Consuming Authenticity At Gettysburg

While there is increasing evidence for the significance of authenticity in everyday consumption practices, the marketing literature is still lacking a full understanding of the concept of authenticity and the role that this plays in consumers’ experiential consumption. In this paper we study the concept of authenticity as a characteristic of Gettysburg, one of the most significant heritage sites in the United States. Findings reveal that authenticity at Gettysburg can be expressed in five different forms: object-related, locational, personage, factual, and environmental. From a theoretical standpoint, our data show that perceived authenticity of the site strengthens consumers’ connection with the past, which is a major consumption payoff for visiting a historic destination.

Citation:

Athinodoros Chronis and Ronald Hampton (2005) ,"Consuming Authenticity At Gettysburg", in E - European Advances in Consumer Research Volume 7, eds. Karin M. Ekstrom and Helene Brembeck, Goteborg, Sweden : Association for Consumer Research, Pages: 208-209.