© 2011 Macmillan Publishers Ltd. 1350-23IX Brand Management Vol. 18, 8, 570–582 www.palgrave-journals.com/bm/ Correspondence: Oriol Iglesias ESADE – Universitat Ramon Llull, Avda Pedralbes 60-62, Barcelona 08034, Spain E-mail: oriol.iglesias@esade.edu Original Article The role of brand experience and affective commitment in determining brand loyalty Received (in revised form): 7th December 2010 Oriol Iglesias is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Marketing Management at Universitat Ramon Llull – ESADE, Barcelona, Spain. He is the Coordinator of the Research Group in Brand Management and Consumption at ESADE. His research interests are brand management, relationship marketing and customer experience management. Jatinder J. Singh is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Marketing Management at Universitat Ramon Llull – ESADE, Barcelona, Spain. He is a member of the Research Group in Brand Management and Consumption at ESADE. His research interests include cross cultural marketing, marketing and consumer ethics and branding. Joan M. Batista-Foguet is Full Professor in the Department of Quantitative Methods at Universitat Ramon Llull – ESADE, Barcelona, Spain. He is Director of the Survey Research Centre at ESADE. His fields of interest are the research design and the improvement of measurement in social sciences mainly using structural equation models. His currently substantive research focuses on the development of social and emotional competences. ABSTRACT The purpose of this article is to study the direct and indirect relationship between brand experience and brand loyalty. The authors propose that the relationship is mediated by affective commitment. A survey-based quantitative approach is used to test the hypotheses based on the proposed theoretical model that delineates the relationships between brand experience, affective commitment and brand loyalty. The data were collected using traditional pen and paper as well as online surveys and were analysed using Structural Equations Modelling. The analysis suggests that affective commitment mediates the relationship between brand experience and brand loyalty for all three product categories that were studied (cars, laptops and sneakers). The article extends the understanding of the brand experience construct by studying its influence on brand loyalty and also by incorporating affective commitment as a mediating variable. In our sample, the findings support the fact that developing brand experience influences customer loyalty only through affective commitment. Journal of Brand Management (2011) 18, 570–582. doi:10.1057/bm.2010.58; published online 28 January 2011 Keywords: brand experience; affective commitment; brand loyalty; customer experience management