Will Apparel Consumers Respond to Global Marketing Strategies?

In the age of global markets and the Internet, many manufacturers and retailers feel that they have an opportunity to position themselves as global brands and that their customers are less defined by geographical lines and cultural ties. Can consumers from around the world be targeted from a global perspective, or are the cultural and lifestyle differences among countries too large to overcome?

Results from an extensive global research project conducted by Cotton Incorporated and Cotton Council International offer some insight into the potential for global marketing of apparel. The Global Lifestyle Monitor™ was conducted by Roper Starch Worldwide in May and June of 1999 with 5,250 consumers aged 15 to 60 in ten countries. Represented in the study were Brazil, Colombia, Taiwan, Korea, Hong Kong, Japan, Italy, Germany, France, and the United Kingdom. Consumers were asked a variety of questions, including questions about shopping for apparel and perceptions of fashion.

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Are attitudes toward clothes shopping the same globally?

According to data from the Global Monitor, consumers’ fondness for shopping appears fairly consistent around the world. On average, 66% of consumers say they either "like" or "love" clothes shopping. However, consumers in the U.S. and Hong Kong are exceptions to this pattern. The majority of Hong Kongers (56%) are indifferent to clothes shopping, while Americans are polarized — 46% "like" or "love" shopping for apparel, while 38% "dislike" or "hate" it. This pattern has remained consistent for more than five years and is related mainly to gender — in the U.S., women love to shop for clothes, but men tend to hate it. In fact, American women go clothes shopping six times more per year than men and spend an average of 30 minutes longer in stores per visit. But this gender difference in attitude does not appear to hold elsewhere in the world.

Globally, the average number of times per year consumers shop for apparel ranges from 6 to 22. Consumers in the U.S. tend to shop most often, while consumers in Colombia shop the least. But the number of times consumers shop for apparel is not an indicator of the amount they spend on it annually. For consumers in the eleven study markets, average annual spending on apparel ranges from $520 to $1,312. Shoppers in Germany, Hong Kong, and the U.K. spend the most, whereas Koreans and Colombians spend the least. However, analysis of the percentage of consumers’ disposable income spent on apparel per year gives a different picture. Per capita, average spending on clothes in these countries ranges from 2.7% to 24.6% of consumers’ income. Although consumers in Colombia, Brazil, and Korea spend the least in dollars, they have the highest per-capita spending rates. Shoppers in more developed countries, such as France, the U.S., and Japan, spend the least per capita on apparel. For consumers in developing countries, where incomes tend to be low, apparel purchases are more a necessity than a luxury, and are less driven by fashion.

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