Considering the popularity of virtual influencer (VI) marketing while its effectiveness remains fully unexplored, there is a need of academic attention testing consumer responses to VIs in comparison with human influencer marketing. Hence, this study aims to fill this gap by comparing consumers’ perceptions of a human versus virtual influencer’s endorsement. Specifically, based on the construal level theory and psychological reactance, this study investigates how consumers differently evaluate human and virtual influencers’ endorsement motives, which may further influence their attitudes toward a brand, advertising (i.e., endorsement), and an influencer and purchase intentions. Additionally, the moderating role of the number of endorsements (single vs. multiple) and perceived innovativeness are examined.

This study analyzed the effects of fashion creators’ innovativeness and attractiveness on consumer response and orientation toward a sustainable relationship in personal media. A survey was conducted with consumers aged in their 20s and 30s who had experience in sharing video content or writing comments and participating in fashion creators’ real-time broadcasting of personal media. The results show that the innovativeness of fashion creators was classified into originality, opinion leadership, variety, and adventurous spirit, while attractiveness was classified into physical, social, and professional attractiveness. Consumer responses were classified into either emotional or cognitive responses, and sustainable relationship orientation was classified into communication, sharing, and relationship sustainability. The originality and variety of the fashion creators positively affected the emotional and cognitive responses of consumers. Adventurous spirit positively affected emotional response, whereas opinion leadership positively affected cognitive response. In addition, the social and professional attractiveness of fashion creators positively affected consumers’ emotional and cognitive responses. Emotional and cognitive responses positively affected consumers’ sustainable relationship orientation. The originality and opinion leadership of the fashion creators positively affected the three factors of sustainable relationship orientation, while variety positively affected communication and relationship sustainability. Fashion creators' social and professional attractiveness positively affected the three factors of sustainable relationship orientation, and physical attractiveness positively affected relationship sustainability. The results of this study are expected to provide useful data on the direction of fashion startups using personal media and marketing as well as distribution strategies in the fashion industry.

수많은 정보의 홍수 속에서 소비자는 자신의 감성에 맞는 스타일을 선택하기 원하므로 개인화 서비스에 대한 효용과 필요성이 꾸준히 증가하고 있다. 본 연구에서는 적극적 개인화 쇼핑몰의 샘플 동영상을 직접 제작하여 인터넷 쇼핑몰 이용자 대학생 170명에 대하여 이를 경험하도록 하였고 이에 따라 소비자 반응이 변하는 것을 측정하였다. 또 소비자의 개인화의 수준에 따라 소비자의 웹사이트 평가, 만족도/인터넷 행동, 제품품질평가 등 반응도 조사하였다. 또한 이를 선호쇼핑몰의 종류, 인터넷 쇼핑몰 접속 횟수에 따라 차이가 존재하는지를 조사하였다. 결과는 첫째, 적극적 개인화 쇼핑몰을 이미 경험해본 대학생 소비자의 경우 적극적 개인화 수준이 높게 나타났다. 선호 쇼핑몰의 종류에 따라서 소극적 개인화 수준이 달랐는데, 일반의류 쇼핑몰을 선호하는 사람들이 낮고 복합대형쇼핑몰과 소셜커머스를 선호하는 사람들은 소극적 개인화 점수가 높았다. 둘째, 대학생 소비자의 적극적 개인화 동영상 경험 전후에 따라서 만족도/인터 넷행동, 제품품질 평가는 변화하지 않는 것으로 나타났으나, 소극적 개인화 점수는 감소하고 적극적 개인화 점수와 웹사이트 평가는 증가하는 것으로 나타났다. 셋째, 인터넷 쇼핑몰 접속 횟수는 만족도/인터넷행동, 웹사이트 평가와 정적 상관이 있는 반면에, 적극적 개인화 요소는 만족도/인터넷 행동, 웹사이트 평가와 부적 상관이 있었다.

