UK Consumers’ Attitudes towards Imports: The Measurement of National Stereotype Image

Abstract

The importance of variables such as price, promotional message, packaging and distribution policy in influencing consumer perceptions and attitudes towards products is well established. However, the additional information input of "Made in . . ." (i.e., the product's country of origin) has attracted little research attention in the United Kingdom, a fact which, in view of our changing status within the European community and the ensuing re-orientations in our international trade, suggests a fruitful course of enquiry for UK marketers faced with intense competition from imports. Similarly, the "Made in ..." concept has usefulness for exporters wishing to determine and exploit the stereotyped images ascribed to their country within specific foreign markets. These generalised images, created by variables such as representative products, economic and political maturity, historical events and relationships, traditions, industrialisation and the degree of technological virtuosity, will have effects upon consumer attitudes additional to those emanating from the significative elements of products. For example, Gaedeke [1] found that attitudes towards a specific product or brand could be substantially changed, both favourably and unfavourably, when the country of origin of the product/brand was revealed to the consumer.In a sense countries have images too, perhaps not so far removed from the marketers' concept of "brand image". National reputations for technological sophistication, reliability, design and value will naturally vary from country to country but, more importantly in the context of this study, consumers may be expected to generalise their attitudes and opinions across wide ranges of products from any given country. The aim of this particular study is to reveal these current stereotyped attitudes of UK consumers towards domestic products and the product offerings from a selection of foreign countries highly active in the UK domestic market.

Key Factors Determining the Ethnocentric Tendencies of Consumers in Serbia

“…Other researchers who were involved in the research of consumer ethnocentrism confirmed that male consumers tended to be less ethnocentric compared to women (Balabanis et al, 2001;Good & Huddleston, 1995;Sharma et al, 1995). Also there is a number of studies where no statistically significant effect of gender differences has been found (Caruana, 1996) and, again, some other studies show that men are more ethnocentric than women (Bannister & Saunders, 1978). The research of this phenomenon in Serbia in 2015 showed that men were more ethnocentric (Marinkovic et al, 2011, Gasevic et al, 2015, Grubor & Đokic, 2015.…”

Country Branding and its effect on the consumer in the global market

“…The consumers' perception of a product significantly changes (for the better and for the worse) when they are told the country-of-origin of the product (Bannister and Saunders 1978). If the COO can influence consumers' perception of a product or service, then improving the image portrayed through the COO should be positioned to increase the number of foreign consumers.…”

Are Consumers Willing to Pay More for a “Made in” Product? An Empirical Investigation on “Made in Italy”

“…Several empirical investigations differ in industrialized countries and developing countries. In particular, different perceptions of manufactured products occurred in developed and developing countries [13,29,30]. There are indeed many preconceptions observed in developing countries [8,20,23].…”

“…According to Baker and Ballington [8], De Nisco [9], De Luca and Pegan [10], Bursi et al [11], the COO effect influences the consumer's decision-making process. Several studies have been proposed with this purpose for general products [12][13][14], for the commodity class of products [15], for specific products [16][17][18], and for particular brands [19,20]. The COO effect is dominant when the consumer associates the manufactured goods with the tradition of production [21,22].…”