Distinctive Brand Cues and Memory for Product Consumption Experiences

Consumer welfare depends upon how well people learn and remember quality differences among competing products. Although some researchers have argued that consumers are quite good at learning from actual consumption experience, such learning is complicated by delays between learning episodes and by delays between learning and use of the information. In the present research, we examine consumer experiential learning from a memory perspective. In a series of three taste-test studies we investigate whether and how distinctive brand names and packaging may facilitate the learning of intrinsic quality differences among products. We discuss the implications of our results for consumer decision theory, brand equity management, and trademark policy.