context of the customer’s brand journey. Design/methodology/approach – This study uses two experimental studies to show that greater customer happiness and customer loyalty could be achieved through collective brand personification whereby the frontline service provider’s identity and core values align with those of the brand persona and store environment. Findings – Specifically, findings reveal that customer happiness increases because of feelings of belongingness and greater brand authenticity when the service provider aligns with the retailer’s brand persona and store environment. Research limitations/implications – While this study gets us closer to understanding how managers can leverage human capital in the retail service environment, there are opportunities to further explore issues such as the impact of collective brand personification on the employee. Practical implications – Given the strong desire companies have to bolster customer happiness to increase brand loyalty, the findings bolster the importance of understanding the influential factors associated with frontline service providers. Their role in creating optimal customer experiences should not be underestimated. Social implications – As an important cautionary note, firms should take care when creating the appearance and personality-based occupational qualifications by considering social norms and the impact on societal well-being (e.g. self-consciousness and exclusion can lead to serious illnesses and including depression). Study shows that people have an inherent need to feel accepted and belong to social groups that help to construct and affirm their self-concept, and appreciate opportunities that empower them to seize control against exclusion. Therefore, appearance and personality-based occupational qualifications should be strategically aligned with the image and goals of the firm, and not subject to management bias from an unconscious reaction to an applicant’s physical and interpersonal presentation. Originality/value – The present study builds on both customer experience and branding literature by examining the relationship between customer happiness and collective brand personification – where the frontline service provider’s identity and core values align with those of the brand. Two experiments test the hypotheses that customer happiness increases because of feelings of belongingness with the brand and the consumer’s perception of the brand’s authenticity when the customer service provider aligns with the brand’s identity and core values. Keywords Brand loyalty, Happiness, Customer service, Belongingness, Brand authenticity, Retail marketing, Frontline employee, Brand personification Paper type Research paper Brand loyalty Received 30 December 2019 Revised 17 June 2020 24 July 2020 Accepted 29 July 2020 European Journal of Marketing © Emerald Publishing Limited 0309-0566 DOI 10.1108/EJM-12-2019-0940 The current issue and full text archive of this journal is available on Emerald Insight at: https://www.emerald.com/insight/0309-0566.htm