• The Korean Journal of Franchise Management
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• v.12 no.3
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• pp.7-19
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• 2021

Purpose: The hotel industry needs a leader who can actively demonstrate leadership to respond to and accept changes in the organization in a highly competitive and fast-changing environment. Therefore, the role of leaders who instill clear vision and goals of the organization in their members, listen to their opinions, and empathize is paramount. Leaders should encourage successful organizational activities based on active participation by employees and create the best environment for working with a sense of mission and responsibility. This study aims to identify the relationship between empathy leadership and job engagement as a result variable of team cohesion in the hotel culinary department and conduct empirical studies on the role of empathy leadership and job engagement. Research design, data, and methodology: The data were collected from employees who work in culinary department at a five-star franchise hotel located in the Seoul metropolitan area. Because it is difficult to conduct a survey through face-to-face contact with employees due to the COVID-19 pandemic, the online survey was conducted from February 1 to February 28, 2020. A total of 330 questionnaires through online were distributed and 268 employees completed the survey, yielding a response rate of 81%. Of the 268 returned responses, 27 responses were not usable due to missing information. Thus, a total of 241 responses were used for analysis. Results: The study results are as follows. First, it has been shown that the empathy leadership of culinary department in hotel companies has a significant positive impact on the job engagement. Second, it has been shown that job engagement has a significant positive effect on members' team cohesiveness. Third, empathy leadership of hotel companies' culinary department has a significant positive impact on members' team cohesiveness. Fourth, job engagement has a significant positive (+) mediating effect in the relationship between empathy leadership and team cohesiveness in culinary department. Conclusion: This study supports the theory that an emotional and empathic leader's behavior or ability can change the effectiveness or atmosphere of a rapidly changing hotel culinary team organization by presenting a research model on the effect of empathic leadership on job engagement and team cohesiveness. And hotel chefs should be more aware of the importance of empathic leadership and make them a human resource of the organization through formal and informal communication with culinary employees.

• Journal of Global Scholars of Marketing Science
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• v.18 no.3
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• pp.1-25
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• 2008

Ⅰ. Introduction Retailers in the 21st century are being told that future retailers are those who can execute seamless multi-channel access. The reason is that retailers should be where shoppers want them, when they want them anytime, anywhere and in multiple formats. Multi-channel access is considered one of the top 10 trends of all business in the next decade (Patricia T. Warrington, et al., 2007) And most firms use both direct and indirect channels in their markets. Given this trend, we need to evaluate a channel equity more systematically than before as this issue is expected to get more attention to consumers as well as to brand managers. Consumers are becoming very much confused concerning the choice of place where they shop for durable goods as there are at least 6-7 retail options. On the other hand, manufacturers have to deal with category killers, their dealers network, Internet shopping malls, and other avenue of distribution channels and they hope their retail channel behave like extensions of their own companies. They would like their products to be foremost in the retailer's mind-the first to be proposed and effectively communicated to potential customers. To enable this hope to come reality, they should know each channel's advantages and disadvantages from consumer perspectives. In addition, customer satisfaction is the key determinant of retail customer loyalty. However, there are only a few researches regarding the effects of shopping satisfaction and perceptions on consumers' channel choices and channels. The purpose of this study was to assess Korean consumers' channel choice and satisfaction towards channels they prefer to use in the case of electronic goods shopping. Korean electronic goods retail market is one of good example of multi-channel shopping environments. As the Korea retail market has been undergoing significant structural changes since it had opened to global retailers in 1996, new formats such as hypermarkets, Internet shopping malls and category killers have arrived for the last decade. Korean electronic goods shoppers have seven major channels : (1)category killers (2) hypermarket (3) manufacturer dealer shop (4) Internet shopping malls (5) department store (6) TV home-shopping (7) speciality shopping arcade. Korean retail sector has been modernized with amazing speed for the last decade. Overall summary of major retail channels is as follows: Hypermarket has been number 1 retailer type in sales volume from 2003 ; non-store retailing has been number 2 from 2007 ; department store is now number 3 ; small scale category killers are growing rapidly in the area of electronics and office products in particular. We try to evaluate each channel's equity using a consumer survey. The survey was done by telephone interview with 1000 housewife who lives nationwide. Sampling was done according to 2005 national census and average interview time was 10 to 15 minutes. Ⅱ. Research Summary We have found that seven major retail channels compete with each other within Korean consumers' minds in terms of price and service. Each channel seem to have its unique selling points. Department stores were perceived as the best electronic goods shopping destinations due to after service. Internet shopping malls were perceived as the convenient channel owing to price checking. Category killers and hypermarkets were more attractive in both price merits and location conveniences. On the other hand, manufacturers dealer networks were pulling customers mainly by location and after service. Category killers and hypermarkets were most beloved retail channel for Korean consumers. However category killers compete mainly with department stores and shopping arcades while hypermarkets tend to compete with Internet and TV home shopping channels. Regarding channel satisfaction, the top 3 channels were service-driven retailers: department stores (4.27); dealer shop (4.21); and Internet shopping malls (4.21). Speciality shopping arcade(3.98) were the least satisfied channels among Korean consumers. Ⅲ. Implications We try to identify the whole picture of multi-channel retail shopping environments and its implications in the context of Korean electronic goods. From manufacturers' perspectives, multi-channel may cause channel conflicts. Furthermore, inter-channel competition draws much more attention as hypermarkets and category killers have grown rapidly in recent years. At the same time, from consumers' perspectives, 'buy where' is becoming an important buying decision as it would decide the level of shopping satisfaction. We need to develop the concept of 'channel equity' to manage multi-channel distribution effectively. Firms should measure and monitor their prime channel equity in regular basis to maximize their channel potentials. Prototype channel equity positioning map has been developed as follows. We expect more studies to develop the concept of 'channel equity' in the future.

