Luxury Goods Market In Mainland China - 80 After The Consumer Behavior Analysis

China, this very word has been in the limelight for these years. This huge market is now attractive to luxury companies all over the world and staging a tierce competition. In China, more and more people are getting involved in luxury world and of which, there’s a star cluster: post-80s catching more and more attention as they are stepping into their consumption time. There are more than 200 million population in their twenties and the population of one child accounts for more than 90 million. Post-80s in China are stepping into adult and becoming the main force of consumption. A substantial part of this population is consuming or considering consuming some entry-level luxury products. Some of them even have been the regular consumers of luxury products.The uniqueness of post-80s and the regional differences on luxury consumption behavior equally make study on post-80s luxury consumption behavior in Chinese Mainland luxury market meaningful both in theoretical and practical respects.Targeted in post-80s in China, this study commenced with literature review, in-depth interview and questionnaire survey were then conducted to enlighten the later analysis. Based on sub-culture difference and referenced with some previous studies, this study proposes to divide Chinese market into seven regional parts, related study is mainly on these four regions: North, South, East, and Southwest. Sub-cultures in different regions were specifically studied:In general, North culture attaches great value to some intrinsic value of Confucianism, emphasizing stability and control. Consumers in this region are relatively more traditional, conservative, resistant to change and new things. They enjoy intrinsic satisfaction, think highly of social class. Hai-pai culture of Shanghai is the main representative of East region.Hai-pai culture is a kind of immigrant culture, well-known for having the best amenities and products for enhancing the quality of life. Consumers are the most innovative and cosmopolitan keeping setting trends in fashion and lifestyles. As the main component of Lingnan culture, Yue culture is a main representative of South culture, with great emphasis on mercantile entrepreneurship. It is characterized with a strong foreign-effected background and inclusiveness. Compared with East culture, Yue culture reveals stronger propensity to ocean culture. People under this culture are more willing to try new things and contact with new brands. The two brightest characteristics of Yue culture are:the spirit of dare to be the first, the appreciation of mass culture. Rooted in the topography specialty and the sense of leisure and content, Ba-Shu culture of southwest is characterized with inclusiveness and easiness.On the basis of literature study and practical experiments, a sub-culture model on post-80s luxury consumption in Chinese market was formed, the sub-cultures are mainly formed in terms of geographical differences and the model is composed of 4 dimensions:democratization: romanticism; innovation; Group affiliation.By integrating the study on sub-culture with related Asian culture, the author proposes several hypotheses on post-80s attitudes towards luxury consumption.HI:The culture dimensions employ a significant difference among different clusters.H2 (H2a-H2d):There are significant regional differences on luxury consumption attitudes based on culture dimensions.On the basis of data analysis,4 dimensions on sub-culture model were proved and 4 clusters were classified in terms of Traditionist, Artist, Free Explorer, The Balancer. Consumers in Traditiionist cluster remain the traditional behavior in terms of judging an individual through belonging group. They believe it is legitimate to judge an individual based on his or her group and pay special attention to the manufacturer & brand as indicators of individual product quality. Consumers in Artist cluster concentrate on inner satisfaction and never stop pursuing an elegant and delicate lifestyle. Meanwhile, they take pleasure in trying new things and adapt well to changes. Consumers in Free Explorer cluster take Democratization and Innovation equally important. They set aside the talking about hierarchy and seldom judge people from the group he or she used to belong. They advocate freedom and worship democratic world. They are born to be innovative and always ready to take a risk or make a new try. Consumers in The Balancer cluster are lack of distinguishable characteristics and may represent the part of featureless population.The results also proved Hl:The culture dimensions employ a significant difference among different clusters. In respect of the series of H2, the four hypotheses on culture dimensions were all proved:On Democratization dimension, respondents of South tent to behave most democratically while respondents from Northern region tent to behave more in accordant with hierarchy. On Romanticism dimension, respondents of East are relatively the most romantic consumers while respondents of South tent to more pragmatic. On Innovation dimension, respondents from Southern region are ahead of others while Northern respondents relatively rather like staying the same. On Group Affiliation dimension, respondents of North attach the greatest value to group affiliation compared with other 3 regions while respondent of Southwest cares least about it.There are also significant regional differences in terms of the distribution of respondents from different region. Confucianism is still influencing post-80s but in a less powerful way. Opposed to what traditional Confucianism advocates, post-80s are willing to try new things and adapt to changes. They assert individuality while are still looking for the identity of recognized group.Related data analysis on post-80s luxury consumption behavior was conducted simultaneously and the main conclusions are as follows: The top three characteristics of luxury chosen by respondents are Price. Uniqueness, and Quality while style and tradition are the last two.A substantial part of occasional luxury goods consumers are seen from the results accounting for more than half of the total, which reflects that there’s a promising regular luxury goods consumers in post-80s and they will contribute a lot while they are capable of.The top three categories of luxury goods post-80s used to or would like to purchase are:clothing, watches, and perfume/cosmetics.Newspaper/Magazine is ranked as the top of luxury goods information channel while Internet and Boutique (presentation window) take the second and third place.Post-80s in China incline to hold positive attitudes towards dilution line of luxury brand and express their intention to purchase it in order to get closer to the original luxury brand. Post-80s also mainly hold a tolerant attitude towards discount on luxury goods. In practice, reasonable and limited time discount may positively affect luxury consumption.Based on all results, corresponding marketing suggestions were proposed.There are still several imitations for limited study time and energy, Etc.:the limitation on samples; the complicated causes of the formation of sub-culture; the influences of other demographic statistics besides residential city.