The ‘Businessization’ of Sacred Spheres: Creating Strategic Family Alliances Through Business Planning

Marketization reaches even into the most sacred spheres of consumers lives. This triggers a conflict between private and market logics that then consumers need to balance and manage in order to protect private spheres from too much market involvement. However, we find evidence that consumers actively choose the market and rely on market logics for managing their most sacred spheres. Our qualitative interpretive study in the context of the online platform Familyship.org shows how people are applying business planning in order to create and manage family alliances.