Prof. Dr. Melike Demirbag-Kaplan studied business administration at Boğaziçi University in Istanbul before completing her doctorate in brand management at Izmir Ekonomi Universitesi. She has worked in marketing and as a management consultant and was awarded her post-doctoral degree in 2011. Before joining the VICTORIA |Internationale Hochschule, Dr Demirbag-Kaplan worked as a professor of marketing at Yasar University and Izmir Ekonomi Universitesi, in Turkey. Between 2014 and 2015, she was a Visiting Professor at the Schulich School of Business, in Toronto, Canada. Her research mainly focuses on brand management and consumer behaviour, with a particular focus on the power shift between consumers and corporations reflected in alternative forms of consumption such as sharing economies, sustainable consumption, etc. Her other research interests include consumption-related topics especially in the energy and digital context, including the smart consumer shift. Her work has been published in recognised journals such as the European Journal of Marketing, the Service Industries Journal, the Journal of Brand Management, the Journal of Marketing Education, Convergence, the Design Journal, Energy Research & Social Science, the Journal of Public Health Policy and the Journal of Medical Marketing.