Artist-brand alliances to target new consumers: can visual artists recruit new consumers to a brand?

Purpose Increasing industry interest in visual artists and commercial brand collaborations has heightened the need for research on exactly how visual art can add meaning to brands in ways that enhance brand value to existing consumers and potentially reach new consumers. Consumers are known to select brands on the basis of how well these brands reflect their own personalities. The purpose of this research is to understand whether brand alliances with artists exhibiting distinct personalities can make brands more attractive to consumers whose personalities do not currently match the brand. Design/methodology/approach Two experiments are used to examine the impact of artists’ personality (in)congruence on consumers’ perceptions of the brand and purchase intentions of the brand’s products. Findings The results show that consumers whose personalities do not match the brand’s current personality are likely to alter their view of a brand when the brand partners with an artist whose personality matches with that of the consumers’. This happens without negatively affecting the brand personality perceptions of current consumers who already identify with the brand. Practical implications When seeking to attract a new target segment, brands can ally with visual artists who convey a personality that matches that of the new target segment. Originality/value This paper adds to a nascent literature on the power of artist–brand alliances, and demonstrates that these partnerships need not only be between artists and brands with consistent personalities but can also effectively be used to target new consumers.