Spillover of Distrust from Domestic to Imported Brands in a Crisis-Sensitized Market

Abstract

Spillover of distrust from domestic brands to foreign brands during an industry-wide scandal is an important but overlooked issue in the international marketing domain. Drawing on assimilation/contrast and attribution theories, the authors develop a general model of trust erosion in a multibrand product-harm crisis involving three brand categories: focal (domestic) brands, contrasting (imported) brands, and hybrid (manufactured domestically but with foreign brand names) brands. Assimilative associations in an epidemic-like crisis erode trust throughout the entire product category, whereas contrastive associations protect or even benefit a competing brand category from the brand damage. A survey of 2,156 consumers in nine metropolitan centers in China measured trust in brands of dairy products after the 2008 milk contamination crisis. This study reveals the roles of category distinctness, focal versus contrasting categories, category hybridity, brand prototypicality, perceived crisis severity, and perceived category typicality in moderating the assimilation/ contrast effects in such a crisis. These findings have important managerial implications: international marketers should be wary of the risks in having their brand associated with products manufactured domestically in a market such as China.

Dialectical mind can be sweet toward crisis‐associated products/brands

“…For instance, a significant effect of perceived crisis severity on Germany's microcountry image was found, with a higher level of severity being related to a less positive microcountry image (Magnusson et al, 2014). Gao et al (2015) found that the higher degree of perceived crisis severity related to a brand in a focal category; the greater the assimilation effect against noncontaminated brands in the same category, the greater will be the contrast effect favoring the contrasting category. Considering these findings, the following hypothesis is proposed:…”

“…Gao et al. () found that the higher degree of perceived crisis severity related to a brand in a focal category; the greater the assimilation effect against noncontaminated brands in the same category, the greater will be the contrast effect favoring the contrasting category. Considering these findings, the following hypothesis is proposed:…”

“…The focus on Chinese consumers is based on the fact that dialectical thinking is widely known as associated with East Asian cultures (e.g., Chinese culture; Peng, & Nisbett, 1999). Moreover, although product-harm crises are increasingly reported in the Chinese market (e.g., BBC News Report, 2009;Gao, Zhang, Zhang, & Knight, 2015), the potential role of dialectical thinking in such an increase of productharm crises has not been examined yet.…”

“…Cues to, or information about, the severity of a crisis are often actively sought by consumers (Laufer, Gillespie, McBride, & Gonzalez, ). Previous empirical research indicates a significant role of perceived crisis severity (e.g., Gao et al., ; Magnusson, Krishnan, Westjohn, & Zdravkovic, 2014) in affecting consumer beliefs and behaviors. For instance, a significant effect of perceived crisis severity on Germany's microcountry image was found, with a higher level of severity being related to a less positive microcountry image (Magnusson et al., 2014).…”

Consumer Responses to High Service Attentiveness: A Cross-Cultural Examination

“…Although it is sometimes used interchangeably with distrust in the literature, suspicion differs from distrust in that distrust is a reached judgment, whereas suspicion is a process or state of mind that requires the consumers to seek more information and affects their attitude and purchase intention negatively (Fein 1996;Gao et al 2015). The ulterior motive often becomes salient and arouses suspicion within consumers when unexpected and inconsistent situational cues occur (Friestad and Wright 1994).…”