Developments on the Chinese automotive market could change the business in the race to the crown for German premium brands. With extraordinary growth rates, car manu-facturers prioritized Asian market development. More concrete, a quickly evolving segment of young, wealthy Chinese customers demanding German luxury cars seems to be a chance to compensate maturing home markets. BMW – originated in premium segments – is about to expand its luxury reach through its 7-series while, at the same time, serving the increasing demand for “affordable luxury” in all markets. However, competitors are catching up with new concepts. Whereas Mercedes-Benz always had a great proportion in the luxury segment, Audi became the market leader in China by launching several new luxury models. BMW sees the answer in the possible launch of a new 9-series sharing a platform with their Rolls-Royce cars. Furthermore, the BMW Individual manufactory launched a new, strictly limited 7-Series in corporation with silver manufacturer Robbe & Berking – the most expensive and exclusive car BMW ever crafted. To be able to win the race, BMW has to incorporate new technologies when considering the trading-up or trading-down of their model range.

오늘날 우리 사회는 거절과 무시라는 사회적 배제(social exclusion) 경험의 증가로 인해 공격 행동, 자기 자멸적 행동, 인지 능력의 저하와 같은 많은 사회적 문제가 발생하고 있다. 본 연구는 사회적 배제의 유형인 무시와 거 절이 각각 과시적 소비와 친사회적 행동에 미치는 효과를 검증하고 근육 강화에 의한 체화된 인지가 그 효과를 어떻게 조절하는지 규명하고자 수행되었다. 이를 위해 무시와 거절 조건의 참가자에게 악력기를 통한 근육 강화 (firmed muscle)로 체화된 인지를 형성시킨 후 과시적 소비(conspicuous consumption) 성향과 친사회적 행동(prosocial behavior) 의도를 측정하였다. 분석 결과, 무시 조건의 경우 악력기를 통한 근육강화 집단이 근육비강화 집단 (통 제 집단)에 비해 더 낮은 과시적 소비 경향과 더 높은 친사회적 행동 의도를 보였으나, 거절 조건의 경우 근육강 화 집단과 근육비강화 집단 간의 유의미한 차이를 보이지 않았다. 이는 사회적 배제 경험 중 무시의 경우, 체화 된 인지를 통해 효능감의 동기를 높이면 친사회적 행동과 같은 긍정적인 행동을 유도할 수 있음을 시사한다.

