• Asia Marketing Journal
• /
• v.14 no.2
• /
• pp.209-237
• /
• 2012

1. Research Purpose Consumers rely on various clues to evaluate their decision to patronize a retail store, and store brand is one of them (Dodds 1991; Grewal et al. 1998). As consumers find ever increasing variety of contact points connecting them to specific store, the value of experiential shopping as a means of increasing store's brand equity warrants greater attention from scholars of retail management. Retail shopping values are credited for creating not only cognitive experiences like brand knowledge but also emotional experiences such as shopping pleasure and pride (Schmitt 1999). This may be because today's consumers place emphasis on emotional values associated with shopping pleasure, lifestyle brought to life, brand relationship, and store atmosphere more than utilitarian values such as product quality and price. Many previous literature found this to be true (Ahn and Lee 2011; Mathwick et al. 2001). This brings forth important research issues and questions regarding the roles of shopping experiential values and brand equity with regard to consumer's retail patronage choice. However, despite this importance, research on this area remains quite inadequate (Hwang 2010). For this reason, this study aims to verify the relationships among experiential shopping values, retail store brand equity and tries to link that with customer loyalty by surveying large-scale discount store shoppers in Korea and China. 2. Research Contents In order to carry out the research objective, this study conducted comprehensive literature survey on previous literature by discussing major findings and implications with regard to shopping values and retail brand equity and store loyalty. For data collection, researcher employed survey-based research method where data were collected in two major cities of Korea (Seoul) and China (Bejing) and sampling frame was based on patrons of large discount stores in both countries. Specific research questions raised in this study are as follows; RQ1: How do Korean and Chinese consumers differently perceive of shopping values regarding shopping at large-sclae discount stores? RQ2: Are there differences in consumers' emotional consumption propensities? RQ3: Do Korean and Chinese consumers display different perceptions of brand equity towards large-scale discount stores? RQ4: Are there differences in relationships between shopping values and brand equity for Korean and Chinese consumers? For statistical analysis, SPSS17.0, AMOS17.0 and SmartPLS were employed. 3. Research Results The data collected through face-to-face survey conducted in Seoul and Bejing revealed appropriate data validity and reliability as a result of exploratory/confirmatory factor analysis and reliability tests, andh SEM model yielding satisfactory model fitness. The result of the study may be summarized by three main points. First, as a result of testing differences in consumption dispositions, Chinese consumers showed higher scores in aesthetic and symbolic dispositions, whereas Korean consumers scored higher in hedonic disposition. Second, testing on perceptions toward brand equity of large discount stores showed that Korean consumers exhibited more positive perceptions of brand awareness and brand image than Chinese counterparts. Third, the result of exploratory factor analysis on the experiential shopping values revealed different factors for each country. On Korean side, consumer interest value, aesthetic value, and hedonic value were prominent, whereas on Chinese side, hedonic value, aesthetic value, consumer interest value, and service excellence value were found salient. 4. Research Implications While many previous studies on inter-country differences in retailing area mainly focused on cultural dispositions or orientations to explain the differences, this study sets itself apart by specifically targeting individual consumer's shopping values from an experiential viewpoint. The study result provides important theoretical as well as practical implications for large-scale discount store, especially the impotance of fully exploring the linkage between shopping values and brand equity, which has significant influence on loyalty. Therefore, the specific implications deriving from the result shed some important insights upon the consumption values based on shopping experiences and brand equity. The differences found in store shoppers between the two countries may also provide useful insights for Korean and Chinese retailers who plan to expand their operations globally. Related strategic implications derived from this study is the importance of localizing retail strategy which is based on the differences found in experiential shopping values between the two country groups. Especially the finding that Chinese consumers value consumer interest and service excellence, whereas Koreans place importance on hedonic or aesthetic values indicates the need to differentiate the consumer's psychographical profiles when it comes to expanding retail operations globally. Particularly important will be to pursue price-orienated strategy in China in consideration of the high emphasis on consumer interests and service excellence, but to emphasize the symbolic aspects of brand equity in Korea by maximizing the brand equity associated with aesthetic values and hedonic orientations. 5. Recommendations This study focused on generic retail branded discount stores in both countries, thus making it difficult to tease out store-specific strategies based on specific retail brands. Future studies may benefit fro employing actual brand names in survey questionnaire to verify relationship between shopping values and brand-based store strategy. As with other studies of this nature, this study needs to strengthen the result's generalizability by selecting respondents from a wider spectrum of respondents.

