Country Image, Perceived Product Quality and Purchase Intention: the Moderating Roles of Quality Warranty Certificate and Country-Image Transferred Strategies

This article aims at researching on the relationship of country image and customer perception on product quality and purchasing intention in South Korean. Additionally, the moderating roles of product quality warranty and country image transferred strategies are also taken into investigation in this empirical research. In order to make a research on these areas, questionnaire forms were distributed by emails and sending hard copies to 350 target samples in South Korea including Koreans and foreigners who have been living in South Korea and 215 forms were returned back and analyzed by SPSS v.21. The results indicated that gender, age groups and nationalities can significantly influence consumers' perception on the relationship country image and product quality. Surprisingly, the image of origin country produced products does not really affect consumers' perceived product quality, but the image of manufacturing country has a strong and significant influence on consumers' perception in terms of product quality. More interestingly, country image transferred strategy is ineffective in altering consumers' psychological perceptions on country image and perceived product quality. Apart from this, product quality warranty is still workable for boosting consumers' confidence in consuming products in Korean context. Even though this empirical research was considerably and carefully implemented, there are still some significant limitations in practice. The limitations and suggestion are finally introduced and explained

SEAWEED DODOL OF AULIA SARI SMALL MEDIUM ENTERPRISE PRODUCT QUALITY IMPROVEMENT USING KANO MODEL AND PRODUCT QUALITY DIMENSION INTEGRATION

Aulia Sari is the only business entity that produces seaweed dodol in Java island. Dodol sales number in West Java is quite high because it is one of the typical souvenirs of West Java. Seaweed dodol Aulia Sari with many benefits offered from seaweed, did not get a big selling number in Bandung as the city where the business entity is established. This research is intended to improve the product quality of seaweed dodol to increase customer satisfaction level using integration of Kano method and Product Quality dimension. Advantages of using Kano and dimensions of product quality in product development has been proven in several previous studies to improve the product performance. This study uses 4 product quality dimensions that have been adapted to the product in the form of food and 22 variable of products quality derived from the Voice of the Customer and integrated with Kano method. The purpose of this study is to get what factors are going to be maintained, improved or removed from seaweed dodol products of Aulia Sari SME

Inattentive Consumers and Product Quality

This paper studies a model in which some consumers shop on the basis of price alone, without attention to potential differences in product quality. A firm may offer a low-quality product to exploit these inattentive consumers. In the unique symmetric equilibrium of the model, firms choose prices with mixed strategies, similarly to Varian (1980) in which some consumers purchase from a random seller without attention to market prices. In our model, though, firms also choose quality stochastically, and there is both price and quality dispersion. Two stylized policy interventions are considered: competition policy, which acts to increase the number of sellers, and market transparency reforms which act to increase the fraction of attentive consumers. With fewer inattentive consumers, firms are less likely to "cheat" (i.e., cut quality) which therefore improves welfare, but profit and consumer surplus can either increase or decrease. When there is a large number of sellers, approximately half the sellers cheat (regardless of the fraction of inattentive consumers), and introducing more sellers boosts consumers surplus and reduces profit, while the impact on welfare is ambiguous.Oligopoly; Complex Products; Market transparency; Competition Policy

PENGARUH KUALITAS PRODUK TERHADAP LOYALITAS PELANGGAN YANG DIMEDIASI OLEH KEPUASAN PELANGGAN (Studi Pada Pelanggan Kosmetik Make Over Malang)

This research aims to describe product quality, customer loyalty and customer satisfaction, product quality influences customer loyalty, product quality influences customer satisfaction, customer satisfaction influences customer loyalty and product quality influences loyalty through satisfaction as mediation. The population used in this research was Make Over Malang cosmetics customers with a sample size of 140 respondents. The analytical method used in this research is path analysis. Based on the results of the research and discussions that have been carried out, it can be concluded that customer loyalty is included in the loyal criteria, product quality is included in the very good criteria and customer satisfaction is included in the satisfied criteria. Product quality has a positive and significant effect on customer loyalty, product quality has a positive and significant effect on customer satisfaction, customer satisfaction has a positive and significant effect on customer loyalty and customer satisfaction is proven to be a mediating variable in the relationship between product quality and customer loyalty