Over the past decades, researchers devoted considerable attention to the impact of store environments on shopping behavior (e.g. Baker et al., 2002; Kotler, 1973; Turley & Milliman, 2000). More recent, practitioners and academics alike have argued that a greater challenge for brands is the creation and enhancement of compelling shopping experiences along, and beyond, the entire path-to-purchase (Interbrand, 2014; Shankar et al., 2011). In a luxury brand context, where the shopping experience is a significant motivator for purchases (Yoon, 2013), the interaction of multiple retail environments greatly affect consumer behavior towards the brands. Accordingly, brand experiences is created at both ends of the marketing supply chain, by brand manufacturers and retailers. Yet, although research has developed fruitful areas for new perspectives on the relationships between manufacturers and retailers (Ganesan et al., 2009), the vast majority of existing research predominantly focuses on consumer response to brand experiences with respect to manufacturer cues (Dolbec & Chebat, 2013; Tynan et al., 2010), store cues (Baker et al., 2002), or retail settings (Möller & Herm, 2013). The evolving business world needs to implement more comprehensive and holistic approaches (Choi et al., 2014), where integrated strategies must emerge. The objective of this study is to present an explanation of luxury brand experiences across manufacturer and retailer’s settings. By overviewing the literature on the interaction between brand management, store atmospherics, and consumer behavior, and applying qualitative methods, the authors provide relevant insights for academics and practitioners toward a more comprehensive understanding of the luxury brand experience. Customer experience and luxury brands In the field of contemporary marketing, customer experience has been defined as a construct which “encompasses the total experience and may involve multiple retail channels” (Verhoef et al., 2009, p. 32). It includes the search, purchase, consumption, and after-sale phases of the experience. In a holistic brand perspective, this definition enlightens the key role of luxury brands in delivering the same brand promise and brand message across each connection between the consumer and the brand. Among the characteristics of luxury brands, consumers are willing to pursue luxury products as these products provide psychological benefits rather than functional benefits (Kapferer, 1997). Further, luxury brands are associated with status, wealth, exclusion, and pride (McFerran et al., 2014). As result, strong experiences with luxury brands derive when consumers develop deep emotional bonds with brands (Grisaffe & Nguyen, 2011). From a marketing perspective, consumers that develop deep emotional relationships with a brand have a lot of positive and strong associations (Yoo et al., 2000), such as the perception of the brand uniqueness and inimitability, and loyalty to the brand. However, when it comes to analyze the brand experience, research confers a conceptually different meaning from other brand constructs. According to Brakus et al. (2009), brand experience has distinct dimensions from evaluative, affective, and associative brand constructs, such as brand attachment, brand attitudes, customer delight, and brand personality. The concept of brand experience encompasses multiple dimensions, which refer to the sensorial, affective, intellectual, and behavioral sphere (Zarantonello & Schmitt, 2009). More specifically, the intrinsic concept of luxury brands as hedonic products with high symbolic value, holistically incorporate manufactures and retailers in fulfilling these various dimensions of brand experience. By assuring consistency across the manufacturer and retailer’s settings of the luxury brand, customer experiences evoke the exclusivity of the brand and transfer the authenticity of the brand message. From a consumer’s perspective, consumers reach brand authenticity when they perceive both the internal consistency, which focuses on maintaining the luxury brand standard and style, honoring its heritage, preserving its essence, and avoiding its exploitation, and the external consistency, which pertains to appearances and claims of the brand (Choi et al., 2014). Similarly, consumers tend to perceive the exclusivity of the luxury brand when they encounter consistent experiences across multiple brand touch points. Accordingly, in the experiential view, the principle of consistency and contiguity proposes that sensations, imagery, feelings, pleasures, and other symbolic or hedonic components are paired together to create mutually evocative consumer response (Holbrook & Hirschmann, 1982). The integration between the marketing and consumer’s perspectives suggests that luxury brands create and maintain powerful customer experiences when there is consistency across the manufacturer and retailer’s environments. However, in the landscape of luxury brand management, the conceptualization of customer experience requires the understanding of how consumers respond to luxury brand messages. This investigation is particularly important when examining brand experiences emerged in the manufacturer versus retailer physical environment. Existing literature on brand experiences, retail atmospherics, and luxury brands cannot fill the gap we address. Prior studies aiming to investigate the brand experience have analyzed the phenomenon of this construct from a theoretical perspective (Verhoef et al., 2009), case study analysis (Payne et al., 2009), or focused only on the direct relationship between manufacturer and consumer (e.g. Dolbec et al., 2013; Kim, 2009). For example, Dolbec et al. (2013) have studied in-store brand experiences on consumer response to flaghship vs. brand stores, and highlighted how their study suffers from not considering the continuity between current, previous and future experiences. Regarding the impact of store atmospherics and retailer’s settings on customer experiences (e.g. Baker et al. 2002; Bloch, 1995), research has found that specific combinations of atmospherics elements influences consumers’ perceptions about merchandise, service quality, and the overall store image. More recently, Möller & Herm (2013) showed how retail settings may shape consumers interpretation and evaluation of the brand, and in-store bodily experiences transfer a metaphoric message to customers’ perceptions of the brand. However, the authors empirically tested a mono-brand fashion retail store, and stressed the importance of examining the interaction between brand and store personalities in transferring meaning “from the product to the retailer and the other way around” (Möller & Herm, 2013, p. 8). The retail landscape has dramatically changed the dynamics of consumer-brand interactions in the physical encounter. The main challenge of these interactions concerns the effective integration of multichannel brand experiences into an exciting, emotionally engaging, and coherent brand experience. However, in-depth studies on consumer perceptions to these multi-environment experiences have not yet emerged. In this paper, we aim to fill that gap. By addressing the attention to the customer’s sphere, we specifically investigate how consumers perceive luxury brands in relation to brand experiences across various retail settings. Method and studies Owing to the lack of relevant research, this study applies a direct qualitative and exploratory approach to develop deep insights of consumers response to luxury brand experiences in different retail settings (Creswell, 2012). Two sequential studies investigate consumer cues of brand experiences across various environments. Study 1 provides the identification of luxury brand elements that are pivotal in the creation of exciting shopping experiences. In study 1, respondents named a luxury brand which they had frequently experienced in the last year, and to which they felt being in a deep relationship across multiple retail touch points of the brand. Respondents were asked about what elements of the brand they were more engaged to. The authors imposed no constraints on the elicitation. Following the categorization of luxury brands (Jackson, 2004) which comprehends fashion, perfumes and cosmetics, wines and spirits, and watches and luxury, respondents chose whatever brand they wanted. One of the authors provided the instructions to respondents. This study includes in the first sample a variety of 35 consumers from various age (20 to 65 years old consumers), as well as various education levels. The interviews were recorded, transcribed, and evaluated with content analysis, following quality criteria of Kassarjian (1977). The luxury brand elements emerged from Study 1 were used in Study 2 as thematic basis for investigating how these elements provide exciting experiences across multiple retail setting of the luxury brand. The same interviewer of Study 1 undertook in-depth interviews with eight of the above respondents, two from each consumer profile identified in line with the hedonic profiles of Arnold & Reynolds (2003). Each interview discussion lasted between 30 and 45 minutes, was audio-recorded and transcribed verbatim. The text was analyzed by the authors following the generalized sequence of steps of data reduction and transformation, data display and conclusion drawing/verification (Miles & Huberman, 1994). The code development followed thematic analysis (Boyatzis, 1998), and coding was multivariate within subjects. With multiple ideas per respondent, we extracted a large list of properties. We sorted thematic elements into logically related clusters and assigned representative headers. The authors now describe results regarding respondents’ perceptions of luxury brand experiences in multiple retail environments. Results and discussion Consumers identified a wide range of experience factors that they seek in luxury brands, and highlighted how the brand and retail environment fulfill these expectations. They considered the brand evocation to exclusivity and authenticity as the primary reason for purchasing luxury brands. One of the respondents stated: “I buy brand X because it is a nice and deeply authentic brand to have. When I use the brand X I feel I am wearing something very exclusive. And I feel exclusive”. Regarding experiencing luxury brands in the stores, respondents stressed the importance of “finding the same brand appealing in the monobrand store as well across retailers’ stores”, and added that when they did not perceive this coherence of message they often switched to other brands in the purchasing stage. Another determinant element of holistic experiences concerns the products presentation of the brand in various settings, which has to be very similar and related across the brand touch points. Respondents explained to feel confused when they visit one store and encounter “colorful display with a charming presentation of the brand Y in the store of retailer 1”, while finding in store of retailer 2 “black and white displays and an awful presentation for the brand Y”. Concerning the specific impact of the retailer’s environment on luxury experiences, we identified that the overall store setting of the retailer influences the luxury brand even when consumers do not experience the brand in the specific. For example, one respondent highlighted that “If I have to buy brand Z, I never go to retailer 3. I know that brand Z does not feel luxury at all in retailer 3 because of its very old fashioned store”. This study shows how consumers respond to luxury brand strategies across manufacturer and retailer’s brand setting. By providing deep insights on their relationship with luxury brands, consumers contributed to understand key elements for living consistent luxury brand experiences. They stresses the pivotal role of a coherent brand exclusivity. This is an evident implication to motivate consumers in purchasing the luxury brands. Retailers can also make important considerations from our study. They must create more appealing and overall exciting store images. By enhancing luxury experiences in the store, retailers can leverage opportunities of stronger connection with consumers. Simultaneously, brand manufacturers can build upon retailers enhanced in-store experience to magnify the holistic luxury brand experience. Finally, this study is one of the first explorations concerning the cross-effect of brand experiences and store atmospherics. In an empirical context, the authors investigate the conceptualization of consumer experiences in a multichannel view, and provide relevant contributions to analyze the brand and the environment as interdependent elements. Further research may test empirically our findings on the interaction between luxury brands and multi-retail experiences.

