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Abstract
This article argues for a third transformation in marketing pedagogy, one made necessary by the emergence of subsistence consumers as a high-growth market segment. Continued double-digit growth in buying power and consumption among the world’s poor appear certain, provided that the subsistence merchants serving such markets are effective. Ensuring such effectiveness, however, demands the training of millions of such marketers, which in turn requires the development of pedagogical approaches that take into account their unique capabilities, characteristics, and orientation. The article begins with a brief review of the historical record of transformation in marketing education in response to market changes, and then moves into a detailed description of subsistence merchants and the challenges they present to contemporary marketing education practices. Focus then shifts to the Marketplace Literacy Project (MLP) and its evolving methodologies for teaching marketing to subsistence merchants in India. The article concludes with takeaways from Marketplace Literacy Project’s efforts that are generalizable to other subsistence contexts and serve to inspire marketing educators to devote energy and resources to improving marketing effectiveness among the global poor.
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