The Missing Piece in Cross-Border Acquisitions: Investigating How Brand Fit, COO Fit, and Awareness Drive Loyalty and Trial

Abstract

In an increasingly globalized marketplace, brand acquisitions have become a central growth strategy for companies, yet the high failure rates of such deals suggest that important factors are being overlooked. While most research on acquisitions emphasizes financial, strategic, and managerial integration aspects, relatively little attention has been paid to consumer perceptions of these transactions. This study addresses that gap by examining how perceived brand fit, country of origin(COO) fit, and brand awareness of the acquiring brand influence two key consumer outcomes, namely brand loyalty and willingness to try the acquired brand, and how these relationships are mediated by brand perception.An online survey (N = 171) using the Coca-Cola acquisition of Costa Coffee as a scenario collected responses from participants across multiple demographic groups. Multiple regression analyses tested the direct effects of brand fit, COO fit, and brand awareness on the two dependent variables, while mediation analyses using PROCESS Macro Model 4 examined the role of brand perception. The results revealed that both brand fit and COO fit had significant positive effects on brand loyalty and willingness to try. Brand awareness significantly predicted willingness to try but not brand loyalty. Mediation analysis showed that brand perception fully mediated the effect of brand fit on brand loyalty and competitively mediated the effect of brand awareness on brand loyalty, while several other mediation paths were unsupported.These findings highlight that consumer perceptions are not peripheral but central to the success of brand acquisitions. The study contributes to acquisition, branding, and consumer behavior literature by extending well-established relationships such as the positive link between brand awareness and product evaluation into the context of acquisitions, and by showing that these relationships may differ in strength and outcome. Managerial implications stress the importance of assessing and strategically managing consumer perceptions during the acquisition process to enhance post-acquisition brand performance.