Linking the individual forgetting context with customer capital from a seller's perspective

Customer capital is a result of interaction between an organization and its customers. Customers change their characteristics, including addresses, behaviour and preferences; but as the customer requirements change, basic beliefs or processes, that is, things that individuals take for granted at an implicit and an explicit level of knowledge, must also change. This paper aims to identify the role of an individual forgetting context on customer capital in today's organization through an empirical study of 229 sellers (front–line contact people) in the Spanish optometry industry. Two structural equation models have been used, resulting in the conclusion that before obtaining an up–to–date memory, it is necessary to identify new ways of doing and interpreting things, which in turn result in a shift in relations that favour the customers.