Nowadays, Korean culture affects fashion cultural industry. Furthermore, art and fashion collaborate considerably more now than in the past. Korean fashion experts and fashion cultural industry have mainly focused on global tourists. Fashion cultural products that promote the image of Korea synthesize both traditional and contemporary traits of the Korean culture (Cho, 2007), which reflects cultural and economic values. Hallyu, which means ‘Korean Wave’, has been a popular trend of Korean cultural contents on the global market. The target market of the contemporary Korean fashion clothing has mostly targeted global tourists. However, traditional products dominate over a few contemporary products on the Korean cultural product market. This study focuses on the contemporary Korean fashion clothing that are designed and reinterpreted in our times. When these designs become available on the market, they can excite more interest both in the fashion industry and among the consumers. This will help highlight the importance and potential of the present-day Korean cultural products. The purpose of the study is to figure out effects of contemporary Korean fashion clothing attributes on consumer response and consumer behavior. Contemporary Korean fashion clothing attributes are divided to Korean culture, fashion/practicality, creativity/uniqueness and design/aesthetic traits. Consumer response is to see the affective and cognitive response. Also, consumer behavior is to see preference and purchase intention. In the study, the data was used to conduct exploratory factor analysis and reliability analysis with SPSS, 21.0 and Amos 18.0 was used to conduct confirmatory factor analysis and structural equation modeling for testing the hypotheses. The results revealed fashion/practicality, creativity/unique attributes had positive effect on affective response and creativity/unique, design/aesthetic attributes had positive effect on the cognitive response. In addition, affective and cognitive response had positive effect on preference but only affective response had positive effect on purchase intention. Lastly, preference had positive effect on the purchase intention. The implications of this study would stimulate the expansion and further development of the Korean contemporary design market. However, as a limitation of research, limited category of product was used so more various kinds of fashion category can be used for the future research.

