• Journal of Distribution Science
• /
• v.9 no.3
• /
• pp.47-54
• /
• 2011

This paper presents exploratory research on consumer awareness and attitudesabout organic food, for which consumer demand continues to increase the paper also assesses consumers' organic food distribution channel preferences. By conducting a literature review, a case study has been carried out in order to glean customer behavior, market condition and typesof distribution channels, and development of specialty stores for organic foods. The early research indicates that consumer awareness and customer attitudes toward organic food are mostly positive however, organic food's high price, as well as a lack of organic food stores, cause a negative effect on consumers' purchase intention. Secondly, the U.S. organic food retail channel consists of such mainstream supermarket/grocery stores and leading natural and organic food supermarket chains as Whole Foods, Trader Joe's, and Sunflower Farmers Market. For the current retail distribution of organic food in Korea, off-line stores are composed of direct management stores and franchise chains. Most of the organic food retail distribution operates through the Internet shopping mall, and are commonly located at retail distribution centers as multi-channel, shop-in-shop stores. Moreover, unlike in the U.S., association and consumers' cooperatives (Co-Ops), and such other member-direct retail stores as Hansallim, iCOOP, Nature Dream,and online shopping malls, are all active in Korea. Thirdly, as a result of an analysis of the present state of the organic food retail channel, as well as building a case for organic food specialty stores, the distinctive featuresand rapid growth of such unique organic food stores as Whole Foods Market, or Trader Joe's successful downsizing strategies, as well as Sunflower Farmers Market low-price approach, show steady industry growth. Moreover, as a result of a case studyof such domestic representative organic food specialty stores as "Olga" and "Chorokmaeul," a similar management style to the United States' "Whole Foods Market" and "Trader Joe's," respectively, can be seen. Similar to the U.S. market, Korean organic food markets should also implement active retail distribution opportunities, allowing consumers to select from various diverse and differentiated choices. In order to accomplish this goal, it is necessary to prepare such measures as sustaining reasonable prices, securing various suppliers for unique products,and improving consumer trust through advertisement strategies that are suitable for each company's branding processes.

• Journal of Korean Society of Forest Science
• /
• v.108 no.1
• /
• pp.116-126
• /
• 2019

The production volume and amount of non-timber forest products in Korea has been on the increase for the past five years. In particular, the production amount of wild vegetables (edible mountain plants) is approximately KRW 400 billion as of 2017, accounting for 14 % of the total production amount of non-timber forest products. Among wild vegetables, especially the production volumes and amounts of bracken, saw-wort (Saussurea), and thistle have grown steadily. Nevertheless, severe price competition with cheap imports and little changes in the pattern of wild vegetable consumption may negatively affect the prices of domestic wild vegetables. This, in turn, can decrease the overall consumption of wild vegetables. Recently, however, consumers have preferred healthy food with increases in their income and interest in health. Therefore, now is a crucial time for the wild vegetable market. Accordingly, this study analyzed consumers' purchase and consumption behavior related to wild vegetables through a consumer survey to contribute to establishing various strategies and policies for promoting the consumption of these vegetables. Also, this study identified consumers' awareness and intention regarding wild vegetables by analyzing social big data. Different from previous studies, this study investigated consumers' awareness and intention by analyzing SNS social big data, as well as conducting a survey. The results of the study will help prioritize strategies and policies for boosting the consumption of wild vegetables.

• Asia-Pacific Journal of Business Venturing and Entrepreneurship
• /
• v.16 no.1
• /
• pp.147-159
• /
• 2021

