The value of art in marketing: an emotion-based model of how artworks in ads improve product evaluations

Arts-based initiatives provide many benefits for organisations, managers, and employees, but little is known of how marketing can incorporate art to add value for consumers. The present research situates marketing tools within broader organisational theory to develop and empirically test an emotion-based model of how artworks in advertisements can increase the perceived value of a product (art infusion effect). Across three experiments (N = 516) using three different artworks (by Vermeer, van Gogh, and da Vinci), three different products (mineral water, toilet paper, and chocolate), and three different measures of product value (product evaluation, willingness to buy, and willingness to pay), brand affect strongly mediated the art infusion effect. Furthermore, this affect-mediation was stronger for utilitarian products (water) than for hedonic products (chocolate). Thus, in support of general theories of arts-based methods in management, emotion appears to be a fundamental mechanism through which art affects product and price evaluations