Today’s consumers experience the brands within numerous in-store and out-of-store contexts, and tend to focus on their holistic experience with the brands across various retail scenarios. Companies, especially in the luxury industry where multiple retail settings contribute to the formation of the brand image, invest considerable funds to create entertaining, exciting, and emotionally engaging experiences. However, researchers have not yet examined how traditional luxury brand factors interplay with experiential factors across multiple retail settings of the brand. In marketing literature, researchers have devoted considerable attention to the effect of store environments on consumer behavior (e.g. Baker et al., 2002; Donovan & Rossitier, 1982; Kotler, 1973). At the same time, academic research has also been conscious of the central role of brand image in the consumer-buying process (e.g. Keller, 1993; Kwon & Lennon, 2009). More recently, these two streams are coming together. Practitioners and academics have argued that creating compelling shopping experiences across multiple environments, and along, and beyond, the entire path-to-purchase is a key challenge for maintaining a certain brand image (Interbrand, 2014; Verhoef et al., 2009). In a luxury brand context, whereas brand managers design most of the strategic implementations of the brand, retailers can increasingly craft value to the brand via the creation of multisensory retail experiences (Spence et al., 2014). Luxury brands, such as Chanel, are continuously growing their retail presence, and identifying ways to cultivate the tradition of the brand and create distinctive and unique brand experiences. However, the academic perspective of investigating luxury brand images in contemporary business contexts has been underdeveloped (Berthon et al., 2009; Miller & Mills, 2012). While this call for more comprehensive and holistic approaches to luxury brand experiences has been raised (Atwal & Williams, 2009), current research predominantly focuses on single aspects of the luxury brand experience, such as in-store multisensory factors (Möller & Herm, 2013), brand owner cues (Tynan et al., 2010), in-store environment cues (Baker et al., 2002), or luxury brand specific factors (Beverland, 2005). The evolving business world needs to implement more holistic and contemporary approaches. By employing the approach of three dimensions store atmospherics (Baker et al., 2002) to luxury brand experiences, this study investigates how consumers integrate traditional brand factors with new factors of consumption. The objective of this article is to understand how various retail settings affect emotional states, which, in turn, affect behavior toward luxury brands. This study addresses the relationship of luxury brand experiences in tight and less controlled retail scenarios, and the ways in which luxury experiences trigger effective successful brand experiences. Utilizing two qualitative studies, the authors consider the interaction between luxury brand experiences and store atmospherics. The paper concludes with relevant implications for academics and practitioners to enable new perspectives on luxury brand strategies, and consumer response to the luxury brand image in the challenging retail landscape.

