The marketing mix concept is one of the core concepts of marketing theory. However, in recent years, the popular version of this concept McCarthy’s (1964) 4Ps (product, price, promotion and place) has increasingly come under attack with the result that different marketing mixes have been put forward for different marketing contexts. While numerous modifications to the 4Ps framework have been proposed (see for example Kotler, 1986; Mindak and Fine, 1981; Nickels and Jolson, 1976; Waterschoot and Bulte. 1992) the most concerted criticism has come from the services marketing area. In particular Booms and Bitner’s (1981) extension of the 4Ps framework to include process, physical evidence and participants, has gained widespread acceptance in the services.