After the 2020 Corona 19 pandemic, consumers' online consumption is increasing rapidly, and non-store online retail channels are showing high growth. In particular, social media is gaining its status as a social media market where direct transactions take place in the means of promoting companies' brands and products. In this study, changes in consumer behavior after the Corona 19 pandemic are different in choosing online shopping media such as existing online shopping malls and SNS markets that can be classified into open social media and closed social media when purchasing agri-food online. We tried to find out what type of product is preferred in the selection of agri-food products. For this study, demographic characteristics of consumers, perceived risk of consumers, and dietary lifestyle were set as independent variables to investigate the effect on online shopping media type and product selection. The summary of the empirical analysis results is as follows. When consumers purchase agri-food online, there are significant differences in demographic characteristics, consumer perception risks, and detailed factors of dietary lifestyle in selecting shopping channels such as online shopping malls, open social media, and closed social media. Appeared to be. The consumers who choose the open SNS market are higher in men than in women, with lower household income, and higher in consumers seeking health and taste. Consumers who choose the closed SNS market were analyzed as consumers who live in rural areas and have a high degree of risk perception for delivery. Consumers who choose existing online shopping malls have high educational background, high personal income, and high consumers seeking taste and economy. Through this study, we tried to provide practical assistance by providing a basis for judgment to farmers who have difficulty in selecting an online shopping medium suitable for their product characteristics. As a shopping channel for agri-food, social media is not a simple promotional channel, but a direct transaction. It can be differentiated from existing studies in that it is approached as a market that arises.

• Asia Marketing Journal
• /
• v.14 no.2
• /
• pp.157-176
• /
• 2012

Brand switching data frequently used in market structure analysis is adequate to analyze non- durable goods, because it can capture competition between specific two brands. But brand switching data sometimes can not be used to analyze goods like automobiles having long term duration because one of main assumptions that consumer preference toward brand attributes is not changed against time can be violated. Therefore a new type of data which can precisely capture competition among durable goods is needed. Another problem of using brand switching data collected from actual purchase behavior is short of explanation why consumers consider different set of brands. Considering above problems, main purpose of this study is to analyze market structure for durable goods with consideration set. The author uses exploratory approach and latent class clustering to identify market structure based on heterogeneous consideration set among consumers. Then the relationship between some factors and consideration set formation is analyzed. Some benefits and two demographic variables - age and income - are selected as factors based on consumer behavior theory. The author analyzed USA automotive market with top 11 brands using exploratory approach and latent class clustering. 2,500 respondents are randomly selected from the total sample and used for analysis. Six models concerning market structure are established to test. Model 1 means non-structured market and model 6 means market structure composed of six sub-markets. It is exploratory approach because any hypothetical market structure is not defined. The result showed that model 1 is insufficient to fit data. It implies that USA automotive market is a structured market. Model 3 with three market structures is significant and identified as the optimal market structure in USA automotive market. Three sub markets are named as USA brands, Asian Brands, and European Brands. And it implies that country of origin effect may exist in USA automotive market. Comparison between modal classification by derived market structures and probabilistic classification by research model was conducted to test how model 3 can correctly classify respondents. The model classify 97% of respondents exactly. The result of this study is different from those of previous research. Previous research used confirmatory approach. Car type and price were chosen as criteria for market structuring and car type-price structure was revealed as the optimal structure for USA automotive market. But this research used exploratory approach without hypothetical market structures. It is not concluded yet which approach is superior. For confirmatory approach, hypothetical market structures should be established exhaustively, because the optimal market structure is selected among hypothetical structures. On the other hand, exploratory approach has a potential problem that validity for derived optimal market structure is somewhat difficult to verify. There also exist market boundary difference between this research and previous research. While previous research analyzed seven car brands, this research analyzed eleven car brands. Both researches seemed to represent entire car market, because cumulative market shares for analyzed brands exceeds 50%. But market boundary difference might affect the different results. Though both researches showed different results, it is obvious that country of origin effect among brands should be considered as important criteria to analyze USA automotive market structure. This research tried to explain heterogeneity of consideration sets among consumers using benefits and two demographic factors, sex and income. Benefit works as a key variable for consumer decision process, and also works as an important criterion in market segmentation. Three factors - trust/safety, image/fun to drive, and economy - are identified among nine benefit related measure. Then the relationship between market structures and independent variables is analyzed using multinomial regression. Independent variables are three benefit factors and two demographic factors. The result showed that all independent variables can be used to explain why there exist different market structures in USA automotive market. For example, a male consumer who perceives all benefits important and has lower income tends to consider domestic brands more than European brands. And the result also showed benefits, sex, and income have an effect to consideration set formation. Though it is generally perceived that a consumer who has higher income is likely to purchase a high priced car, it is notable that American consumers perceived benefits of domestic brands much positive regardless of income. Male consumers especially showed higher loyalty for domestic brands. Managerial implications of this research are as follow. Though implication may be confined to the USA automotive market, the effect of sex on automotive buying behavior should be analyzed. The automotive market is traditionally conceived as male consumers oriented market. But the proportion of female consumers has grown over the years in the automotive market. It is natural outcome that Volvo and Hyundai motors recently developed new cars which are targeted for women market. Secondly, the model used in this research can be applied easier than that of previous researches. Exploratory approach has many advantages except difficulty to apply for practice, because it tends to accompany with complicated model and to require various types of data. The data needed for the model in this research are a few items such as purchased brands, consideration set, some benefits, and some demographic factors and easy to collect from consumers.

