A consumer ethnocentrism model of foreign grocery retail store patronage in Beijing: do extrinsic cues and shopping orientation matter?

The most widely used marketing concept to explain consumers' reluctance to patronise foreign retail stores and to purchase imported products is consumer ethnocentrism (CET). To date, however, research has mostly concentrated on the antecedents and consequences of CET, whilst little is known about variables that may offset the impact of CET. This study represents the first step in addressing this gap by examining shopping orientation, specifically utilitarian value, as a moderator of the relationship between CET and the consumers' willingness to shop in foreign grocery retail stores (WTS). Other important research gaps addressed in this study are context specific (i.e., consumers and grocery retailers in China), which includes an investigation of the impact of country-of-origin cue, store brand cue, CET and shopping orientation on WTS, the causal relationships between CET, WTS and customer loyalty (i.e., attitudinal and behavioural loyalty) as well as between shopping orientation and customer loyalty, and the robustness of the CETSCALE (i.e., CET measurement instrument) in relation to socially desirable response bias. Building on an extensive literature review, a consumer ethnocentrism model of foreign grocery retail store patronage was conceptualised and examined for its theoretical applicability in Beijing via an initial qualitative study. The conclusive quantitative phase was store-intercept surveys conducted in four Beijing hypermarkets owned by two established domestic and foreign grocery retailers in China; this achieved a total sample of 500 questionnaires. Rigorous statistical assessment of the collected questionnaires was undertaken, where the raw data was verified for data entry accuracy, missing values in the raw datasets were resolved via the multiple imputation method, and the multiple imputed datasets were assessed for outliers and non-normality. The conceptual model was then tested using Structural Equation Modelling (SEM). Based on conventional SEM procedures, the main results revealed that utilitarian value was a significant moderator of the relationship between CET and WTS, whilst the country-of- origin cue and store brand cue returned non-significant effects. In addition, store origin was a significant moderator of the relationship between WTS and loyalty intention towards foreign grocery retailers, i. e., this relationship was positively related for Beijing consumers who shop in foreign grocery stores but non-significant for those who shop in domestic grocery stores. The findings, theoretical and managerial implications, limitations and directions for future research are discussed.