Retail Service Quality and Service Recovery Quality: A Comparison Between Small and Large Retail Stores

Abstract

<p>Because the retail environment is rapidly changing and increasingly competitive, consumers expect higher-quality service (Wong and Sohal, 2003). Thus, researchers have attempted to identify the dimensions and instruments to measure service quality and service recovery quality. In this study, I aimed to measure how these dimensions differently perceived across small and large retail stores. I investigated the dimensions of service quality (personal attention, tangibles, and reliability), perceived justice (distributive and interactional justices), and customers' emotions (positive and negative emotions). The results confirmed that store size significantly affects customers' expectations about personal attention, interactional justice, and positive emotions. This implies that personal relationships between customers and employees are influenced by store size and customers in small stores expect greater personal attention from employees, evaluate fair interaction strongly, and are more likely to feel positive emotions. Thus, small retail stores should develop strategies to engage their customers in a more personal manner.</p>