Keywords

6.1 Introduction

Studies have investigated the part of the consumer-brand relationship like brand hate (Fetscherin, 2019; Kucuk, 2019, Zarantonello et al., 2016; Zhang & Laroche, 2020), complaints (Kucuk, 2018), negative brand emotions (Park et al., 2013), brand divorce (Sussan et al., 2012), and brand negativity (Dessart et al., 2020). Bayarassou et al. (2020) posited that the wider part of these studies considered brand hate from the point of the firm although Kucuk (2019, 2018) suggested that it is equally crucial to consider brand hate from the point of the consumer.

Conventional consumer research has been emphasizing primarily the positive side of brand consumption whilst interest in anti-consumption keeps surging (Hashim & Kasana, 2019). Positive emotions towards brands are good for the brand because it activates positive word-of-mouth (WOM) (Albert & Merunka, 2013), triggers the loyalty of consumers (Veloutsou, 2015), exhibits the willingness to forgive brands that misbehave (Hegner et al., 2017a) and prepares the consumer to pay premium price (Albert & Merunka, 2013).

However, psychologists argue that the consequences of negative emotions like protests and boycotts impact stronger the behaviour of individuals (Fetscherin, 2019). The literature on hate has identified in recent years that brand hate has a significant impact on negative WOM (Hegner et al., 2017b), revenge (Fetscherin, 2019; Hegner et al., 2017b), brand rejection (Moore, 2019), brand switching and negative WOM (Hegner et al., 2017a; Islam et al., 2020).

Having a relationship that is strongly positive or negative is very essential to the consumer due to its promotion of the consumers’ (Ramirez et al., 2019) self-esteem (Trudeau & Shobeiri, 2016), self-concept (Islam et al., 2020), self-signalling (Alvarez & Fournier, 2016), self-expression (Trudeau & Shobeiri, 2016) social status and civic role (Islam et al., 2020). Veloutsou (2015) suggests that brands should cultivate solid and positive relationships with their consumers. The studies on brand hate which is a negative brand emotion can be very crucial for companies as it may prevent the likelihood of loss-making and enhance the provision of better service quality as well as the well-being of the consumer (Zhang & Laroche, 2020). However, only a handful of studies have focused on the fact that negative emotions and actions towards brands need to be managed (Azer & Alexander, 2018).

Although extant studies specify that consumers form positive or negative relationships with a particular brand, several brands concurrently have a substantial group of both those who love it and those who hate it (Ramirez et al., 2019). This is more manifested in sectors where self-expression is important (Rozenkrants et al., 2017) like sports (Grohs et al., 2015), politics (Finneman, 2015), art (Outram, 2016) and religion (Sunstein, 2002); and also other sectors like food, petrochemical and news media, where it is not expected (Ramirez et al., 2019). Instances of this situation include Trump Hotels, CNN and NBC News in the USA (Armstrong, 2017); which are reported to have a large following of both supporters and opponents (Ramirez et al., 2019). A brand like Facebook prominently features on the list of most loved brands (Morning Consultant, 2017) and the list of most hated brands (USA Today, 2018).

Most recent studies have stressed either the determinants or the outcomes of negative emotions but have failed in presenting a study that comprehensively considers both (Hegner et al., 2017b). Extant studies have emphasized the significance of comprehending negative emotions but are fragmented and thus the need for a comprehensive conceptual framework for brand hate relationships (Fetscherin, 2019). Further, studies on brand hate are scarce (Zhang & Laroche, 2020).

It is against this background that the researcher undertakes this conceptual study by reviewing current literature on the antecedents and consequences of brand hate and their implications on both scholarship and practice in a comprehensive manner whist opportunities for future research are identified, and a comprehensive conceptual framework is proposed. The objective of this study is therefore to examine the trends in brand hate as exist in current literature.

This would contribute to knowledge by theoretically identifying the factors that trigger the emotional feeling of hatred, practically demonstrating that the feelings and activities of consumers who exhibit hatred towards brands have negative consequences on companies and finally expanding existing knowledge by postulating that negativity directed towards brand requires further studies (Fetscherin & Heinrich, 2014; Hashim & Kasana, 2019; Veloutsou & Guzmán, 2017); and that brand hate has negative consequences on companies (Kucuk, 2014). This study considers the approach used in selecting the literature, conceptualizing brand hate, theoretical underpinning, the antecedents of brand hate, the consequences of brand hate, the implications of brand hate to theory and practice, recommendations for future studies and conclusion.

