It is certainly not possible to analyse the evolution of the global luxury consumers orientations for the new luxury Chinese brands without considering the essence and the impact of the “brandscape”. In the last decade, China has assisted to the surge of the “luxury lifestyle” for a multiplicity of consumer segments living in those coastal areas – and not only - filled with luxury and fashion brands, that invaded every city area from streets to airports from clinics to hotels where concept stores, luxury flagship stores, sponsorships for events and urban artefacts “add value to the symbolic production of an urban lived space” (Bellini and Pasquinelli, 2015). Luxury product brands are enriched by the synergy with the city brand and the diverse fashion and art city locations, activities and events. In the new luxury perspective that sees luxury in its experiential dimension and no longer only in desire of an exclusive object, the relation of luxury brands and city brand requires a specific focus, in particular in the new fast growing economies as China that sees the rise of the new experiential luxury lifestyle and new local luxury brands. In the fast growing luxury Chinese luxury market where new Chinese luxury brands are striving to acquire a brand identity and image first in the local market and then in the international one, city branding may be a conductive solutions for brand value and identity creation. Authentic luxury experiences in significant city contexts appear added value activities for luxury brands in particular for those with no consolidated heritage and identity as the new Chinese luxury brands. New retail formats such as pop-up stores, concept stores located in specific high value artistic or fashion related locations adds value (Bellaiche et al, 2012). For Chinese luxury brands with a very limited identity, a almost absent heritage and a ongoing value creation of the brand, in-store experience is increasingly important (Atsmon et al, 2012) and the shopping location certainly represent an important factor for the increasingly diverse and demanding luxury customers by being not only the instrument towards the desired subjects but also a value-adding experience on its own (Rintamaki et al, 2007, p. 628). The emergence of the Chinese luxury consumer did not mean the presence on a market where the consumers are gathered by the same tastes, desires and purchasing patterns. Reference to the global consumer culture and paradigm evidenced that consumers in diverse geographical contexts may have different and sometimes even conflicting opinions or shared desires and values expressed in similar behaviours or symbols towards a brand. Global brands sets the international standards and convey shared symbols (Holt, Quelch and Taylor 2004) and a myth of cosmopolitanism to which many consumers world-wide appreciate (Strizhacova, Coulter and Price 2008).Brands represent a form of culture and they relate to the way people live, think, eat and choose to wear as well, a form of seeing life and the world (Askegaard, Kjeldgaard and Arnould, 2009) . Luxury brands have become increasingly present in the Chinese consumer market and lifestyle and the role of purchasing luxury goods experiencing a luxury lifestyle has taken an unexpected importance and meaning in the Chinese social context. China has started to experience the consumer culture only after China's opening up to the market economy as a result of the economic reforms post-1979 that have given to "aspirational" consumers more freedom to develop a consumer culture partially away from political limitations but still permeated in the Chinese culture and its characteristics. Those reforms have also given rise to the private businesses and the birth of a consumer middle class, "the new rich", in China. The birth of the Chinese middle class has fuelled the emergence of a highly diversified consumer class with different purchasing attitudes (Latham, 2006) and a new way to express their taste, their motivation for purchasing (Gillette, 2000) and in particular an increasing brand awareness, mode of purchasing and conceptualisation of luxury (Rambourg, 2014; Rovai, 2016). Distinctive aspects of luxury consumer culture have started to emerge in the late years, evidencing new desires for Chinese luxury consumers with respect to luxury brands, accompanied by the entrance in the market of Chinese luxury brands aspiring the capitalise on the increasing "Chinese luxury desire" but limited by their lack of specific characteristics of authentic luxury brands - heritage, identity and prestige amongst others. As a result, this research focuses on the analysis of Chinese luxury brands presence in the local Chinese urban context; specifically, it focuses on how the Chinese urban fashion context can help to support the creation of a luxury brand value and also reinforce a luxury brand identity and image in a Chinese luxury consumer culture that does not possess a luxury heritage. An analysis of two luxury Chinese brands and a local luxury and fashion concept store has been initiated together with further evidence from the Shanghai urban context, its activities, events and cultural specifics together with the following a qualitative method and in particular Yin (1989) case study approach. A series of 15 interviews have been held in late 2016 in Shanghai with the two Chinese luxury brands creative designers, owners and staff during one month together with observation and consulting of documents. Literature review has focused on the role of individual brands that, being somehow associated with the city become a collective brand (Pasquinelli, 2014), framing "the complex network of associations, linking products, spaces, organizations and people (Bellini and Pasquinelli, 2015). Initially, an important attention has been oriented towards the geographical associations to the country-of-origin effect (Bilkey and Nes, 1982; Johansson et al, 1985) later on evidencing that a defragmentation into of smaller geographical units may be appropriate at urban level (Bellini and Pasquinelli, 2015) to highlight the relevance of the "origin" not simply in relation to a broad geographical context where the brand manufactures a product but also „the place, region or country where a brand is perceived to belong‟ (Thakor and Kohli, 1996, p. 26). The origin being not only a matter of product production but more of product conceptualisation, perception or consumption going towards the "brand product usage context" (Gerr et al, 1999). Brand product usage happen in those spatial circuits whose cities are part of and whose role may be conductive to the „local origination‟ of product brands, adding value to the birth and internationalisation of locally originated brands (Pike, 2011). Those local brands are developed from an ecosystem composed by relations and ownerships involving a multiplicity of stakeholders whose customers are an integral part (Power and Hauge, 2008). In the literature, Fashion capitals is a unique case of those ecosystems with a specific relationship between industry and spacial circuits is based on the urban context instrumental to fashion creation and also to consumption (Breward and Gilbert, 2006). The city as a part of the consumer culture and in particular as part of the brand product experience (Thrift, 2004). As a result of the literature review and the conceptualisation of fashion capitals as ecosystems conductive to the fashion creation and consumption, an exploratory study of: Which context related variables affect new Chinese luxury brands identity and value and how the China fashion capital ecosystem affects Chinese luxury consumers brand perception. The paper will show an insight of the instrumental relation of the "brandscape" Shanghai and the impact on the Chinese luxury brands value and identity acquisition with respect to Chinese consumers.

The Chinese fashion market, which has typically been dominated by luxury brands, is expanding more into mid- to low-end fashion brands including global SPA (Specialty retailer of private label apparel) brands. This change in the Chinese fashion market is due to the growth of the middle class in China. The advance of the Chinese middle class is attributed to the fact that the wages of large city workers is improving due to the development of various industries, particularly IT. Recently, the Chinese government has initiated an anti-corruption movement, which has led to the prohibition of luxury goods consumption, and so the interest of Chinese potential fashion consumers has moved to the mid-to low-end fashion products imported from developed countries. In addition, young Chinese consumers' positive attitude toward online shopping is favorable for foreign mid-to low-end brands. These changes in the tastes of Chinese fashion consumers are favorable for Korean fashion brands in particular for several reasons. First, the Korean fashion industry does not have a history of producing luxury brands, but does produce many good mid- to low-end fashion brands. In addition, Chinese tend to consider Korean fashion and food culture as more developed and preferable due to the success of the Korean wave. Lastly, it is easy for Korean practitioners to offer online shopping and customer service. The emergence of mid- to low-end fashion brands started in Korea in the late 2000s when global SPA brands entered the market. Unlike Korea's soho brands, which are based on the "No-brand" strategy, global SPA brands have actually shaken up the market by offering reasonable prices for Korean domestic brand products that are of similar quality. Since then, consumers’ willingness to pay for clothing has been reduced even further in the Korean market even though the low-growth trend in the economy has stabilized. So, it is very important to analyze and study the consumption tendency for low and mid-priced fashion brands among both Chinese and Korean consumers. The purpose of this study was to investigate how Chinese and Korean consumers perceive the personality of mid- and low-priced fashion brands and how such personality affects brand loyalty, commitment, and perceived quality. Brand personality is a vital area of research since fashion products are a type of consumer good that is consumed by users close to the body and which can express the self and the personality to others. Aaker (1997) developed a brand personality measurement scale consisting of five dimensions which many researchers have used in exploring the brand personality dimension in various industries. In the study of fashion in particular, the dimension of brand personality has been explored and its effects have been analyzed. However, most of the research has focused on luxury or high priced brands. Also, the research has not compared cultures such as China and Korea in this regard. Therefore, this study explored how Chinese and Korean consumers perceive some of the mid- to low-end priced brands originating in Europe and Korea. Also, the research examined how multiple dimensions of brand personality affected perceived quality, commitment, and brand loyalty. This study assumed that perceived quality and commitment may mediate the relationship between brand personality dimensions and loyalty. In order to conduct quantitative research, this study adopted scales from the previous literature to measure the variables used in the research model. A professional online research company conducted the survey, which was designed to be administered only to potential consumers of mid-and low-priced fashion brands who had purchased one or both European and Korean brands which were suggested in the survey. Also, gender (female), residential area (Seoul, Beijing, Shanghai), and age (21-39 years old) were controlled for. In this research, the European origin brand was the global SPA (Zara, H & M, ONLY), and there were eight Korean brands, including “Style Nanda,” which is popular in China (Refer to Table 1). The data collected on the 250 Korean and 250 Chinese participants were analyzed using statistical package SPSS 20.0. The brand personality dimension was explored