• KDI Journal of Economic Policy
• /
• v.32 no.2
• /
• pp.93-143
• /
• 2010

This paper estimates the impact of Japan's economic sanction on DPRK trade in the 2000s. It conceptualizes the effects of sanction on DPRK trade, econometrically tests whether such effects exist in case of Japan's sanction using currently available DPRK trade statistics, and measures the size of the effects by correcting and reconfiguring the deficiencies of the currently available DPRK trade statistics. The main findings of the paper are as follows. First, Japan's sanction can have two different effects on DPRK trade: 'Sanction Country Effect' and "Third Country Effect.' The former means that the sanction diminishes DPRK trade with Japan while the latter refers to the effects on DPRK trade with other countries as well. The third country effect can arise not simply because the DPRK changes its trade routes to circumvent the sanction, but because the sanction forces the DPRK to readjust its major trade items and patterns. Second, currently no official DPRK trade statistics are available. Thus, the so-called mirror data referring to DPRK trading partners' statistics should be employed for the analysis of the sanction effects. However, all currently available mirror data suffer from three fundamental problems: 1) they may omit the real trade partners of the DPRK; 2) they may confuse ROK trade with DPRK trade; 3) they cannot distinguish non-commercial trade from commercial trade, whereas only the latter concerns Japan's sanction. Considering those problems, we have to adopt the following method in order to reach a reasonable conclusion about the sanction effect. That is, we should repeat the same analysis using all different mirror data currently available, which include KOTRA, IMF and UN Commodity Trade Statistics, and then discuss only the common results from them. Third, currently available mirror data make the following points. 1) DPRK trade is well explained by the gravity model. 2) Japan's sanction has not only the sanction country effect but also the third country effect on DPRK trade. 3) The third country effect occurs differently on DPRK export and import. In case of export, the mirror statistics reveal positive (+) third country effects on all of the major trade partners of the DPRK, including South Korea, China and Thailand. However, on DPRK import, such third country effects are not statistically significant even for South Korea and China. 4) This suggests that Japan's sanction has greater effects on DPRK import rather than its export. Fourth, as far as DPRK export is concerned, it is possible to resolve the abovementioned fundamental problems of mirror data and thus reconstruct more accurate statistics on DPRK trade. Those reconstructed statistics lead us to following conclusions. 1) Japan's economic sanction diminished DPRK's export to Japan from 2004 to 2006 by 103 million dollars on annual average (Sanction Country Effect). It comprises around 60 percent of DPRK's export to Japan in 2003. 2) However, for the same period, the DPRK diverted its exports to other countries to cope up with Japan's sanction, and as a result its export to other countries increased by 85 million dollars on annual average (Third Country Effect). 3) This means that more than 80 per cent of the sanction country effect was made up for by the third country effect. And the actual size of impact that Japan's sanction made on DPRK export in total was merely 30 million dollars on annual average. 4) The third country effect occurred mostly in inter-Korean trade. In fact, Japan's sanction increased DPRK export to the ROK by 72 million dollars on annual average. In contrast, there was no statistically significant increase in DPRK export to China caused by Japan's sanction. 5) It means that the DPRK confronted Japan's sanction and mitigated its impact primarily by using inter-Korean trade and thus the ROK. Fifth, two things should be noted concerning the fourth results above. 1) The results capture the third country effect caused only by trade transfer. Facing Japan's sanction, the DPRK could transfer its existing trade with Japan to other countries. Also it could change its main export items and increase the export of those new items to other countries as mentioned in the first result. However, the fourth results above reflect only the former, not the latter. 2) Although Japan's sanction did not make a huge impact on DPRK export, it might not be necessarily true for DPRK import. Indeed the currently available mirror statistics suggest that Japan's sanction has greater effects on DPRK import. Hence it would not be wise to argue that Japan's sanction did not have much impact on DPRK trade in general, simply using the fourth result above.

