How self-success drives luxury demand: An integrated model of luxury growth and country comparisons

摘要

Since 1990, luxury market growth has mainly come from emerging economies, due to the growing number of consumers who have achieved sufficient purchasing power to acquire brands, thereby fulfilling their needs for pleasure, social recognition, and superior quality, including sustainability. With a sample of 3217 luxury buyers from six countries, both mature and emerging, Asian and Western, a partial least squares analysis confirms, for each country, the relevance of a model that ties materialism to luxury growth and the dominance of self-made success versus mere richness as a determinant of materialism and of luxury demand. The influence of these two variables is not fully mediated by materialism. Thus self-success leads to a perception of luxury as a financial investment, whereas richness boosts the hedonistic function of luxury and thereby stimulates demands for sustainability. From a managerial perspective, self-success and richness should be used as structural variables to segment luxury consumers.