This study analyzed consumers’ recognition and demand for probiotic products and dietary and living habits according to their probiotics ingestion experience to provide information on the development of probiotic products and marketing strategies in the health functional food-related industry. A total of 280 consumers living in Seoul, Incheon and Kyeonggi-do area were enrolled in this study. The consumers expected mostly intestinal health (80.4%) after ingesting probiotics. The appropriate price level for purchasing probiotics was between 20,000-50,000 won (58.2%), preferring a price range of 50,000 won or less (77.1%). There was a significant difference in the dietary habits depending on the experience of probiotics ingestion, but there was no difference in the living habit. Consumers took Vitamin C, red Ginseng and Ginseng the most instead of probiotics as health functional foods. Based on the results, a marketing strategy could be established to meet the consumer’s needs, such as focusing on the effects of probiotics, building up various price policies and the development of new products mixing with other commonly consumed health supplements.

This study investigates the effect of high-level customization experience delivered via information and communication technology (ICT) on consumers’ patronage behavior toward a brand. The results indicate that customization experience increases purchasing intention for it enhance the level of happiness about the product. The relationship between customization experience and happiness is found to be mediated by autonomy (i.e., feeling of being in charge of one’s own action), competence (i.e., feeling that one effectively utilize one’s skill and abilities) and the pride of authorship (i.e. feeling of pride when creating an artifact of one’s own). Introduction The advancement of ICT (Information and Communication Technology) has led the paradigm shift in managing a producer and consumer relationship in the fashion industry. In particular, it has blurred the boundaries between the role of a producer and the role of a consumer. For example, Adidas, one of the biggest sportswear companies in the world, has built SpeedFactory, which offers a special customization service for their users to build sneakers according to their own design specifications. There it takes only five hours for a customized design put together by its users to be produced in a real pair of sneakers and ready to be delivered to their home (Wiener, 2017). The term, prosumer (i.e., producer and consumer) indicates such people who not only purchase and use a product a company offers but also actively participate in the production process by communicating and reflecting their preference (Toffler, 1980). This phenomenon is particularly evident with millennial consumers who desire customer-centric experiences with which they feel wanted and valued. They are willing to engage with brands through producing consumer-generated contents and suggesting their ideas during the production process (McGee, 2017). Such desire has driven the growth of customization services and the rapid development of technology further enabling companies to provide customization more easily and at lower costs (Mitrea, Werner, & Greif, 2010). Despite its increasing significance, not much attention has been paid to understanding the psychological underpinnings as to how and why customization services may enhance consumer patronage behavior toward a brand. This study fills this void by examining the underlying mechanism of the relation between personalization experiences and purchasing intention. Literature review and research questions Customization Experience and Happiness “Experience” has emerged as an important keyword for marketing professionals in the last couple of decades (Pine & Gillomore, 1999; Schmitt, 1999). Consumers wanted and were willing to pay for unique, personalized events that are not the same as anyone else’s, and those that can surprise and impress them beyond providing mere satisfaction (Pine & Gillomore, 1999). Customized services thus have a great impact on consumer patronage behavior such as purchase intention and brand loyalty. Recently, marketing and psychology research has also observed that customized experiences bring happiness (e.g. Bhattacharjee, & Mogilner, 2014; Guevarra & Howell, 2015). Happiness refers to a cognitive and emotional evaluation of one's own life (Diener, 1984). While, to some extent, happiness can be assessed by external criteria such as socioeconomic level or objective indicators, subjective well-being is argued to be important for individuals to assess their own psychological states (Diener, 1984). In general, studies have found that material goods provide lower level of happiness than life experiences, since consumers tend to evaluate happiness through specific events. However, Guevarra & Howell (2015) illustrated that the dichotomous distinction between material items and life experience is ambiguous at the boundary, and in the middle of continuum from material items to life experiences exists “experiential products,” which give consumers the same level of happiness as life experiences. Offering consumers the ability to reflect their preferences in product designs is a way to tap into this psychology. Customization can be a unique experience in that consumers themselves participate in production processes. It is expected that the experience of designing one’s own good will positively affect consumer's happiness level. What Drives Happiness from Customization Experiences? Self-determination theory