Competitive brand‐choice and store‐choice among Japanese consumers
| Date | 01 December 1998 |
| Pages | 481-494 |
| Published date | 01 December 1998 |
| DOI | https://doi.org/10.1108/10610429810244657 |
| Author | Kau Ah Keng,Mark Uncles,Andrew Ehrenberg,Neil Barnard |
| Subject Matter | Marketing |
JOURNAL OF PRODUCT & BRAND MANAGEMENT, VOL. 7 NO. 6 1998, pp. 481-494 © MCB UNIVERSITY PRESS, 1061-0421 481
Introduction
In this paper we analyze brand loyalty for packaged goods in Japan and draw
comparisons with brand loyalty in Western industrialized countries such as
the UK and the USA.
There are of course marked cultural differences between Japan and the West
in consumer habits, motivations, needs and lifestyles. Thus it is often said
that the Japanese tend to be indirect and formal rather than direct and
relaxed. Firms are thought of as customer-oriented rather than control-
oriented, and the concern is with effectiveness rather than with efficiency.
The marketing concept is said to be so pervasive that there are no marketing
departments. On the other hand, historically the distribution system has been
so cumbersome that truly effective marketing – in a modern sense – has been
inhibited.
These differences have been widely commented on in the marketing
literature. Indeed, the norm has been to stress differences in all aspects of
brand management – production, new product development, time to market,
distribution, advertising, consumer adoption, loyalty, brand associations and
meanings in the minds of consumers, etc. (Usunier, 1996). Not least is the
interest with Japanese corporate brands – names such as Toyota, Nissan,
Toshiba, Kao – and what sets them apart from their counterparts in the West
(Hamel and Prahalad, 1994; Macrae, 1996; Tanaka, 1993).
Studies which explicitly compare marketing between the West and Japan
have been growing in number. Many of these studies have a focus on new
product development (Song and Parry, 1997) and elements of the marketing
mix, such as advertising (Lin and Salwen 1995; Mueller, 1992). Others have
looked at traditional elements of consumer behavior and how these impact
on brand choice and repeat buying – particularly relevant in the present
context is the work by Muramatsu (1991) and Kau et al. (1987). The
evidence in these studies appears to be mixed. Some aspects of consumer
behavior really do differ (doormats are still difficult to sell in Japan because
Competitive brand-choice and
store-choice among Japanese
consumers
Kau Ah Keng
Associate Professor, Department of Marketing, Faculty of Business
Administration, National University of Singapore, Singapore
Mark Uncles
Professor of Marketing, University of New South Wales, Sydney,
Australia
Andrew Ehrenberg
Professor of Marketing, South Bank Business School, South Bank
University, London, UK
Neil Barnard
Research Fellow, South Bank Business School, South Bank University,
London, UK
We thank the Marketing Intelligence Corporation for the provision of consumer
panel data. The paper was processed by Michelle A. Morganosky, Editor, and had
the benefit of input from two anonymous referees.
Cultural differences
Studies compare
marketing
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