6.2 Conceptualizing Brand Hate

Zarantonello et al. (2016) suggest that brand hate is viewed as a complex emotion that comprises specific emotions; and as such, brand hate is basically defined as strong and deep negative emotional effect towards a brand (Bryson et al., 2013). Brand hate mediates the relationship between a set of drivers that anticipates negative WOM, brand avoidance or brand retaliation which form a set of outcomes that courses damage to a given brand (Pinto & Brandao, 2020). It is a set of predictors that are supposed to trigger hateful consumers’ emotions and attitudes, their context or marketing experience (Hegner et al., 2017a). According to Kucuk (2019, p. 29), brand hate is a consumer detachment and distaste from a brand and its systems of value to the consistent occurrence of brand injustices which would arouse intensely and extremely held negative consumer emotions (Kucuk, 2019).

Alba and Lutz (2013) on the other hand consider brand hatred as real brand disgust because consumers are taken captive by the company as a result of strong exit barriers. According to Kucuk (2016), brand hate is a psychological situation where consumers endure extreme negative emotions and disconnection to brands which offer bad and hurting experiences at personal and social levels. Brand hate is the “detachment of consumers from a brand and its associations” (Kucuk, 2019, p. 29) which according to Bayarassou et al. (2020) is a result of the deep negative emotions that are intense. Brand hate is said to be an extreme dislike (Romani et al., 2012), consisting of anger and contempt (Joireman et al., 2013) with sadness, disgust, shame, disappointment and fear (Zhang & Laroche, 2020). Joshi and Yodav (2020) conceptualized brand hate as a strong and negative feeling towards a brand which is greater than a dislike of the brand. As such, when consumers are having the feeling of frustration towards the brand, they exhibit negative emotions that reflect in the avoidance of the brands and also engage in anti-branding programmes. Husnain et al. (2020) argued that hate for brands is intentionally avoiding or rejecting the brand that would lead to behaviours like the expression of negative feelings, rejection or causing of harm. It is the situation where consumers take an act of revenge by punishing the brand for the harm caused them or desiring to cause a distraction from a given brand (Sampedro, 2017).

Zarantonello et al. (2016) posit that desire for revenge is confrontational and active with a penalty directed at the company which mostly triggers retaliatory behaviours whilst desire for avoidance is non-confrontational and passive with the urge to withdraw from the relationship with the company, which is conveyed as patronage reduction/cessation. The authors suggest that the two desires co-exist and are aroused as a result of service failure.

6.3 Theoretical Underpinning

This study adopts the theory of stimulus-organism-response (S-O-R) to establish the role of brand hate in the relationship between the antecedents and consequences of brand hate. According to Mehrabian and Russell (1974), the S-O-R model proposes the idea that environmental elements in service delivery are stimuli (antecedents of brand hate), causing consumer responses (consequences). In the context of this study, “organism” (hate) represents the internal processes (disappointment, disgust, anger, fear and contempt) between external stimulus and “response” (consumer behaviour) and embraces perceptual, physiological, emotional and cognitive factors (Jung Chang et al., 2014). “Response” thus shows the final effect or behavioural reaction (brand avoidance, negative word-of-mouth, retaliation and revenge and willingness to make financial sacrifices) exhibited by the organism or consumer (Jung Chang et al., 2014). This means that the antecedents are conceptualized as stimuli that will trigger a response which is hate, which then influences the consequences which are behaviour.

6.4 The Antecedents of Brand Hate

According to Hegner et al. (2017b), recent research on negative brand emotions offer numerous determinants which are mainly categorized under product-related, consumer-related or contextual related determinants. Product-related factors typically reflect a situation where the consumer previously had a negative experience with the brand and this experience is normally attributed to product/service failure, dissatisfaction or negative country-of-origin associations (Hegner et al., 2017b). Consumer-related factors are mainly attributable to symbolic incongruity with a brand, where the brand is perceived by the consumer as having an image that is contrary to theirs (Hegner et al., 2017b). On the other hand, contextually related factors are related to ideological incompatibility which consumers identify as legal, social or moral corporate misconduct which triggers negative feelings against the brand (Hegner et al., 2017b).

