Servicescape,standards,and the plus-size consumer subject

Abstract

This study explores how exclusion is materially produced and sustained within the servicescape. While prior research on spatial exclusion has largely emphasized ideological and economic factors, this study foregrounds the socio-material structuring of market environments that regulate bodily presence and consumer legitimacy. Servicescapes are not neutral; their material infrastructures are imbued with normative assumptions about bodily conformity, determining who belongs and who is marginalized. Focusing on the inflight servicescape and the experiences of plus-size consumers, this study reveals how spatial constraints, institutional policies, and service interactions converge to enforce bodily discipline. It conceptualizes marginalization as a cycle of exclusion, operating through institutional, relational, and self-disciplining mechanisms. Airline infrastructures, through standardized designs and efficiency-driven protocols, privilege certain body types while marginalizing non-normative bodies. This produces what the study terms a standardization paradox: the pursuit of consistency and inclusivity paradoxically reinforces exclusion by encoding sizeist and ableist norms. By theorizing servicescapes as socio-material instruments of power, this study contributes to consumer research by illustrating how servicescapes shape consumer legitimacy and actively enact market boundaries.