What is a luxury brand? A new definition and review of the literature

In spite of considerable prior research on luxury branding, no widely accepted definition of luxury brand exists. The purpose of this paper is to review the literature in order to: a) summarize the state of knowledge on luxury brand marketing; and b) provide a new and usable definition of a luxury brand. A literature review was conducted with a focus on developing a more useful definition of luxury brand, outlining key theoretical perspectives that have been used in this area, and summarizing key research findings. Ko and Megehee's (2012) framework for understanding consumption of luxury brands is used as the guiding conceptual framework for the review. Directions for future research are provided.