PREJUDICE AND DISCRIMINATION IN SEASIDE RETAILING. COMPARATIVE ANALYSES BETWEEN BRAZIL AND ITALY

Abstract

This paper focuses on the phenomena of prejudice and discrimination among the interactions of frontline employees and customers in retailing spatial environments. The aim is to identify if there is perception of prejudice and discrimination related to Ageism, Sexism, Lookism (ASL) and Sexual Orientation bias (SO) against customers in Brazil and Italy Seaside Retailing. Through quantitative research and descriptive study, data from Curitiba-Parana-Brazil and Urbino-Marche-Italy are collected, using sampling by convenience. Likert Scales have been used to evaluate ASL+SO. Findings: One statement (4.2 “The frontline male employees are nicer to younger female customers”), out of 15 shows that the interviewees from both countries had presented a highly agreement perception, which is the reinforcement that they had perceived that gender, age and appearance have influence on frontline employees’ behaviour. However, considering the results of the majority of the statements, an overall conclusion can highlight that the respondents do not perceive ageism, sexism, lookism or sexual orientation bias against customers when the seaside retail companies provide face-to-face services. A theoretical contribution of this paper can be drawn for the development of protocols that can be useful to identify and to evaluate ASL+SO phenomena in retailing. Its format and its methodology can be used to research different kinds of organisations, especially in the retail and services industries. The managerial implications are in the importance of developing T&D to reduce ASL+SO practices against customers and to include these issues as subjects in the organisation’s strategic statements. Also it would be suitable designing more efficient procedures of queueing management. These practices could avoid that dissatisfied customers reduce purchasing and consequent falling sales and profits.
Classification-JEL:
Keywords: prejudice, discrimination, seaside retailing, ageism, sexism, lookism, sexual orientation bias.