Luxury value perceptions that drive South African female consumers' purchase intent for luxury exotic leather accesories

Abstract

The study investigated South African female consumers' purchase intent for luxury exotic leather accessories, with specific reference to exotic crocodile leather, as well as their perceived values of luxury exotic leather products and brands. A survey was conducted across South Africa that included representation of the following ethnic groups: African, White, Coloured, Asian and Indian. All the individuals surveyed were female. Consulta Research, a consumer research company, assisted the research study in collecting data. Data was collected by means of a non-probability convenient sampling method. Consulta Research distributed an online questionnaire to female participants on their database. Three hundred and thirty seven (337) usable questionnaires were completed and returned. Data analysis consisted of descriptive statistics, exploratory factor analysis, Spearman's correlation analysis and Cohen's d correlation analysis. All of the demographic and lifestyle characteristics were useful in describing the South African female consumer. The findings indicated that the majority of the respondents were not willing to spend market-related prices for genuine crocodile leather accessories. The study confirmed that luxury value perceptions may include five dimensions that are distinguished in literature, namely Social, Individual gifts, Individual pleasure, Financial, and Functional value perceptions. Functional value perceptions were found to be more important to South African respondents, although previous studies in other countries have shown that Social and Individual value perceptions are more important. According to the literature presented in the study, it was confirmed that purchasing intent is part of the decision-making process, since intention is evident in an individual's readiness to perform a given behaviour. The findings showed that South African female respondents have a weak Purchasing intent for exotic crocodile leather accessories. The study, however, also showed that in the future at some point a substantial percentage of respondents might buy (24.00% + 18.60% + 20.70%), have the intention to buy (23.40% + 17.50% + 21.30%) and have an interest to buy (23.10% + 17.80% + 18.90%) an exotic crocodile leather accessory. A high practical significance was also found for the correlation between Purchasing intent and Functional value perceptions. This might be an indicator of the important role that functionality would play in respondents' final decision to buy or not buy an exotic crocodile leather accessory. This has implications for industry stakeholders because Functional value perceptions, according to the study, can be described as superior quality, quality assurance, high quality standards and substantive attributes and performance factors. Therefore industry stakeholders within the luxury exotic crocodile leather industry, be it suppliers, manufacturers, breeders, farmers, retailers or marketers, should take these consumer values into consideration in order to maximise the ultimate value delivered by the supply chain. Various recommendations are made based on the findings of this study, to either expand or build onto this existing research. Topics related to luxury exotic crocodile leather accessories and luxury consumers in South Africa can definitely be explored further to fill the current gap in knowledge in this field.