Influencing Factor On Consumer Intention To Purchase Counterfeit Luxury Products

With the global economic development, trade and consumption of luxury goods increase rapidly in the world. At the same time, the counterfeit luxury goods flood rapidly and develope into a huge market. Especially in China, Brazil and other emerging economies, market share of the counterfeit goods and the genuine of luxury brand are almost evenly divided in the market. In the market being accessiable to the counterfeit goods, consumers face the problem how to choose the products between the genuine and counterfeit of luxury brands in the purchase decisions (Gentry et al.,2001). In recent years, with the improvement of the counterfeit technology and the process of counterfeit production are pay more attention to details, there are difficult for consumers to clearly identify the genuine and counterfeit goods (Gentry,2006). So, would high degree of similarity between the counterfeit goods and the genuine affect consumers’purchasing decisions? And whether consumers’perception of similarity between counterfeit goods and the genuine would connect with their past experience?This study is conducted around the above-mentioned problems as the starting point specifically including four aspects:(1) whether consumers’past purchase experience are associated with their individual characteristics? (2) Do consumers past purchase experience have influence on the perception of the similarity between the genuine and counterfeit goods? (3) Do consumer perceived similarity between the counterfeit goods and the genuine affect their intention to buy the counterfeits? And how the influence mechanisms are? (4) Whether consumers past purchases experience would affect their intention to buy counterfeit goods?First, a new categorical variable "purchase experiences" conbined by the experiences of consumers buying the genuine of luxury brands and counterfeit goods is set, and on the basis of this, through multiple correspondence analyses, this article analyze the correlation among consumer countries (regions), age, sex and purchase experiences and understand the interactions among categories of different variables. The results show that:(1) In the context of counterfeiting, consumers in different countries (regions) have different experiences of buying luxury goods and counterfeit goods; consumers of different ages have different experiences of buying luxury goods and counterfeit goods; consumers of different gender have different experiences of buying luxury goods and counterfeit goods; (2) There are significant interaction among demographic characteristics such as country (region), age, gender and purchase experiences, that is to say, the purchase experiences for consumers of the different categories of country (region), ages, gender to buy the luxury and counterfeit goods are also different.Next, this article construct a covariance model to analysis the effect of consumer beliefs and past purchase experiences on perceived similarity between ounterfeit goods and the genuine. By analysis and post pairwise comparisons, it can be draw the following conclusions:(1) Consumer beliefs affect significantly on consumer perceived similarity. (2) There are differences for different consumers of buying experience in perceived similarity. From the results of means comparation of perceived similarity, perceived similarity for consumers buying the genuine are lower, and perceived similarity for consumers never bought or used counterfeit goods or the genuine are higher. There are no significant differences in perceived similarity for consumers bought counterfeit goods, whether bought the genuine or not; there are significant differences in perceived similarity for consumers who did not purchase the genuine or counterfeit goods.And then, this article construct a structural equation model to demonstrate the effects of perceived similarity on purchase intention of counterfeit luxury, which contain the mediating variables "dissonance due to buying the genuine", and "pressure due to buying counterfeit goods", and the moderating viarables country, gender and age. Through theoretical analysis and empirical studies, it can be draw the following conclusions:(1) Consumers perceived similarity have indirect effect and no direct effect on intentions of purchase counterfeit goods, and the variables "dissonance due to buying the genuine" and "pressure due to buying counterfeit goods" play fully mediate roles in the relationship between perceived similarity and purchase intent. Consumer perceived similarity affect indirectly purchase intention through two mediating variables "dissonance due to buying the genuine" and "pressure due to buying counterfeit goods". Consumers perceived similarity have significant positive effect on dissonance due to buying the genuine, and disosonance due to the genuine have positive effect on purchase intention of counterfeit goods. Consumers perceived similarity have negative effect on pressure due to buying counterfeit goods, and pressure due to buying counterfeit goods have negative effect on intention to buy counterfeit goods. (2) Country (region) and gender play moderating roles on the relationships between consumer perceived similarity and consumers’ purchase intention of counterfeit goods. Consumer age has no moderating effect on the relationships between consumer perceived similarity and purchase intention of counterfeit goods.Finally, this article analyzes the direct effect of consumers’experience of past purchase on purchase intention of counterfeit luxury goods using analysis of variance. The results show that there are significant differences for consumers’different experiences in purchase intentions of counterfeit luxury. Further analysis show that consumers intention to purchase counterfeit goods would be greatly reduced as long as they purchased or used the genuine and did not purchase counterfeit goods, and there are significant differences in purchase intentions compared with other consumers; while intention to purchase counterfeit goods for consumers who bought counterfeit goods but never bought or used the genuine would greatly increase; intention of consumers who bought both counterfeit goods and the genuine are higher than those only purchased the genuine and are lower than those only purchased counterfeit goods; there are no significant differences in intentions for consumers who never bought the genuine and counterfeit goods compared with those bought the genuine and counterfeit goods.This study introduce firstly perceived similarity as an explanatory variable into the research on purchasing behavior for counterfeit luxury goods, and combined with consumer past purchase experiences, trying to clarify the effects of consumers buying experiences and perceptions of similarity on consumers’ purchase intentions. This study on purchasing behavior of counterfeit luxury goods from the perspective of perceived similarity provides a new train of thought for behavior research on buying luxury brands and counterfeit goods and has certain academic front. This work not only has certain practical significance, but also is development and supplement of the theory on purchasing behavior for counterfeit goods. Finally, we sum up the theoretical contributions and practical significance and also put forwords research limitations and future research directions.