NATIONALISM ROLE ON LOCAL BRANDS PREFERENCE: EVIDENCES FROM TURKEY CLOTHES MARKET

Abstract

Consumers decide which brands they should choose, and which brands they should forget every day. In a globalized marketplace, choices between worldwide and local brands are affected by numbers of factors. Local brands link the domestic economy with the well-being of individuals. For this reason, it could be useful from a financial point of perspective to create a shared identity among the people of a nation. The main purpose of this study is to investigate the role of nationalism on purchasing process, the relationships of culture and society with the brands, and their impact on consumer preferences for local brands in apparel sector. In accordance with this purpose, a research was carried out on Turkish citizens in Istanbul. In this research, survey method is used, and the data collected are analyzed through SPSS program. This study contains six variables which are: national identity, tradition and personal cultural orientation, local brand bias, local brands social value, brand relevance in the clothes market, and local brand loyalty. As a result of the analyzes carried out within the scope of this research, it was concluded that national identity has a strong relationship with local brand loyalty. So if the local brands pay more attention to promote the national identity and lead consumers to have more linkage with self-national identity, that can impact the loyalty to the local brands and raise the preference and sales of local brands. The concept of nationalism can include many variables. In this study, some of them were discussed and variables such as traditional and personal culture orientation, brand social value, and of course national identity were analyzed. The findings of the study revealed that all variables had a strong relationship with local brand loyalty in terms of the population this research is conducted on. Therefore, it can be stated that the stronger the consumers' feelings about these variables, the more they become loyal to local brands. This research proves that the main factor impacting consumer bias toward local brands is quality and price ratio. This inference indicates that perceived price and how the price is associated with the quality is the most important factor which the consumer care about while evaluating a local brand