6.4.1 Negative Experience

A negative experience (NPE) denotes the bad experiences faced by consumers in dealing with products and services of a brand such as dissatisfied offerings, product and service failures and other negative associations (Hashim & Kasana, 2019). Although it is a truism that consumers have varied reasons for patronizing varied brands, the predominant factor is product or service performance (Lee et al., 2009a). Farhat and Chaney (2020) proposed and confirmed in their empirical study that a negative experience with a destination brand would arouse the feelings of hate as such a negative experience may be far below what customers might have expected. In their study, Pinto et al. (2020) argued that consumers’ negative past experience with a product or service may influence brand hate. Consumers’ negative past experience with the brand in terms of poor quality, procedural inconvenience and poor customer service would trigger brand hate (Ali et al., 2020). Also, Rodrigues et al. (2020) postulated that negative experience positively influence brand hate.

Bryson et al. (2013) in their study suggested that consumer dissatisfaction is the toughest determinant of brand hate whilst Zarantonello et al. (2016) found a violation of expectations as a pertinent factor that leads to brand hate. According to Hashim and Kasana (2019), customers’ dissatisfaction with the brand of a given product which causes negative experience affects other products which come under the umbrella of the affected brand and thus, consumers show negative attitude towards all products under that brand.

6.4.2 Symbolic Incongruity

Symbolic incongruity occurs when a given brand does not epitomize the image of consumers (Hashim & Kasana, 2019). Khan and Lee (2014) posit that consumers have the affinity to purchase brands whose images are congruent to their self-esteem or those that would provide an expected meaning to their lives. Sung and Huddleston (2017) suggest in their study that consumers have the preference for brands with personality traits that are congruent with theirs and hence do not only make a purchase to satisfy their needs but also purchase what brands stand for. Hegner et al. (2017a) argue that incongruity between the brand meanings and the consumer’s sense of self may lead to negative reactions in the direction of the brand. Voter’s symbolic incongruity intensifies political brand hate which suggests that, in the process of voters forming their political liking or disliking, they consider symbolic identity more because it is accepted that the symbolic meaning of the brand reflects in the consumer’s mind (Banerjee & Goel, 2020).

Passive hate influences the consumer to avoid the brand if the brand identity does not match with consumer’s self-identity (Bayarassou et al. 2020; Islam et al., 2019). Islam et al. (2018) conclude in their study that symbolic incongruity has a positive relationship with brand hate. Zarantonello et al. (2016) in their study argue that symbolic incongruity is a key predicting factor of brand hate, as such symbolic incongruity influences brand hate (Hegner et al., 2017a). This means that congruence of images is critical in building a good relationship between the consumer and the brand to avoid generating negative emotions that would result in brand hate (Hashim & Kasana, 2019).

6.4.3 Ideological Incompatibility

Contrasting the other two determinants discussed above, ideological incompatibility encompasses a more contextual and mostly societal and ethical focus that goes beyond the needs of individual consumers’ self-image or the core product or service performance (Nenycz-Thiel & Romaniuk, 2011). Islam et al. (2020) posited that ideological avoidance and the sudden internationalization of online apps trigger moral attendance and that moral avoidance consists of a social goal that extends beyond app users’ obligation. Islam et al. (2020) also concluded in their study that moral avoidance measures which were measures through anti hegemony and country of origin associated positively with app hate because if consumers or users feel angered, dissatisfied or irresponsible on the grounds of morality, then these users or consumers that particular brand of the app; thereby enhancing app hate. In this regard, consumers perceive an ideological incompatibility with the brand due to legal, moral and societal concerns when a brand is perceived to be socially irresponsible (Romani et al., 2015). Zarantonello et al. (2016) mentioned ideological incompatibility as corporate wrongdoings, which they suggested is a determinant of brand hate.

According to Kucuk (2010), a large number of brand haters resist brands as a reminder to firms of their obligations and responsibilities. This is critical to the corporate social responsibility (CSR) concept (Romani et al., 2013). Though CSR triggers positive consumer emotions towards the brand, consumers might desire to punish the brand if it behaves socially irresponsible (Antonetti, 2016). In such instance, customers’ responses could include anger and eventually brand hate (Kucuk, 2018). According to Hollenbeck and Zinkhan (2010), anti-branding activities are mostly highlighting corporate irresponsibility in creating vigilance among consumers and soliciting them to resist corporate wrongdoing. Banerjee and Goel (2020) found out in their study that ideological incompatibility was the second most crucial factor that surges the force behind political brand hate.

6.4.4 Rumor

According to Difonzo and Bordia (2007), propagandists to influence the opinions of others, deliberately use rumours via propaganda campaigns and misinformation. When rumour begins to spread, people are compelled to believe it as it is trailed by selective information which supports the rumour (Hashim & Kasana, 2019). Extant literature on rumour clarifies that the spreading of the rumour is linked with destructive, motivated and murmuring campaigns (Rosnow, 2001). According to Hashim and Kasana (2019), both negative and positive rumours exist but negative rumours are mostly disseminated more than a positive rumour.