This research studied the effect of underwear’s product cues (style, fabric and price) on consumer choice by using conjoint and consumer neural response (EEG). The results reveal that female prefers bikini style and silk fabrics while male likes brief and boxer. In addition, male more relies on price than female.

This study of Product Placements examines cross-cultural differences in the UK, Germany and Mexico using an online survey of 338 respondents. Although product placement can still be used as a standardised global marketing strategy significant cultural differences were found, Marketers must therefore pay attention to such differences for international product placement decisions.

최근까지 제품디자인에 있어서의 조형요소의 심미성에 관한 연구가 많이 진행되어 왔다. 그러나 기존의 연구는 "심미성 요인이 무엇인가\ulcorner"에 초점을 맞추어 왔을 뿐 각각의 심미적 요소들이 사용자의 심미적 반응에 어떻게 영향을 미치는지에 대해서는 그다지 연구된 바가 없다. 따라서 본 연구는 제품디자인에서 심미성 요소를 내용미와 형태미로 나누어 서로의 상관관계를 파악하고 사용자의 심미적 반응에 어떠한 영향을 미치는지를 알아보는 연구이다. 더욱이 연구의 초점이 내용미 중 전형성을, 형태미 중 균형을 중심으로 서로의 심미적 반응의 영향정도와 관여수준과 국가와 같은 조절변수에 의해 심미적 반응이 어떻게 달라지는지를 검증하고자 하기 위한 연구이다. 본 연구를 통하여 실제로 디자인 현장이나 기업에서 디자인에 있어서 심미적 영향요소를 적용하는 데에 대한 의미 있는 시사점을 제공해주고 디자인의 심미성에 대한 이론적인 체계를 만들어가는 것에 기여하리라 본다. 기여하리라 본다.

Product liability is the law of the manufacturer's responsibilities for the consumers' personal injuries or the losses of property resulted from defective products. In today's many countries, the product liability law are being enacted because of the safety of product use and the protection of consumer's right. In korea, the product liability is going to enforce on July 1, 2002. Though the construction of product liability response system is urgent situation, domestic manufacture company's PL response system is not nearly prepared in present. Consequently, the purpose of this study is to discuss the Quality Management's importance and the PL countermeasures by presenting the difference of PL response system construction degree by the Quality Management Maturity degree

General views of 1,436 housewives respondents through the country on commercial kochujang (fermented hot pepper-soybean paste) were surveyed by questionnaires. The 65.0% of total respondents had experience of purchasing commercial kochujang on the market, mostly super market (43.0%) of respondents, and the respondents who has job and live in apartment purchased the commercial products more often than the others (80.5%). The reason for purchasing commercial products were convenience (36.1%) and short of time (13.0%). The critera for purchasing commercial product were previous experience (40.1%) and well known trademark (20.6%) and not for purchasing were concerning of noxiousness (29.2%) and inferior taste (25.0%). Respondents prefered glass packing (44.3%) and plastic bottle (20.2%) of 500 g pack for single usage (42.3%). The most important standards for kochujang taste were pungency (59.1%) and savory taste (28.6%). The problems indicated to commercial products were inferior taste (32.2%), especially too sweet (52.6%), and safety (20.6%).