service quality–loyalty relationship in retail services: does commitment matter?

Oct 16, 2026

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Marketing research frames customer loyalty in services through two competing lenses: service quality, where evaluations drive loyalty, and relationship marketing, where customer commitment to the provider drives loyalty. Commitment is treated as a multidimensional construct with affective commitment rooted in liking and identification and continuance commitment rooted in dependence and switching costs. An integrated model of retail-service relationships tests these views.

LanguageEnglish

CategoryResearch & Report

FormatPDF

Pages13

Reading Time33 min

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Abstract

Introduction

The nature and role of service quality

The Journal of Retailing and Consumer Services 12 (2005) 99–111 service quality–loyalty relationship in retail services: does commitment matter? Gordon Fullerton* Department of Marketing, Saint Mary’s University, Halifax, Nova Scotia, Canada B3H 3C3 Accepted 6 April 2004 Abstract The marketing literature has produced two schools of thought on the cause of customer loyalty in services industries. The service quality perspective puts forward that service quality evaluations substantially drive customer loyalty in services industries. The relationship marketing perspective puts forward that customer commitment to the service provider substantially drives customer loyalty in services industries. In addition, commitment is a complex construct with at least two forms, one based in liking and identiﬁcation (affective commitment) and one based in dependence and switching costs (continuance commitment) . These positions were examined in an integrated model of retail–service relationships. It was found that affective commitment and continuance commitment were mainly partial mediators of the service quality–loyalty relationship. It was also found that affective commitment to the retailer had a positive impact on customer loyalty while continuance commitment in marketing relationship had a deleterious effect on customer loyalty. r 2004 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved. Keywords: Retail relationships; Service quality; Customer commitment 1. Introduction The marketing management literature has seen asigniﬁcant emphasis on both services marketing (Zeithaml, 2000) and relationship marketing (Sheth and Parvatiyar, 2002) over the past decade. For the most part, these two streams of literature have developed without much overlap, even though the area of relationship marketing was pioneered by a prominent services marketing scholar (Berry, 2002) and it has been argued that services industries are natural venues for the study of organization to consumer relationships (Bitner, 1995) . In addition, service marketing scholars (Zeithamlet al., 1996) and relationship-marketing scholars (Morgan and Hunt, 1994) are interested in many of the same loyalty-related dependent variables. Recently, a number of scholars have attempted to study the nature of service relationships thereby merging two ﬁelds of study (Garbarino and Johnson, 1999; Gruen et al., 2000; *Corresponding author. Tel.: +1-902-496-8167; fax: +1-902-420- 5112. E-mail address: [gfullerton@stmarys.ca](gfullerton@stmarys.ca) (G. Fullerton) . Gwinner et al., 1998; Pritchard et al., 1999) . From the relationship marketing perspective, customer commitment is seen as being the key determinant of customer retention and loyalty (Gundlach et al., 1995; Morgan and Hunt, 1994) . On the other hand, the services marketing literature generally views service quality asthe central construct that drives customer loyalty (Cronin and Taylor, 1992; Zeithaml et al., 1996; Zeithaml, 2000) . As a result of this work, there is asigniﬁcant opportunity to merge these two ﬁelds of study in order to build a more comprehensive understanding of organization–consumer relationships in services industries (Gruen et al., 2000) . This paper will examine the ways that service quality and the relationship marketing perspective both contribute to our understanding of customer loyalty in retail and services industries. The major research question explored in this paper is whether service quality or customer commitment is the prime driver of customer loyalty-related behaviors in the context of aretail–service relationship. The paper begins with a discussion of the nature and role of service quality in retail relationships. This is followed by a discussion of 0969-6989/$ -see front matter r 2004 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved. doi:10.1016/j.jretconser.2004.04.001 100 G. Fullerton / Journal of Retailing and Consumer Services 12 (2005) 99–111 the role and nature of commitment in retail relation

FAQs

What are the two main perspectives proposed for customer loyalty in services industries?

One perspective argues that service quality evaluations substantially drive loyalty. The other argues that customer commitment to the service provider substantially drives loyalty.

How is customer commitment characterized in the study?

Commitment is treated as complex and multidimensional, with affective commitment based on liking and identification, and continuance commitment based on dependence and switching costs.

What does the study find about the mediating roles of commitment in the service quality–loyalty relationship?

Affective and continuance commitment act mainly as partial mediators of the service quality–loyalty relationship, with affective commitment improving loyalty and continuance commitment harming loyalty.

Oct 16, 2026

Uploaded by Ezra