Product Quality and Market Size

Recent literature notes that when quality is produced with fixed costs, a high quality firm can undercut its rival's prices and may find it profitable to invest more in quality as market size grows large. As a result, a market can remain concentrated even as it grows large. When quality is produced with variable costs, by contrast, a wide range of product qualities can coexist in the market because they are offered at different prices. Larger markets will fragment and offer products with a wider range of qualities. Using US urban areas as markets, we examine the relationships between market size and product quality - and between market size and product concentration - for two industries that differ in their quality production process. We document that in the restaurants industry, where quality is produced largely with variable costs, the range of qualities on offer increases in market size, with each product maintaining a small market share. In daily newspapers, where quality is produced with fixed costs, the average quality of products increases with market size, and the market does not fragment as it grows large.

Product Quality and Worker Quality

We study the relation between product quality and worker quality using an economic model that, under certain conditions, provides a direct link between product price, product quality and work force quality. Our measures of product quality are the evolution in the detailed product price relative to its product group and the level of the product price relative to this group. Our worker quality measures are the firm's average person effect and personal characteristics effect from individual wage rates. We find a very weak, generally positive, relation between worker quality and product quality using detailed firm-level data from the French Producer Price Index surveys.

PRODUCT QUALITY AND DISTRIBUTION CHANNELS

We introduce strategic behaviour in assigning a certain distribution channel to a product of a particular quality. We propose a variety of models to analyze and study some of the determinants of the choice of distribution channels. Taking the Gabszewicz and Thisse's (1979) model as a benchmark, we first study whether there exist strategic incentives for delegation of sales in a vertically differentiated duopoly. Secondly, product quality is associated with a particular distribution channel. Finally, the model is extended to account for multi-quality production. The resulting equilibria of every game depend on the relative market profitability, the degree of vertical differentiation (i.e. the relative marginal utility of income for quality and the non-buying option), and hence on the intensity of inter-quality and intra-quality competition. In all of the games analyzed, delegation appears as an equilibrium action. In the first game it is a dominant action for both manufacturers. In the second game, at least one of the manufacturers delegates sales. Whether it is one or both crucially depends on market profitability for each quality and the intensity of inter-quality competition. In the third of the games, the single-product manufacturer delegates sales at equilibrium whereas the multi-product manufacturer delegates only one of the qualities. The multi-product manufacturer employs wholesale prices together with the decision of not delegating both qualities to optimally combine the trade-off between the intensity of intra-quality competition and intra-firm competition.vertical differentiation, distribution channels, multi-quality production.

Leading methods for promoting finished product quality

Modern promising theoretical and methodological studies have reasonably shown that the issue of bonuses significance in the production and economic mechanism is not controversial. Currently, an order has been established where economic incentive funds are formed according to fixed standards, approved in differentiated amounts by year of economic development cycle; the main fund-forming indicators are performance to the supply plan of finished products under the concluded contracts, increase in labour productivity, improvement of finished product quality and volume growth net profit. The introduction of long-term wage standards for the hryvnia finished product strengthens the economic interest of labour collectives in increasing labour productivity and reducing staff turnover, improving the procedure of material incentives for combining professions, high rates and criteria for evaluating quality in labour, introducing technologically founded standards. This paper focuses on the issue of assessing and determining leading methods for promoting finished product quality. We employ both theoretical and empirical tools for achieving this goal and for deriving relevant outcomes and policy implications

Evaluation of Housing Product Quality Using Six Sigma Approach

The property industry in Indonesia is one of the areas that has been developing, such as housing. Quality management is very important to be applied in any housing development process. This study aimed to design an evaluation model of housing product quality and assess the quality of housing product in Malang City. By using purposive sampling, this research focused on 9 unit samples. Quality assessment used was standard quality measures, CONQUAS 21 and CIS: 7. The analytical method applied was Six-Sigma approach with DMAIC tools. Moreover, Pareto and Fishbone diagram had also been used as analytical tools. The result revealed that there was a low sigma level in housing product, the average was 2,18 sigma. The critical causes of this problems were unskilled labours, poor materials, and climate changes. The action plans for the improvement that could be implemented were a selection of qualified contractors, job skill training for labours, and a regular inspection according to standard