• Journal of the Korean Society of Fisheries and Ocean Technology
• /
• v.9 no.1
• /
• pp.1-18
• /
• 1973

For regulating the depth of midwater trawl nets towed at the optimum constant speed, the changes in the shape of warps caused by adding a weight on an arbitrary point of the warp of catenary shape is studied. The shape of a warp may be approximated by a catenary. The resultant inferences under this assumption were experimented. Accordingly feasibilities for the application of the result of this study to the midwater trawl nets were also discussed. A series of experiments for basic midwater trawl gear models in water tank and a couple of experiments of a commercial scale gears at sea which involve the properly designed depth control devices having a variable attitude horizontal wing were carried out. The results are summarized as follows: 1. According to the dimension analysis the depth y of a midwater trawl net is introduced by $$y=kLf(\frac{W_r}{R_r},\;\frac{W_o}{R_o},\;\frac{W_n}{R_n})$$) where k is a constant, L the warp length, f the function, and $W_r,\;W_o$ and $W_n$ the apparent weights of warp, otter board and the net, respectively, 2. When a boat is towing a body of apparent weight $W_n$ and its drag $D_n$ by means of a warp whose length L and apparent weight $W_r$ per unit length, the depth y of the body is given by the following equation, provided that the shape of a warp is a catenary and drag of the warp is neglected in comparison with the drag of the body: $$y=\frac{1}{W_r}\{\sqrt{{D_n^2}+{(W_n+W_rL)^2}}-\sqrt{{D_n^2+W_n}^2\}$$ 3. The changes ${\Delta}y$ of the depth of the midwater trawl net caused by changing the warp length or adding a weight ${\Delta}W_n$_n to the net, are given by the following equations: $${\Delta}y{\approx}\frac{W_n+W_{r}L}{\sqrt{D_n^2+(W_n+W_{r}L)^2}}{\Delta}L$$ $${\Delta}y{\approx}\frac{1}{W_r}\{\frac{W_n+W_rL}{\sqrt{D_n^2+(W_n+W_{r}L)^2}}-{\frac{W_n}{\sqrt{D_n^2+W_n^2}}\}{\Delta}W_n$$ 4. A change ${\Delta}y$ of the depth of the midwater trawl net by adding a weight $W_s$ to an arbitrary point of the warp takes an equation of the form $${\Delta}y=\frac{1}{W_r}\{(T_{ur}'-T_{ur})-T_u'-T_u)\}$$ Where $$T_{ur}^l=\sqrt{T_u^2+(W_s+W_{r}L)^2+2T_u(W_s+W_{r}L)sin{\theta}_u$$ $$T_{ur}=\sqrt{T_u^2+(W_{r}L)^2+2T_uW_{r}L\;sin{\theta}_u$$ $$T_{u}^l=\sqrt{T_u^2+W_s^2+2T_uW_{s}\;sin{\theta}_u$$ and $T_u$ represents the tension at the point on the warp, ${\theta}_u$ the angle between the direction of $T_u$ and horizontal axis, $T_u^2$ the tension at that point when a weights $W_s$ adds to the point where $T_u$ is acted on. 5. If otter boards were constructed lighter and adequate weights were added at their bottom to stabilize them, even they were the same shapes as those of bottom trawls, they were definitely applicable to the midwater trawl gears as the result of the experiments. 6. As the results of water tank tests the relationship between net height of H cm velocity of v m/sec, and that between hydrodynamic resistance of R kg and the velocity of a model net as shown in figure 6 are respectively given by $$H=8+\frac{10}{0.4+v}$$ $$R=3+9v^2$$ 7. It was found that the cross-wing type depth control devices were more stable in operation than that of the H-wing type as the results of the experiments at sea. 8. The hydrodynamic resistance of the net gear in midwater trawling is so large, and regarded as nearly the drag, that sweeping depth of the gear was very stable in spite of types of the depth control devices. 9. An area of the horizontal wing of the H-wing type depth control device was $1.2{\times}2.4m^2$. A midwater trawl net of 2 ton hydrodynamic resistance was connected to the devices and towed with the velocity of 2.3 kts. Under these conditions the depth change of about 20m of the trawl net was obtained by controlling an angle or attack of $30^{\circ}$.