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Heeding the call for insights into the Sub-Saharan African international marketing context, this study aims to empirically examine consumers' desires and motivations for buying counterfeit luxury goods. It examines influences on consumers' attitudes and purchase intentions related to counterfeit luxury goods in Rwanda, one of Sub-Saharan Africa's fastest-growing economies and growing luxury markets, developing and testing a model examining the effect of social context on personal attributes, providing evidence on economic and social-status factors as drivers for counterfeiting.

The data were collected using an online survey administered in Rwanda to consumers who had previously purchased luxury goods and counterfeits. A total of 312 valid responses were analyzed using structural equation modeling.

This study found that normative and informational influences had a positive effect on Rwandan consumers' attitude toward purchasing counterfeit luxury products, with attitude influencing purchase intentions directly and indirectly, through mediating variable desire for status or through value consciousness and desire for status.

The study contributes to academic research − one of the first empirical studies to examine consumers' desires and motivations for buying counterfeit luxury goods in Sub-Saharan Africa, providing insights that benefit scholars and practitioners seeking to better understand a market where more than half of the world's fastest economies are located.

Natural and cultural tourism are important motivators for international tourism. Spain has impressive tourist attractions that are outstanding on the natural and cultural tourism dimensions. The purpose of this paper is to identify traits of the most attractive destinations in Spain and to understand the relative importance of natural, cultural, and dual (natural and cultural) attractions to target consumers.

The authors compare the level of tourism in the 17 major regions of Spain and identify the key natural, cultural, and dual attractions using a two-step cluster analysis to ascertain the relative importance of the three types of attractions.

The findings of the cluster analysis suggest that natural attractions had the highest importance, followed by dual attractions, with cultural attractions having the lowest importance in affecting the level of tourism in a region. The study identified four categories of regions resulting from “high vs low” total number of attractions by “high vs low” levels of tourism (operationalized via the number of tourist-nights). The regions with high levels of tourism were either located in the bodies of water (a group of islands) or on ocean/sea(s) surrounding Spain. The study suggests placing greater emphasis on promoting cultural attractions in Spain.

The findings suggest that there is a need to put more emphasis on promoting the cultural attractions in Spain. Spain is a diverse country with huge potential for tourism from people all over the world, due to its diverse geography and rich history.

To the best of the authors’ knowledge, this is the first study that analyzes 17 regions of Spain in relation to their tourism characteristics, identifying attractions that are not sufficiently leveraged, and suggesting strategies for identifying opportunities for the tourism industry in Spain.

Previous research has posited country image to operate at two levels: the country’s macro image, based on general politico-economic descriptors of the country, and the country’s micro image, based on perceptions of products from the country. The purpose of this paper is to further explore this premise in a practical study, using a psychometric assessment of macro and micro country images by ascertaining the nature of differences in macro and micro images of leading exporters, the USA and China, for consumers in Malaysia, a top import destination of US and Chinese goods; the images of Malaysian goods were similarly assessed.

The study used a systematic sample, with questionnaires distributed to adult respondents using a street intercept. Interviewers asked every other passer-by to fill out a questionnaire, and stood in close proximity to address any questions from respondents. The study hypothesized that there is a significant difference between country macro and micro image, respectively for the USA, China and Malaysia, and that there is significant relationship between country macro image and country micro image in each country, respectively, USA, China and Malaysia.

The study found support for the reliability of existing country micro and macro image measures, and further refined them for increased validity. The study compared between the countries and found significant differences on both macro and micro dimensions of country image. The US scored highest on technological research, high quality products, standards of living, labor costs, welfare system, industrialization, civilian government, development, literacy, free-market system and democracy, followed by China on technological research, industrialization, development and free-market system, with Malaysia scoring higher on product quality, labor costs, welfare system, civilian government is civilian/non-military, literacy, free-market system and democracy.

A broader study of countries that share geopolitical and cultural similarities might offer additional insights into country macro and micro image.

The study cautions marketers to assess the acceptance of their products in the context of their country’s macro and micro image perceptions in target markets, and steer those perceptions in a manner that would be beneficial to their marketing efforts.

The conceptualization of the macro and micro aspects of country image has been one of the less studied dimensions of country image. This study is the first to address these dimensions from an emerging-market perspective, suggesting that, at the macro level, country perceptions regarding technology, economy, and politics contribute to an overall impression of the country, which would then influence the desirability of its products originating there. For the micro country image, products from countries perceived as innovative, excelling in product design, and producing prestigious products, are likely to be perceived as desirable.

Describes the contrast between the state of marketing in Romania before and after the fall of communism. Specifically evaluates the changes in the marketing mix components from 1989 to 1993. Presents details of a survey in Bucharest examining how Romanian consumers perceive the changes taking place in the market in terms of product, price, promotion and distribution. Gives recommendations for marketing in Romania in the future.

