Consumer-brand assemblages in advertising: an analysis of skin, identity, and tattoos in ads

Brands have taken center stage in contemporary consumer culture, furnishing consumers with cultural materials with which they can construct experiences, social relations, and identities (Arvidsson 2006). Although the concept of brands has traditionally been closely related to products (Strasser 1989), brands clearly are emerging as vehicles of meaning that not only offer consumers a lens through which to experience the world (Holt 2002), but also provide firms with a central focus for organizing business (Kornberger 2010).