• Korean journal of food and cookery science
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• v.24 no.6
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• pp.771-779
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• 2008

The purpose of the study was assessing Kochujang sauces(BBQ & Chicken) using a Home Use Test(HUT) focused on England food consumer. To achieve of the purpose, 58 England food consumers were selected by CCFRA's customer database. The qualification of the sample was responsible for the households' main grocery shopping, cooking Oriental/ Far Eastern cuisines at home, enjoying hot/spicy chilli based food and would be willing to buy hot chilli based Oriental sauce. 3 times of HUT were accomplished. The test was continued during 3 weeks, and each test was continued during one week. To check the sensory evaluation results on these sauces, 9 point hedonic scale and JAR(Just About Right) were used. The frequency analysis was adopted for the study. The results of a study were as followed. The overall satisfaction(upper 7point) on BBQ sauce was 60%, and the chicken sauce was 55.1%. The sweetness, hot taste, and BBQ aroma were suitable as a upper 40% using JAR scale. On purchase intention, BBQ & Chicken was slightly increased. These sauces were proper lunch & Dinner time. Also, good for dip, stir fry, and marinade. The result of put to use the sauces on food material as followed. BBQ sauce was proper Chicken(45.5%), vegetable(29.9%), and turkey(19%) in the order named. In case of the chicken sauce was ordered chicken(46.2%), vegetable(27.5%), beef(17.5%).

• Journal of The Korea Institute of Healthcare Architecture
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• v.21 no.4
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• pp.27-36
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• 2015

Purpose: Of late, the focus of service design is moving toward emphasizing customer satisfaction and taking users' experience more seriously. In addition to the change in perspective in service design, scholars in this area are paying more attention to service design methodology and process, as well as its theory and real-world case studies. In the case of medical space, there have been few studies in attempting to apply service design methods useful for deriving user-focused results. The author of this paper believes, however, case study-oriented approaches are more needed in this area rather than ones focusing on theoretical aspects. The author hopes thereby to expand the horizon to practical application of spatial design beyond service design methodology. Methods: In order to incorporate the strengths of service design methodology that can reflect a variety of user opinions, this study will introduce diverse tools in the framework of double diamond process. In addition, it will present field cases that successfully brought about best results in medical space design. It will end with summarizing the ideal process of medical space design which is reasonable and comprehensive. Results: Medical service encompasses preventive medicine as well as treatment of existing medical conditions. A study in establishing the platform of medical service design consists of a wide range of trend research, followed by the summary of two-matrix design classification based on results of the trend research. The draft of design process is divided into five stages composed of basic tools for establishing spatial flow lines created by matching service design tools with each stage of space design processes. In all this, most important elements to consider are communication and empathy. When service design is actually applied to space design, one can see that output has reflected the users' needs very well. The service design process for user-oriented medical space can thus be established by interactions on the final outcome and feedback on the results. Implications: One can see that the service design with the hospital at its center produces the result that encompasses the user's needs best. If the user-focused service design process for medical space can be extended to other space designs, the author believes that it would enhance the level of satisfaction for users and minimize trials and errors.

• Journal of the Korea Furniture Society
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• v.27 no.3
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• pp.237-245
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• 2016

Single households currently account for 26.5% of all households and their number is expected to continue to rise, reaching 34.5% by 2035. An analysis of the consumption trends and needs of single households shows that they are rising as a new consumer group with a focus on investment on the individual and favouring: small but high-tech products: efficient use of limited resources: safety and peace of mind: self-improvement and leisure. Products which meet such demands are having an impact on the growth of home-furnishing market. An analysis of companies in Korea's home-furnishing market, with examples like the lifestyle company IKEA, shows a variety of brands such as SPA brand, furniture specialist, distributor and character products. And yet most are OEM products which lack differentiated product lines and compete with similar display and distribution structure. We needs the Single household consumption tendency of home-furnishing market and differentiation strategy through product analysis. In order to increase the value of companies in the home-furnishing market, in addition to differentiated design, product competitiveness must aspire to higher customer satisfaction with easy assembly, innovation in logistics, innovative sales methods such as virtual-reality simulation for products and space, individually-tailored furniture for the needs of single household and products which combine smart technology. For home-grown home-furnishing brands to have competitiveness, they must leverage on the strengths of the industry, offering differentiated and competitive products in a wider range of areas with convergence functions as well as differentiation in consumer interface and application of advancing technology; in-depth product research is called for.

• Journal of Nutrition and Health
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• v.53 no.4
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• pp.431-444
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• 2020

Purpose: The purposes of this study were to understand the health interest of consumers in the United States and Japan and thus understand the motivation of food choices, in order to provide basic data on the country's strategy based on healthy and correct food choices in the future. Methods: A customer survey was conducted in 2019 from October 18 to 31, and it targeted 115 American and 120 Japanese local consumers between the ages of 20- to 64-years-old. Eight questions were formed using General Health Interest. Based on food choice motivation, 27 questions were reconstructed and asked about demographic information. All data were analyzed by SPSS Statistics (ver. 25). Results: Health consciousness was categorized into 2 types: nutrition-seeking type and preference-seeking type. Based on these 2 factors, customers were grouped into 3 clusters: healthy dietary life-seeking group, nutrition balance-seeking group and health indifference group. Food choice motivation was categorized into 4 types: health, efficiency, value, and mood. All 3 groups showed a high tendency for efficiency in common. The results show that consumers want higher satisfaction with their time and money invested in food consumption. It is believed that the focus and investment of market segmentation strategy should be focused on product development, especially for American and Japanese consumers who are interested in health. Conclusion: The results of this study reflect consumer needs that can assist in the selection of healthy and correct foods in the future.