of Deci & Ryan (2012) (e.g., Maltby & Day, 2001; Wilson, Rodgers, Fraser, & Murray, 2004) is used as the conceptual framework to identify the underlying psychological mechanisms for this study. In particular, the selfdetermination theory posits that people feel happiness when they are satisfied with such psychological needs as autonomy (i.e., engaging in behaviors that express one’s true identity and feeling of being in charge of one’s own action), competence (i.e., feeling of fulfillment that one effectively utilize one’s skill and abilities), and relatedness (i.e., feelings of closeness to a desired social group) through experience (Deci & Ryan, 2012). Given the focus of this study is the customized service delivered online, the variable of relatedness is less relevant since our study focuses on independently designing a product to a user’s unique preferences. The variable of relatedness is excluded in our research model. Instead, we include the “pride of authorship” (Trentin, Perin, & Forza, 2014), which refers to the feeling of pride generated when creating an artifact of their own and a sense of being the creator of it (Schreier, 2006). Customized services can enhance the sense of accomplishment as an author which is also found to affect happiness (Schreier, 2006). We thus formulated the following hypotheses. Hypothesis 1-3. Perceived customization experience will have a positive influence on autonomy (H1), competence (H2), pride of authorship (H3). Hypothesis 4-6. Autonomy (H4), competence (H5), pride of authorship (H6) will have a positive influence on happiness. Hypothesis 7. Happiness will have a positive influence on purchase intention. Method The data were collected via an online experiment in May 2017 with women in their 20s and 30s residing in South Korea, nationwide. Procedure The target site we used as an experiment stimulus was a shoe retail site (http://www.shoesofprey.com) that offers customization options (e.g., shapes, colors, and heel height). The data were collected for a week with 180 participants in total. After entering a designated computer lab, participants were given a detailed instruction of how to use the customized services of this brand. Experiment assistants provided real-time help to participants for any technical difficulties. We asked respondents to visit an online website of this brand. The participants were asked to explore the site and to design customized shoes to their liking. After spending some time on the site and finish customization, they were asked to answer questions in our questionnaire. Measures/Data Collection and Analysis The measures of our constructs were developed based on previous literature. All items (except for demographic characteristics) were measured using a 7-point Likert scale (1 = “strongly disagree;” 7 = “strongly agree”). About 12 responses were deleted from a total of 180 responses due to incomplete data, thus168 were used for final analysis. The data were statistically analyzed using SPSS 21.0 and AMOS 18.0. Results Underlying Mechanism of the Relation between Personalization Experience and Happiness: Autonomy, Competence, and Pride of Authorship With the pooled data (n=168), the results of the confirmatory factor analysis on the entire measurement model showed that our measurement model had a reasonably good fit (χ2(df=145)=300.546, p=.000; Normed χ2(CMIN/DF)=2.073; GFI=.847; CFI=.924; NFI=.864; TLI=.910; RMSEA=.080). The measurements of reliability yielded Cronbach’s α coefficients above 0.7. The convergent validity and discriminant validity were confirmed between the measurement variables, and the measured values were found to be appropriate. Customization experience had a significant influence on the path of autonomy, competence, and pride of authorship at the .001 level. Specifically, the results showed that the coefficient of the path from “customization experience to autonomy” to be .71***, that from “customization experience to competence” was .81***, and that from “customization experience to pride of authorship” was .68***. We thus accept Hypothesis 1, 2, and 3. These mediation variables were found to have a positive influence on happiness at the .001 level. The coefficient of the path from “autonomy to happiness” was .38***, that from “competence happiness” was .29***, and that from “pride of authorship to happiness” was .25***. We thus accept Hypothesis 4, 5, and 6. It was identified that happiness was positively related to purchase intention with coefficients, 0.49***. Thus, Hypothesis 7 was supported. Discussion and implications Previous research found that offering customization service positively influences purchase intention and willingness-to-pay. This paper extends the current understand as to the effect of customization service experience on consumer patronage intention by identifying underlying psychological mechanism. The customized products allow and demand consumers to engage in the designing process. This distinctive experience generates psychological reactions that are linked to personal happiness. In particular, we find that a heightened sense of autonomy, competence, and the pride of authorship are critical mediators linking the customization experiences to happiness. The results also indicate that feeling of happiness is a significant driver for consumer patronage behavior. Our results imply that millennial consumers want to experience consumer-centric events and to engaging in creating their own contents to feel fulfilled with consumption experiences and that customized services can be a power tool to meet this desire.