• The Journal of Information Systems
• /
• v.24 no.2
• /
• pp.139-162
• /
• 2015

Purpose This study reviews technology acceptance research in the information system area and consumer behavior research in the marketing area, sets characteristics of convergence products, personality of consumers and communication channels as main concepts and demonstrates their effects on 'relative level of attraction' and 'intent to adoption. Design/methodology/approach The survey was conducted against potential consumers who have the intent to purchase electric communication media products that provides a variety of functions and service, such as a smart TV, a tablet PC and a smart watch. All items were adapted from previous literature and revised as appropriate the purpose of this study and measured on a 7-point Likert scale with answer choices ranging from "strongly disagree" (1) to (7) "strongly agree." Totally, 300 respondents participated in the survey. Out of the 276 respondents, incomplete or invalid 24 were discarded. With them, SPSS 18.0 and AMOS 20.0 for structural equation modeling were used for the analysis. Findings Main findings are as followed;- First, it is found that 'interrelationship of technology' and 'functional diversification' of convergence products has positive effects on relative level of attraction. Second, perceived behavior control has significant effects on the intent to adoption convergence products. Third, communication through mass media has positive effects on making potential consumers feel attraction about products while there is no relationship with the intent to a. On the other hands, it is demonstrated that there is no relationship influential relationship between communication through interpersonal channels and relative level of attraction while communication through interpersonal channels has significant effects on the intent to adoption.

• The Journal of the Korea Contents Association
• /
• v.9 no.8
• /
• pp.255-271
• /
• 2009

Since consumers have difficulty in acquiring information related to products in online, they are apt to use WOM(word-of-mouth). It seems to be more popular and acceptable methods to acquire information about products sold in online. In other words, consumers who visit the Internet shopping-mall can not make a purchase-decision immediately because they have no sufficient knowledge about products. To solve this problem, consumers make use of the service called "online review". The objective of this study is to verify how these reviews can influence attitude toward the message, product and several buying behaviors in the online. In particular, this study focus on the message's sidedness(positive or negative) and objectivity(objective or subjective), because it is expected that consumers are likely to behave differently according to the characteristics of online reviews. Thus, to measure consumer's attitude and buying behavior, this study was examined by 4 types of messages. The results of this study are as follows: First, in the positive-objective message, the message attitude has a stronger effect on purchase intention than other outcomes. Second, in the positive-subjective message, the message attitude has a stronger effect on revisiting intention than others. Third, in the negative-objective message, the message attitude has a stronger effect on purchase intention than others. Hence, it is said that online shopping-mall managers need to understand the effects of multidimensional online review.