using factor analysis which applied Varimax rotation based on the principle component method. As a result, even though the items included were found to be somewhat different according to the country and origin of the brand, the brand personality dimensions of the European global brands turned out to be similar and reflected “TRENDY, SINCERITY, AND COMPETENCE.” Also, Chinese consumers’ perception of brand personality in Korean brands was found to be similar to their perception of European brands. However, Korean consumers’ perception of Korean brands, which are of course their own brands, was more diverse reflecting “TRENDY, SINCERITY, COMPETENCE, AND OUTGOING.” This seems to be because Korean consumers may have had more chance to experience Korean brands either online or offline through visiting stores or being exposed to a variety of marketing communications. Thus, because there are more Korean brands than European, Korean consumers may be able to have an accurate perception of the personality of Korean brands. The conceptual model of the current research includes the relationships among multiple dimensions of brand personality in perceived quality, commitment, and loyalty. Also, the mediating effect of quality and commitment between brand personality and loyalty was examined. In order to test the hypotheses, hierarchical multiple regression using SPSS was analyzed and is described in Table 2 in relation to European brands and in Table 3 in relation to Korean brands. As expected, brand personality dimensions that were found to be a significant factor in perceived quality, commitment, and loyalty were likely to vary based on Chinese or Korean perceptions. For Korean consumers’ perception of global brands, while TRENDY was likely to be the most powerful personality dimension forming brand loyalty, its impact on loyalty seemed not to be mediated by quality but rather by commitment. Also, the influences of COMPETENCE on loyalty were mediated by quality and commitment. For Chinese consumers’ perception of global brands, the impacts of SINCERITY as well as TRENDY on loyalty were found to be mediated by quality and commitment. In addition, COMPETENCE seemed to have a rather direct impact on quality, commitment, and loyalty without a mediating effect. For local brands, Korean consumers did not seem to rely on brand personality or commitment when considering brand loyalty. Since the R2 did not improve at all with adding mediating factors such as quality and commitment, there was found to be no mediating effects in the Korean cases for local brands. In particular, while TRENDY directly impacted loyalty, OUTGOING was found to be significant only in its impact on quality. On the other hand, all three dimensions of local brand personality turned out to be significant influencers on loyalty and quality for Chinese consumers. The impact of TRENDY and COMPETENCE on loyalty seems to be mediated by quality and commitment. In this study, we found that mid- to low-end fashion brands seemed to reflect valid brand personality according to the brand’s origin (global vs. local) as well as consumers’ culture (Chinese vs. Korean). Also, the effect of brand personality dimension was different. This study contributes to the study of brand personality and the Chinese fashion market by comparing a conceptual model of the consumption behavior of Chinese and Korean consumers in relation to mid and low-priced fashion brands and brand awareness formation. In particular, the research revealed differences between Chinese and Korean consumers, suggesting different approaches for Korean fashion practitioners who are planning on entering China, which has not only a similar market to that of Korea but also one that is familiar to Korean practitioners.

This research tends to answer the following question: How do multinational corporations transmit their service brand to the local employees of the host country? Service brand has been discussed from the point of internal marketing, which ensures that employees can demonstrate the authentic value of the service brand in their attitudes and behaviors. However, when a corporation attempts to transmit the service brand across borders, there needs to be a balance between globalization and localization. This research intends to build a systematic internal marketing mechanism from the viewpoint of internal marketing, international service branding and subsidiary brand-specific transformational leadership. This study uses both qualitative and quantitative methods to conduct an in-depth case study and questionnaire survey. This research provides the following theoretical and managerial contributions. Firstly, it proposes a systematic internal marketing mechanism to transmit the service brand across international borders. This includes a brand-specific leadership with cultural sensitivity, a brand norm positively led by the leader and an organizational learning system, which influences the practice of the brand norms. Secondly, in order to transmit the international service brand successfully, this paper argues that subsidiaries’ leaders should have cultural sensitivity and demonstrate a brand-specific transformational leadership style. Thirdly, the paper finds and verifies that brand-specific transformational leadership has a positive effect on the brand norms and organizational learning, which in turn affect employee brand behavior and attitude toward the company’s core brand value. Managerially, the systematic internal marketing mechanism developed by this research can enlighten those service companies who intend to expand their international scope and ascertain their service brand value is transmitted accurately and executed locally.

Via an exploratory survey we decoded the interplay of the multiple points of attachment leading the consumer to the soccer field. Results indicate that local soccer player brands’ conceptual property which lies with the shared bond of team identification and is leveraged reciprocally, adds both to the human and the organizational brand equity.