LUXURY free of charge for the New Year 2017
or, more precisely,
Publication “Luxury Products Buyers' Behaviour” in open access
Dear Colleagues,
Those who are interested in topics related to luxury, those whose students are passionate about luxury and those whose social milieu or environment is interested in luxury are invited to visit the webpage:
In 2012 I published my Habilitation dissertation “Luxury products buyers’ behavior” (Habilitation is a post-PhD degree in the countries with two-step scientific systems). It appeared that it was the first scientific monograph on this subject (other colleagues were busy with writing books “Marketing” of luxury goods and brands for managers).
Since the book was not written in English, the awareness of its existence is very limited.
Now, two out of six chapters of my dissertation, namely: chapter 3 and sub-chapters 5.1-5.3 have been translated, updated and made available on the webpage (including introduction and updated references with articles from the very beginning of research on luxury).
The third chapter is useful for students writing reports and Bachelor or Master theses on the subjects related to luxury goods and brands. It is a unique document, in which substantial amount of data has been presented on a digestible number of pages.
For people living beyond Franco-French context the lecture of this chapter may offer an opportunity to read about substantial changes the luxury industry lived since 1911/12 - assortment diversification, 1949/50 - creation of the licenses system and 1959 - the beginning of accessorization and democratization.
This chapter is in two versions: a “functional” one and an extended one (with an upgraded “festive” design). The latter contains graphs and one more table with the latest data.
Chapters 5.1, 5.2 and 5.3 are destined for those who are teaching introductory lectures in economics and for those, who wish to compare their spending patterns with “mainly” “US-based” multi-millionaires (especially chapter 5.3).
In economics definition of luxury is based on income elasticity of demand. Although some economists are not happy with this definition, I do not see serious discussions on what is wrong with it. These sub-chapters offer, I hope, some clarifications based on facts and figures.
Finally, since Christmas (and analogous) and New Year celebrations offer opportunities of increasing socialization with family and closer friends, the festive atmosphere may shift discussions from current political surprises and troubles to more esoteric subjects, i.e. to luxury, among others. Since, as from Professors, an expert-level knowledge is also expected beyond your basic scope of competences, maybe reading chapters 3 and 5 will contribute to maintain the Aura.
Some rare (I hope) typographic errors and one “economy” instead of “economics” (end of chapter 5.3) will be corrected in the updated versions.
Costs of translation and creating the webpage www.luxury-research.info are covered by the sponsor: a luxury brand (it could not have been any other way) - dr Irena Eris.
All your remarks and suggestions are very welcomed. Please, do not hesitate to contact me by e-mail written in footnote.
Best regards and a Happy New Year 2017
Tomasz SIKORA (PhD, Hab.)
Institute of International Management and Marketing
Warsaw School of Economics - SGH
Post Scriptum: Information about the original book printed in 2012 may be found at:
- but it is not a foreign reader-friendly webpage.