Kimmel and Audrain-Pontevia (2010) explained in their study that marketplace rumours are considered as a competitor to information exchange because the information is released from the other side of the company to counter the one from the company and thus the contrary information turning into a rumour to pose a threat to marketing managers and decision-makers; and this is a great challenge to specialist communicators in the company in outlining effective strategies to respond and counter such rumours. In their study, Hashim and Kasana (2019) postulate that the strongest influencer of brand hate is a rumour which is obvious in the cases of McDonald's and P&G where a single rumour harmed even the most renowned brands.

6.4.5 Poor Relationship Quality

According to Hashim and Kasana (2019), poor relationship quality denotes that the relationship between customers and their brands are negative for reasons other than past performance, image incongruity and ideological incompatibility and that poor relationship quality is connected to the relationship equity concept which puts all the emphasis on the compactness of the relationship. Relationships are ruled by emotions like commitment, intimacy, passion, etc. (Alvarez & Fournier, 2016). According to Fetscherin et al. (2019), the relationship between brands and consumers can be either positive or negative and that the feelings expressed about brands are indicators of consumers’ attitudes, opinions and the likelihood of either supporting or resisting brands. Nevertheless, forming negative or positive opinions or emotions towards a brand may not lead to a situation whereby consumers would be willing to engross in a relationship with it (Fetscherin et al., 2019). Normally when consumers have the feeling of passion for a brand, they tend to be more active in the relationship (Wallace et al., 2014).

At an individual level, consumers would have strong inclination and emotions to enthusiastically interact with the brand (Veloutsou, 2007) whilst at the collective level, the brand becomes the main unifier that sticks people together in either sharing their passion (Wallace et al., 2014), joining forces to offer aid (Kaufmann et al., 2016) or harming the brand (Kristal et al., 2018), all through brand communities (Fetscherin et al., 2019). Strong positive brand relationships breed the spread of positive word-of-mouth (Wallace et al., 2014) via several communication media (Karjaluoto et al., 2016), arousing the feelings of social groups (Iyer et al., 2016) and the will to be actively part of brand communities (Wallace et al., 2014). Nonetheless, consumers’ sentiments towards a brand could be negative (Veloutsou & Guzmán, 2017) which is known as brand hate (Zarantonello et al., 2016). Poor relationship quality is the second strongest influencer of brand hate because relationship quality decides whether the relationship is good or poor; and if poor it leads to hate (Hashim & Kasana, 2019). And brand hate causes brand divorce (Fetscherin & Heinrich, 2014).

6.4.6 Country of Origin

Roth and Romeo (1992) postulate that customers have a strong will to purchase an item from a particular country if the image of the country is an essential characteristic of the category of product. In their study on luxury goods, Aiello et al. (2009) found that country-of-origin effect greatly impacts how consumers evaluate products and services. For instance in their study, Bryson et al. (2013) suggested that consumers associated Germany with high performing cars. Many luxury brands accentuate their country of origin to critically enhance their brand image (Bryton et al., 2013). Laforet (2010) posit that different countries have unique “fingerprints”. Therefore, country of origin can impact the brand trust of some consumers (Huitzilin Jimenez & San Martin, 2010), short of which brand avoidance may occur (Lee et al. 2009a). Consumers may be avoiding a particular brand because they feel enmity towards the country of origin or buying a product produced by a foreign country is unpatriotic (Klein et al., 1998). Thus a country of origin is a key antecedent of brand hate (Bryson et al., 2013).

6.5 The Consequences of Brand Hate

6.5.1 Brand Avoidance and Switching

Lee et al. (2009b, p. 422) define brand avoidance as “a phenomenon whereby consumers deliberately choose to keep away from or reject a brand”. According to Grégoire et al. (2009) avoidance occur when consumers stop interacting with their firms. It defines conscious and thoughtful abstinence from buying and using a particular brand (Knittel et al., 2016) regardless of consumers having the purchasing power and access to the brands in the marketplace (Lee et al., 2009a). Consumers engage in brand avoidance by switching to a competitor or refusing to consume the brand which is triggered by brand hate (Hegner et al., 2017b). The negative effect of intimacy and hatred lead to avoidance by making a switch to other brands (Park et al., 2013). Harmeling et al. (2015) in their study concluded that brand hate creates avoidance-oriented coping processes that lead to consumers taking actions to protect and distance themselves from the brand. In his study, Fetscherin (2019) concluded that cool hate results in brand switching. According to Banerjee and Goel (2020), brand hate phenomenon influences political brand avoidance positively. Thus, political brand hates directly influence the avoidance of political parties (Banerjee & Goel, 2020). Brand hate has a significant positive influence on brand avoidance (Pinto & Brandao, 2020). Farhat and Chaney (2020) demonstrated that brand hate significantly influences avoidance.