The home meal replacement (HMR) food industry began in 1980, and it has grown rapidly as a major food business for both consumers and the food industry since the development of industrialization and societal changes. Many researchers investigated a variety of HMR food product characteristics. On the other hand, previous studies have focused only on topics in limited study areas. Therefore, this study examined the effect of color marketing and the value of experience on the consumer behaviors. This study used a survey to collect the respondents' opinions about HMR food products. The study results showed that the characteristics of color marketing and the experience value of the HMR products influenced the consumers' attitudes. Moreover, consumers' attitudes affected their repurchase behavior. The results suggest that marketers of HMR food products should use colors that show the characteristics of products to appeal to consumers. In addition, HMR products should be developed in line with what consumers value the most; for example, consumers value their previous experience with the products and the characteristics of the products.

This research explored how experiencing a country’s cultural heritage influences consumers’ authenticity evaluation of its luxury brands. It showed authenticity was culturally constructed and perception was influenced by marketing means selectively exposing the consumers to different brand attributes. It contributes to transcultural research by linking cultural attributes to brand authenticity attributes.

본 조사는 한국 소비자들의 식중독 경험여부, 식중독 원인균에 대한 지식 및 식품안전과 식중독 예방을 위한 행동에 있어서의 인식 정도를 알아보기 위하여 2001년 11월 일반성인 총 1,040명을 대상으로 전국적으로 전화조사를 실시하였다. 그 결과 12.4%는 연 1회 이상 식중독을 경험하고 있으며, 0.3%는 식중독으로 인해 병원에 입원하는 것으로 나타났다. 식중독이 발생한 원인장소로는 일반음식점에서의 음식 섭취가 37.2%로 가장 높게 나타났고, 가정에서의 부주의가 212.%등으로 나타났으며, 원인식품으로는 고기 등의 육류 및 가공품이 41.7%, 생선 등 어패류 및 가공품이 18.7% 등으로 나타났다. 식중독 원인균에 대한 인식에서는 콜레라(75.5%), 비브리오(73%), 이질(65.5%), 장티푸스(51.8%), 살모넬라증(47.5%)의 순으로 잘 알고 있는 것으로 나타났지만 리스테리아증(9.9%), 브루셀라증(8.3%)에 대해서는 대부분이 모르거나 음식물로 인해 발생하지 않는 것으로 인식하고 있는 것으로 나타났다. 한편, 조사자료를 바탕으로 3가지 모델로 구분 즉, Model 1은 식중독 원인균에 대한 지식, Model 2는 식품안전에 대한 인식, Mode 3은 식중독예방을 위한 행동에 대한 인식으로 구분하였고, 각 모델들은 조사자의 일반사항에서 나타난 변수와 식중독 경험여부 별로 다중회귀분석(Multiple regression analysis)을 수행하였다. 그 결과 식중독 원인균에 대한 인식(Model 1)은 여러 변수 중 교육수준(OR 0.536), 결혼상태(OR 0.529)가 영향요인으로 나타났으며, 특히, 과거 식중독 경험이 가장 중요한 영향요인으로 나타났다(OR 1.714). 식품안전에 대한 인식(Model 2)에서는 교육수준이 중요한 영향요인으로 나타났으며(OR 0.702), 식중독 예방을 위한 행동에 대한 인식(Model 3)에서는 교육수준(OR 0.816)과 성별(OR 0.650)이 중요한 영향으로 나타났으며, 과거 식중독 경험이나 식품안전에 대한 인식정도는 식중독 예방을 위한 행동에 대한 인식과는 상관관계가 없는 것으로 나타났다. 결론적으로 식품안전에 있어 경험과 지식은 실제 식중독 예방을 위한 행동에는 크게 영향을 미치지 않음을 의미하는 것으로 볼 수 있다.

This study deals with shopping value and trust as the factors to influence consumer attitude and purchase intention in online shopping. Utilitarian and hedonic shopping values, trust, attitude and purchase intention are incorporated into the Value-Attitude-Behavior model to find out how differently shopping values and trust influence online shoppers attitude and purchase intention when they have different purchase experiences. Data are collected from survey of 187 subjects and divided into two groups according to their online purchase experiences : 97 shoppers with low online purchase experiences and 89 with high experiences. PLS(Partial Least Square) method is applied to estimate the research model and to test 7 hypotheses. The results show the difference of the way how shopping value and trust influence purchase intention. In the case of low experienced online shoppers, trust has the greatest influence purchase intention, followed by hedonic shopping value mediated by attitude. However utilitarian shopping values have a bigger impact on it for shoppers with high purchase experiences. In the latter, trust also has a significant impact on purchase intention at confidence level of 0.05. The results also provide useful implications for practitioners to build and manage their marketing strategies. Managers of online shopping mall should react to the different shopping value by shopper's experience.