Customer Co-Production and Service Innovation Characteristics: A Conceptual Argument

Innovations often modify the nature and/or extent of customer co-production (Eiglier et al. 1977). Such modifications affect customer evaluation of innovation characteristics (Lovelock and Young 1979). In fact, Prahalad and Ramaswamy (2003) view co-creation as the “next practice and the future of innovation” programs. By exploring the associations between co-production and innovation characteristics, this research links two previously unrelated streams of research: service characteristics and diffusion of innovations.