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Authenticity is one of the cornerstones of contemporary marketing practice yet confusion surrounds the nature and use of authenticity in the brand arena. Examining the strategies of 26 luxury wine firms informs the authenticity of specific brands. Creating an impression of authenticity required creating a sincere story consisting of a creative blend of industrial and rhetorical attributes. Sincerity was achieved through the public avowal of hand crafted techniques, uniqueness, relationship to place, passion for wine production, and the simultaneous disavowal of commercial motives, rational production methods, and the use of modern marketing techniques. For the wineries, appearing authentic was critical in order to reinforce their status, command price premiums and ward off competitors. Images of authenticity were accomplished by developing a sincere story that enabled the firms to maintain quality and relevance while appearing above commercial considerations. This was achieved through the deliberate decoupling of their technical core from their espoused communications.

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Authenticity has historically been associated with transcending the self and the market (Beverland, 2005; Fine, 2003; Kozinets, 2002; Peterson, 2005; Thompson, Rindfleisch, & Arsel, 2006), yet an emerging stream of consumer research identifies that people attribute authenticity to brands. Research suggests that authenticity is central to brand status, equity and corporate reputation (Beverland, 2005; Gilmore & Pine, 2007), with some even suggesting it is one of the "cornerstones of contemporary marketing", (Brown, Kozinets & Sherry, 2003, p. 21). Scholars have previously examined consumers' quests for authentic experiences (Arnould & Price, 2000), rituals associated with the authentic self (Belk & Costa, 1998; Kozinets, 2002), the cues used to attribute authenticity to objects (Beverland, Lindgreen, & Vink, 2008; Grayson & Martinec, 2004; Leigh et al., 2006; Thompson et al., 2006), the processes used to assess an object's authenticity (Rose & Wood, 2005), and the various forms that authenticity can take (Brown et al., 2003; Grayson & Martinec, 2004). We extend this line of inquiry by defining and measuring consumer-based brand authenticity. We do this through the development of a brand authenticity scale. Such research seeks to reduce the present fragmentation of research on the consumption of authenticity and assist managers create and maintain a brand's authenticity-building on calls for more research in this area (Beverland, 2005; Leigh et al., 2006; Peterson, 2005).Four separate studies were undertaken to generate and refine scale items (Study 1), determine and then confirm the underlying factor structure of brand authenticity (Studies 2 and 3), and finally to test for convergent and discriminant validity of the scale (Study 4). In Study 1, Churchill's (1979) scale development paradigm was adopted, using a deductive approach for the generation of scale items (Schwab, 1980). Drawing on the extant literature, an initial list of 157 items was generated reflecting brand heritage (26 items), quality commitment (21 items), craftsmanship (14 items), sincerity (43 items), nostalgia (23 items), cultural symbolism (21 items) and design consistency (nine items). Content validity of the initial pool of items was then assessed following the method outlined by Bearden, Netemeyer and Teel (1989) and Zaichkowsky, (1985), resulting in the retention of 33 scale items. Study 2 involved further purification of the scale and an assessment of the internal reliability of the 33 items. Data was collected via self-administered questionnaires from 247 undergraduate students at a large inner city university. Several items were eliminated during analysis, resulting in the retention of 19 items reflecting three factors, namely quality commitment, heritage and sincerity. These items formed the basis for further structural testing through confirmatory factor analysis in study 3, where data was gathered from a second sample of university students (n=203). Examination of the data suggested the deletion of five additional items, ...

Authenticity is a cornerstone of contemporary marketing. Yet, how do firms develop brand positions based on authenticity when marketing, and in particular advertising, is believed to 2 be antithetical to such positioning? We examine how consumers assess the claims of Trappist and Abbey beer brands. We identify three forms of authenticity: pure (literal) authenticity, approximate authenticity, and moral authenticity. In each case, consumers draw on either indexical or iconic cues to form judgments of authenticity, although the type of cue and degree of abstraction differ across the three types. We also find that the informants are duped by careful advertisements, and explain this by proposing that the relationships between indexical and iconic cues are closer than previously thought.