Torn between socially‐mandated dress conformity and the glitter of Western designers, consumers in Eastern Europe have always been interested in Western style. After the fall of Communism, fashion, led by Western brands, quickly conquered consumers, while local manufacturers started to offer quality goods. Exposure to Western brands and advertising affected consumer values: former collectivist values are gradually being replaced by individualism. These changes are occurring at different rates and vary in different market segments. Under these conditions, a study was conducted in Bulgaria, Hungary and Romania, comparing respondents on two dimensions of style: fashion‐consciousness (capturing individualism) and dress‐conformity (capturing collectivism). The findings support the hypothesis that fashion consciousness is highest for Westernized Hungarian respondents, who have the highest income and can afford fashionable clothing. Dress conformity was highest for Bulgarian respondents, who had setbacks in adopting a market economy and are less Westernized. The findings support demographic differences predictions: younger individuals are more fashion conscious than older individuals, whereas dress conformity is higher for older than for younger individuals. Finally, men are more fashion conscious than women. The findings on gender differences in dress conformity are mixed. Marketing implications of these findings and future research directions are discussed.

The financial market offers an intricate laboratory for the study of consumer behavior. One area that has received little attention in the finance literature and that could benefit from insights from consumer behavior research is the relationship between gender and consumer investment preferences and practices. The primary goal of the present study is to explore the influence of consumers' gender on their investment behavior. The study examines the investment strategies of male and female investors using psychometric measures and self‐reporting of investment behavior.

The purpose of this paper is to investigate the online fashion sponsorship, shedding light on the content and appeal of online fashion magazine advertising. Heeding the call of researchers for cross-cultural advertising investigations, this research offers a comparison of online fashion magazine advertisements in France and the USA in terms of needs appeals, emotional appeals, and sex appeals.

Elle and Vogue were identified as prominent fashion magazines with an online presence in France and the USA After pretesting to identify appeals that appeared most frequently in online fashion advertisements, a content analysis of website advertisements was conducted with the full population of online advertisements in the US and French Elle and Vogue at the time of the study.

The research found that need appeals conform primarily to national character and that emotional advertising is more preponderant in French advertisements, whereas sexual advertising is more preponderant in US advertisements. For needs appeals, the need for affiliation was higher for US advertisements, whereas online French magazines advertisements were more likely to use guidance and safety appeals. The need for prominence, attention, and autonomy were higher for online US magazine advertisements, whereas French advertisements were more likely to use escape and aggression appeals.

As fashion magazines develop an online presence that is well coordinated with their print fashion pages, it is important to understand how advertising sponsors on the magazines’ webpages target consumers. This study is a first step in providing cross-cultural comparative insights into advertising appeals in relation to national character and preferences.

The marketing of food products to children through online media has grown rapidly in recent years, particularly in high‐income countries, where children spend considerable amounts of time on computers. Most food products marketed to children online are obesity‐causing, and childhood obesity has grown to epidemic proportions, with harmful effects on society. Marketers use creative methods to engage children online, entertaining them, offering rewards and promoting products through interactive activities. Online media is monitored much less than conventional media and little is known about online marketing of food to children. This study seeks to examine policies related to food marketing in three high‐income countries, France, Spain, and the USA, and their impact on the methods marketers use to engage children.

The paper presents a conceptual framework linking several aspects of the policies and the socio‐cultural environments in these countries with the design of the food companies' web sites. Six hypotheses are advanced based on this framework and tested using content analysis.

The findings of this study indicate that there are significant differences in online marketing of food products to children in the three countries studied in the authors' research, France, Spain, and the USA, and these differences are largely attributable to these countries' policies. The web sites of French food companies placed greater emphasis on nutrition‐related and interactions‐related features compared to the web sites of US and Spanish food companies. On the other hand, the web sites of US and Spanish food companies placed greater emphasis on games‐related, rewards‐related, attributes‐related, and brand‐related features compared to the web sites of French food companies. These differences in the web sites were conceptualized to result from the differences in the socio‐cultural and policy/regulatory environments of the three countries.

The study provides several useful insights related to understanding of consumer behavior, consumer policy, and design of food companies' web sites in the three countries. The design of food companies' web sites in terms of their emphasis on different categories of features reflects the companies' understanding of consumers in the respective country and government policy and enforcement of online communications. The article provides a conceptual framework that identifies six factors hypothesized to influence the design of food companies' web sites, three related to the socio‐cultural environment, namely attitudes toward health and nutrition, food and nutrition communication, and brand building, and three related to the policy/regulatory environment, namely, government regulatory agencies, self‐regulation by companies, and enforcement and compliance.

Considers how non‐Thais can negotiate successfully withe business and government executives in Thailand. Gives an overview of Thailand’s geography, climate, population, religion and business practice. Discusses important aspects of the social‐cultural environment that have a significant effect on the way Thai’s negotiate. Includes further tips regarding body language, entertainment protocol, how to dress, and favourite negotiating tactics by buyers and sellers. Provides conclusions and directions for further research.