6.5.2 Negative Word-Of-Mouth

WOM is conceptualized as a conversation that is personal “between a receiver and a communicator, whom the receiver perceives as non-commercial” (Istanbulluoglu et al., 2017, p. 1122). When this conversation turns negative, it becomes negative WOM which is defined as a consumer’s oral message that is delivered to denigrate, complain or recommend against products, services brands or the firm (Istanbulluoglu et al., 2017). Due to its perceived damaging nature to the organization (Philp et al., 2018), negative WOM several studies have contributed to solidifying the topic (Curina et al., 2019; Jayasimha et al., 2017; Keiningham et al., 2018) especially the antecedents that provoke consumers to use it (Curina et al., 2019). It is confirmed that brand hate has an influence on brand hate (Pinto & Brandao, 2020). Presi et al. (2014) outlined two forms of negative word-of-mouth. According to Fetscherin (2019), private complaining has families and friends as its audience whilst public complaining has a bigger audience like governmental agencies, consumer protection groups and the firm itself. Consumers participating in private complaining alert friends and families to the negative experience they have suffered from the brand (Singh, 1988), guard them against unfair actions (Funches et al., 2009) or just vent out their feelings of negativity in private (Fetscherin, 2019). Brand hate has a significant impact on both private and public complaining (Fetscherin, 2019; Romani et al., 2012). The results of the research by Curina et al. (2019) posited that hateful emotions towards a service brand create a situation where consumers talk negatively both offline and online as they refuse to make a repeat purchase.

6.5.3 Brand Retaliation and Revenge

Thomson et al. (2012) suggest that retaliation is severe, deleberate and hamful behaviours which are directed at the brand. Retaliation is based on the theory of equity which aims at ensuring fairness rather than destroying the sbrand (Kähr et al., 2016). According to Grégoire et al. (2009), brand retaliation is a resultant variable of brand hate. As indicated by Grégoire et al. (2009), consumers do not only submissively withdraw from a relationship or just complain, they fight back and directly engage in actions against a brand. In empirical work, Zhang et al. (2020) postulated that failure severity impacts consumer’s negative emotions (brand hate) which then impact consumer retaliation intention. Although recent studies have argued for the association between brand hate and revenge (Curina et al., 2019; Zhang & Laroche, 2020; Zhang et al., 2020), not all forms of brand hate lead to revenge behaviour (Bayarassou et al., 2020).

According to Harmeling et al. (2015), the intention of a revenge which is another fighting strategy is to penalize the source of anger. In his study, Fetscherin (2019) suggests that the difference between revenge and retaliation is that revenge is a state of mind intended to hurt the brand in the long term whilst retaliation is a reflection of a severe impulsive and short-term behaviour and therefore proposed that brand hate leads to retaliation and revenge. Brand retaliation is primarily triggered by negative past experience which normally occurs as a result of product failure, poor performance or an unpleasant store environment (Hegner et al., 2017a).

6.5.4 Willingness to Make Financial Sacrifices to Hurt the Brand (WFS)

Extant literature suggests that if consumers have positive emotions towards a brand, they have the “willingness to make financial sacrifices in order to obtain it” (Thomson et al., 2005, p. 77). According to Albert and Merunka (2013), brand love has an impact on willingness to pay (WTP) a premium price for a given brand. However, the question is, are consumers with negative emotions towards a given brand willing to financially sacrifice to hurt the brand? Jin et al. (2017) posit that brand love and hate are associated with each other. Therefore, the same could be reasoned in the context of WTP and WFS (Fetscherin, 2019). Sweetin et al. (2013) further explain that consumers have the willingness to penalize or cause harm to a brand. WFS should be differentiated from brand retaliation and brand revenge, in that revenge and retaliation, are founded on the theory of equity where the key intention is to restore equity (Kähr et al., 2016) whilst WFS is founded on the theory of interdependence which implies that if it is the will of people to sacrifice in ensuring that they do good for a relationship, there should be the expectation that same be applied to causing harm (Fetscherin, 2019).

