The Role of Service Quality and Retail Store Image in Consumption Experience of Automotive Services.

Abstract

Services have played an increasingly important role in adding value to consumers. In this sense, the evaluation of the consumption experience in relation to these services is of importance for retailers that operate in competitive environments. The scope of this work is to analyze the role of service quality and store image in consumer experience of automotive services. The study was divided into two parts. In the first one there was a quantitative survey with 1346 consumers in order to obtain an assessment of image and quality attributes and their contribution to a positive evaluation of the consumption experience. Then, a qualitative survey was performed, a focus group, in order to discuss the results obtained in the quantitative survey. The main contribution of this study was to demonstrate the relevance of the aspects related to the image of the service provider. It should be noted that, in the survey, the image was considered as relevant as the elements directly related to the quality of services for the development of an enjoyable consumption experience.