University of Washington
Loyola Marymount University
University of Texas at Austin
The annual Shelby D. Hunt/Harold H. Maynard Award recognizes the Journal of Marketing article published in the last calendar year (2025) that has made the most significant contribution to marketing theory. The 2025 winners are Esther Uduehi, Julian K. Saint Clair, and Rowena Crabbe for their article, “Intersectionality in Marketing: A Paradigm for Understanding Understudied Consumers” (November 2025).
The selection committee, composed of Maura L. Scott (Chair, Arizona State University), Linda L. Price (University of Wyoming), and Ajay Kohli (Georgia Institute of Technology) noted:
“This refreshing and thought-provoking research encourages scholars to consider consumers’ multiple, intersecting identities when building theory. The paradigm-shifting article challenges the marketing discipline to incorporate understudied consumer segments and, more generally, consumers’ multiple identities in theory development. The in-depth web appendix provides valuable tools for researchers to use when capturing consumers’ lived experiences. In doing so, the author team helps the field see how meaningful inclusion of multiple identities of consumers can result in more nuanced theory-building in marketing.”
The authors will be honored at the 2026 AMA Summer Academic Conference, July 24-26 in Denver, CO. Previous recipients of this award can be found here.
Read an in-depth summary of the winning article here.
The other excellent finalists for the award were:
- “Where A/B Testing Goes Wrong: How Divergent Delivery Affects What Online Experiments Cannot (and Can) Tell You About How Customers Respond to Advertising,” by Michael Braun and Eric M. Schwartz
- “Cardio with Mr. Treadmill: How Anthropomorphizing the Means of Goal Pursuit Increases Motivation,” by Lili Wang and Maferima Touré-Tillery
Go to the Journal of Marketing