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Brand and country-of-origin effect on consumers' decision to purchase luxury products

This three-continent seven-country interdisciplinary collaborative research was presented at the 2010 Global Marketing Conference, September 9-11, Tokyo with the title “Does the Country of Origin of Brands still Help to Sell Luxury Products in the World? An International Research Investigation on Consumers in 7 countries” and received the best conference paper award. I was the only researcher investigating situations in China, contributing to the formation of the project, and providing the empirical findings.

This work extends previous work (Journal of Brand Management 16:323-337) and considers the combined effect of brand and country-of-origin (CoO) on the decision to purchase luxury goods. Thus far no study had linked brand to CoO, CoD, CoM or investigated the impact of price and guarantee. Furthermore, no study had compared empirical findings across different countries.

The research undertook an intercultural analysis of online questionnaire survey results (a total sample of 1102 respondents) from seven countries. These results concern the differences in the relative importance of components of the consumer decision-making process in respect of the purchase of luxury and non-luxury goods; the relative importance of CoO for consumers making purchasing decisions relating to luxury goods; and the variation in consumers’ decision-making criteria depending on the maturity of the luxury market. This research is part of the managerial perspective of improving understanding of the cultural differences in perception and purchasing behaviour relating to luxury brands. They are interesting in terms of management recommendations for a company that wishes to expand internationally in a geographic area covered by the study, since the research found significant differences. The results also contribute to the theoretical controversy concerning the importance of CoO in the consumer decision-making process.