Country of Maunfacture Effects in Consumer Choice: Made-in Korea vs Made-in Malaysia

Abstract

The purpose of this study was to examine Korean consumers' views about brand familiarity, ethnocentrism, brand attitudes, product evaluation, product attitudes and purchase intention of bi-national and uni-national products. Country of origin (COO) and country of manufacture (COM) were of particular interest. Structural Equation Modeling (SEM) was used to estimate a conceptual model.The results indicated that brand familiarity and brand attitudes influenced the evaluation of a domestically-branded product's evaluation when the product was manufactured in Korea (uni-national). Only brand attitudes, however, influenced a domestically-branded product's evaluation when it was manufactured in Malaysia (bi-national). Ethnocentrism was positively related to consumers' product attitudes and purchase intention of uni-national products. However, ethnocentrism does not show any significant relationship with consumers' product attitudes and purchase intention of a domestically-branded bi-national product. Finally, product evaluation was found to affect product attitudes, and product attitudes influenced purchase intention of bi-and uni-national products.