• Journal of Digital Convergence
• /
• v.16 no.12
• /
• pp.257-266
• /
• 2018

The implication of this study is that the development and market participation of the next generation eco - friendly vehicles is accelerating, and consumers 'interest is increasing. Also, the product attributes of environment - friendly vehicles and the government's policy support for the next generation eco - friendly vehicles. The purpose of this study is to investigate the effect of purchasing behavior of eco-friendly vehicles on the product attributes of eco-friendly vehicles. Economic, image, functionality, and service convenience have positive effects on consumers' purchase intention. As a result of examining the moderating effect of the government support policy between the product attributes of environment - friendly vehicles and the purchase intentions of environment - friendly vehicles, the government or municipal government has no control effect such as vehicle price subsidy, vehicle tax subsidy, Carbon tax support to prevent emissions was found to have a moderating effect of supporting 10,000 won per ton, even if 5,000 won per ton was supported. This suggests that consumers who prefer to buy eco-friendly vehicles are more likely to have environmental factors.

• Management & Information Systems Review
• /
• v.38 no.1
• /
• pp.169-180
• /
• 2019

The results of the present study on corporate social responsibility activities have different results for each researcher. This is considered to be the influence of the moderated variables depending on the relations among the variables. The purpose of this study is to propose anti-corporate emotion as a variable to moderate the relationship between social responsibility activities and outcome variables and to investigate its influence. The results and implications are as follows. Ethical responsibility activities and discretionary responsibility activities had effects on corporate attitude and corporate attitude affects consumers' purchase intention. This is consistent with many previous studies, which means that it is necessary to create a positive psychology for a firm or product in order to induce consumer behavior. In addition, in the group with high anti-corporate emotions, the effect is not significant even if the company has a lot of discretionary activities, but if the ethical responsibility is done, the negative attitude toward the company can be alleviated even if the anti- corporate emotion is high. This explains why many companies now have social contribution activities as an alternative to reduce the corporate crisis, but the effect is insufficient. Therefore, companies that want to carry out social responsibility activities should be interested first in the ethical management or ethical responsibility activities of companies.

• Journal of the Korea Convergence Society
• /
• v.6 no.6
• /
• pp.221-229
• /
• 2015

This study aims to identify and analyze the main factors that determine the properties and buying behavior in the premium bottled select and analyze the degree of impact on the relevant variables are premium water demand. When applied to the truncated negative binomial model to derive the study results: The results of estimating the variables that affect the demand for premium mineral water are as follows. Premium bottled water demand of this group my purchases with a choice between buying behavior variables are significantly higher than the relative population. To also do a good ingredient water, it appeared to be on a statistically significant positive effect on the demand for the more groups you purchase a premium bottled water for the purpose of receiving special feeling, just buy purpose is called to drinking water does not significantly affect to be analyzed. Among demographic characteristics it showed that demand for premium bottled water purchases are significantly higher in women than in men, professional / clerical job, such as the military, college graduates were more consumer research as significant in comparison to the relative population. Taste and package design factors of premium bottled mineral water among the select attribute factors are having a significant positive impact on the purchasing demand, local conditions and cost factors have been estimated to be insignificant.

• Journal of the Korea Academia-Industrial cooperation Society
• /
• v.17 no.3
• /
• pp.629-637
• /
• 2016

This study examined the purchasing behavior and satisfaction of people with convenience store PB foods. The factors affecting the purchasing behavior and the overall satisfaction with the convenience store PB foods were examined. This study first found that the purchasing motivation of PB foods is the cheaper price than NB foods. Second, age is a statistically effective variable for the visit frequency at the convenience store and gender and age are effective variables for the purchase frequency of PB foods. Third, there is a statistically positive correlation of convenience store brand preference with the PB food brand preference for 6 food categories. Next, in terms of the attribute-level satisfaction, the most satisfied areas are diverse food groups and diverse food taste and the least satisfied areas is price. This is followed by taste and design/packaging influence overall satisfaction. From this analysis, the following suggestions were drawn. First, because consumers are likely to be matched convenience store brand preference and PB food brand preference, advertising is necessary to ensure that the consumers continue to visit the convenience store. Second, product improvement by increasing the quality should be designed to motivate the major consumer group of people in their 20s and 30s. Finally, to boost PB food satisfaction, the industry should improve the taste and design/packaging.