Mythic Agency and Retail Conquest

This paper expands agency theory by identifying mythic agency as a lens through which retailers can view spectacular events during which consumers act heroically to achieve an important consumption goal. Partaking in a stressful and challenging retail experience invokes the stages of a quest, through which successful consumers emerge transformed and where they challenge, at least in part, the culturally prescribed role of bride. Retailers who create events that evoke and support consumers’ heroic actions can develop powerful, meaningful, and enduring relationships with their customers.

Graphical abstractHero-Brides engage in a mythic quest in order to obtain the most sacred object of the wedding: the wedding dress. This retail quest follows the same path as traditional myths.Figure optionsDownload full-size imageDownload as PowerPoint slideHighlights► Consumers engage in quests to obtain objects of personal and social significance. ► Retail quests and follow the arc of departure, initiation, and return. ► Consumers enact agency by exerting control over their environment. ► The ultimate goal of transformation happens if consumers succeed at the quest.