A Study on the Determinants of Global Sourcing Strategies in Korean Apparel Industry

한국의류산업의 범세계적 조달전략 결정요인에 관한 연구

Global sourcing strategy is the one that apparel firms adopt in order to improve efficiency. Souring statesgies are not limited to the decision of sourcing country or vertical integration of sewing process Sourcing strategies include all the ecision of marketing process from the acquisition of fabric to distribution of products. The present study aims to analyze the soucing strategies of Korea apparel industry in global perspectives by applying transaction cost approach and aims to provide the implications for the future. The results are as follows ; (1) sourcing strategies in the dimension of domestic versus offshore soucing are determined by the experience in foreign business and the degree of fashionability of the product. (2) Firms tend to increase affshore soucing as they accumulate the experience in foreign business because they can decrease transaction costs as the perceived risks decrease (3) Also firms tend to source their products in foreign countries when the products are more fashionable. Brand loyalty of the product is a additional factor that increases the proportion of domestic sourcing. (4) Degree of vertical integration of sourcing is determined by the fashionability brand loyalty and the experience in foreign business. That is firms decrease the transaction costs by avoiding the investment to short life fashion products. However firms increase the control over the high reputation product by in house production. As the apparel firms tend to more marketing oriented and the national boundaries of business envrionment becomes permeable more efficient global sourcing strategies should be stablished, Besides the production costs nonproduction costs should be equallly considered in order to analyze the total costs.