The loyalty patterns of repertoire and subscription markets

In 2002 I published with Malcolm Wright and Gerald Goodhardt on an empirical discovery. Repeat-purchase markets are polarized into those that show repertoire patterns and those that show subscription patterns of loyalty. With no markets showing ‘in between’ patterns.

We also found that the Dirichlet model of repeat-purchase fitted both sorts of markets, predicting brands’ loyalty metrics rather well. This was a surprise. It highlights what an achievement this scientific theory is.

Here is the paper for download.

Sharp, Byron, Malcolm Wright, and Gerald Goodhardt (2002), “Purchase loyalty is polarised into either repertoire or subscription patterns” Australasian Marketing Journal, 10 (3), 7-20.

There is also a related test of the boundaries of repertoire markets:

Sharp, Byron (2007) “Loyalty Limits for Repertoire Markets”, Journal of Empirical Generalisations in Marketing Science, Vol. 11.