Furthermore, the focal point of WFS is the consumer’s monetary sacrifices that are committed to hurt the brand e.g. the willingness to bear the cost of writing complaint letters or the registration and hosting fees for purchasing anti-brand website but retaliation and revenge are focused more on stealing from the brand, intentionally breaking or causing harm to things from the brand or wasting resources from the brand (Fetscherin, 2019). Fetscherin (2019) thus proposes that brand hate leads to the willingness to make financial sacrifices (WFS).

6.5.4.1 Proposed Comprehensive Conceptual Framework

figure a

6.6 Opportunity for Future Research

The main limitation of this paper is that it is not operationalized. Future study should operationalize it in different cultures and industry to ensure its generalizability. The negative relationships existing between consumers and brands, and the role consumers’ emotions play in such relationships are attracting the attention of modern scholars, indicating that there exist several research issues that need to be worked on (Hashim & Kasana, 2019). Meanwhile, this study considered the antecedents and outcomes of brand hate. Hashim and Kasana (2019) recommend that future research could look into the management process of brand hate. Except for With the exception of Ahmed and Hashim (2018) and Kucuk (2016) who discussed few strategies required in the management of brand hate, the management process required to handle brand hate has been non-existent. This according to Hashim and Kasana (2019) may be as a result of the need to apply different recovery process to each antecedent of brand hate mainly because each antecedent of brand hate requires that different recovery process is applied (Hashim & Kasana, 2019). Although Kucuk (2016) discussed the consumer-related antecedents of brand hate, no study has empirically proved that these antecedents influence brand hate (Hashim & Kasana, 2019). Therefore future studies should investigate this issue comprehensively to enhance the understanding of the factors that stimulate brand hate (Hashim & Kasana, 2019). Because the personalities of some consumers obstruct managers’ effort in reconciling brand haters with the company, future research needs to look into this issue (Fetscherin, 2019; Hegner et al., 2017a).

Underhill (2012) argues that love and hate are social and cultural constructs. As such, future research should investigate the degree of influence of culture and society on brand hate (Hegner et al., 2017a). Jain and Sharma (2019) suggest that future research should investigate independently the dimensions of both active and passive brand hate to clearly outline the peculiarity between the behavioural outcomes of the two dimensions. Future research should also investigate the role and significance of monetary and non-monetary sacrifices in brand hate relationship situations (Fetscherin, 2019). Finally, Grégoire et al. (2009) posit that brand revenge declines with time whilst brand avoidance surges with time. Hence future research should measure the degree to which the antecedents and outcomes change over time as well as their impact on brand hate (Hegner et al., 2017a).

6.7 Conclusion

Hashim and Kasana (2019) posit that although recent studies have investigated the negative relationships between brands and consumers with varied outcomes like Hegner et al. (2017a) who discussed extreme negative emotions and Kucuk (2016) who discussed brand hate and its determinants, there is still a theoretical gap in terms of factors that trigger the emotional feeling of hatred as extant literature (Fetscherin & Heinrich, 2014; Fournier & Alvarez, 2013; Park et al., 2013) has emphasized that further research need to be launched into brand hate. Recent studies have stressed either the determinants or the outcomes of negative emotions but fallen short of presenting a study that comprehensively considers both (Hegner et al., 2017a). Furthermore, as a practical gab, studies on brand hate websites demonstrate that the feelings and activities of consumers who exhibit hatred towards brands have negative consequences on companies (Kucuk, 2014).

For that matter, this conceptual paper discussed comprehensively by reviewing current literature on the antecedents (negative past experience, symbolic incongruity, ideological incompatibility, rumour, poor relationship quality and country of origin) and consequences (brand avoidance, negative word-of-mouth, retaliation, and revenge, and WFS) of brand hate by basing the study on the theory of S-O-R. It is also clear from the review of literature that future research needs to investigate this brand hate construct. This conceptual paper contributes to the extant literature by suggesting that brand hate is a multi-dimensional construct which is influenced by emotions and also considers a new outcome variable named WFS (Fetscherin, 2019), all in one study. The study also proposes a comprehensive conceptual framework for operationalization. Practically, it provides managers with the requisite knowledge of the factors and emotions that drive brand hate and how they associate with diverse behavioural outcomes (Fetscherin, 2019). This enables firms to manage brand hate well to protect their brands and earn a competitive advantage.