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Online ISSN 2345-0037. ORGANIZATIONS AND MARKETS IN EMERGING ECONOMIES, 2014, VOL. 5, No. 1(9)

IMPACT OF CONGRUENCE BETWEEN
SPORTS CELEBRITY AND BRAND
PERSONALITY ON PURCHASE INTENTION:
THE CASE OF MINERAL WATER CATEGORY
IN LITHUANIA
Eleonora Šeimienė*
Vilnius University

Tamara Jankovič
Vilnius University

Abstract: Present research argues that it is important to understand relation between celebrity, brand personality and the consumer, however, there are only few studies covering this topic. Moreover, most of the studies on celebrity endorsement are conducted in developed countries. In Lithuania as in other post-soviet and emerging countries, the practice of using celebrities in advertising is relatively new, but the trend has been growing over the past two decades. The study performed in Lithuanian mineral water category analyses relation between purchase intention of the advertised brand and such independent variables as sports celebrity, brand personality, celebrity similarity to the consumer and consumer attitude towards the celebrity. This paper proves that congruence between the celebrity and brand personality positively impacts purchase intention of the advertised brand. Brand personality turns to have the most impact on purchase intention. The study also revealed that the more consumers find themselves similar to the celebrity, the more they are willing to purchase the brand. However, consumer attitude towards the celebrity appears to be not as important as it was expected.
Key words: celebrity, brand personality, purchase intention

1. Introduction
The increasing competition for consumers has encouraged marketing specialists to use celebrity endorsement in advertising in order to increase sales. Celebrity endorsement is the most popular method used for brand reinforcement. Use of a celebrity does not necessary guarantee sales, but it can attract attention to advertisement’s message and
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Corresponding Author: Marketing Department, Faculty of

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