Background of Welsh Cymru Clothing
In today’s era, culture has become one of the important factor in the business’s success. Different types of culture do have a positive and negative impact on the companies. It is been recognized by many of the managers and executives of the companies that culture drives the behaviour of people, innovation and customer service. It has become a major issue for the business and not only the human resource manager, but the CEO and other executive team must take responsibility for consistently reviewing the organization’s culture and behaviour of the people. It is been observed that cultures can lead to the success and failure of the business during the times of mergers, growth, acquisition and product cycles. The extent of success or failure also depends upon the alignment of culture with the direction and objective of the business (Minkov, 2011)
Welsh Cymru Clothing is the largest supplier of welsh clothes and accessories operating its business in United Kingdom. The company deals in providing shopping services to its customers all over the country. It stock its products from Official WRU and Rugby World Cup shirts to Welsh novelty hats. It offers online shopping services with competitively low prices on the wide range of Welsh products (Welsh. 2018).The items stocked from Manav Clothing, a brand of UK, which includes rugby balls, umbrellas, scarves, hats, traditional clothing for St. David’s Day and many more. As the company provides a variety of products as per the tastes and preferences of the customers, so it is more likely to be exposed to the risk of cultural differences. The research study aims at observing the impact of different cultures on Welsh Clothing (Welsh. 2018).
The culture of a person is related with its behaviour, dressing and traditions, which are directly affected, by its nationality, society and many other factors. Therefore, culture has a very important role to play in the social lifestyle of the people. Talking about the lifestyle, fashion is the one thing, which clearly defines a style of an individual as it shows the one’s taste in clothing and other accessories worn by him or her. Thus, it can be said that companies operating in fashion industry are directly and highly influenced by the different cultures of various people. This study is concerned with the identification of such influences on Welsh Cymru Clothing. It focuses on observing the effects of cultural differences on the company.
The study aims at understanding the cultural differences that have a significant impact on the business on international level, while adapting every means for improving the customer satisfaction.
As it is clear that cultures do affect the performance of a company operating in fashion industry, the study is conducted keeping in mind following objectives.
- To identify the international culture which differs from one society and community to another.
- To determine the various differences in the culture that are present on the international level.
- To figure out the way in which the company can adapt to every culture that in a way lead to high degree of customer satisfaction.
The rationale behind this research is to establish a clear understanding about various types of cultures that exist in the society and which affects the businesses internationally.
As mentioned in the dictionary of Webster, culture is the art, ideas, skills, customs and many more of a particular person in a given period. Organization or corporate culture is a system of the assumptions, beliefs and values shared between individuals in order to help them understand about the behaviour, which is suitable and appropriate for the organization. Many times, culture is considered as a basis of competitive advantage for the companies as the strong corporate culture is more organising and controlling for any organization. According to the research conducted by Kratzer, Meissner and Roud (2017), it had been observed that in most of the Russian companies, behaviour like closed innovation is more widely found as compare to proactive innovation behaviour. The authors links the innovation openness and innovation culture with labour mobility. They said that openness in innovation means that it results from sharing the competences between the different individuals. The labour mobility forces the organizations to reassess the range of their innovation activities, which they can deliver independently. However, the research also highlights the challenges faced by the organization in developing the innovation culture. The main obstacle in doing so is the mindset of the company and their willingness to bring new product in the market quickly. Apart from this, the underlying challenge for the entities is to incorporate the opinion on innovation, not only from the managers or leaders but also from the employees.
Culture and Fashion Industry
Westbrook and Oliver focuses on the concept of consumer satisfaction aligning it with the patterns and emotions of consumption. In their study, they defined consumption emotion as a set of emotional replies produced particularly at time of consuming or using a particular product. In addition to this, their research also focuses on the patterns of consumption emotion and having the knowledge about the same is very much important. Reason being it demonstrates the overall emotional experience of the customer rather than categorizing it into separate emotions like joy, anger and many more. Another reason is that the natural occurrence of the emotion patterns helps in determining the dimensionality of consumption emotion (Westbrook and Oliver, 1991).
The research done by Rivera, Bigne and Curras-Perez focused on assessing the kinds of CSR initiatives that affects the satisfaction of the customer within the company. Furthermore, the research also highlighted the role played by brand attitude between relationship of CSR and satisfaction (Rivera, Bigne and Curras-Perez, 2016).
Talking about the national culture, various review of literature are conducted out of which Hao Han conducted a research on understanding the culture of United Kingdom and China. In addition to this, Clay Posey and other authors conducted a study on the self-disclosure of online communities working in France and UK. Han (2014) adopted Hofstede’s cultural model to analyse the impact of culture on the accounting system adopted in United Kingdom and China. The research was further supported by Gray’s model of 1998. From the analysis conducted, it has been observed that how the public behaviour is been influenced by the culture and do affect the accounting standard of many countries. The finding of study stated that both the countries should follow two principles that are full disclosure and social accountability. In addition to this, companies must focus on the transparency disclosure policy and bring more variability in its practices (Hao, 2014).
Posey and others conducted a self-disclosure research in online communities and for which, they had developed a model named as online community self-disclosure model. The research was focused on highlighting the social and environmental factors that forecast such revelation in the societies. Furthermore, it also shows how the cultural differences at individual level affects the practice of self-disclosure. In Addition, it reflected the point that are there any difference between the disclosures of French and British cultures. The findings of the research stated that the tendency of individuals towards collectivism increases the disclosure and the individualism has no such impact. Furthermore, it was found that there were no statistical differences in individualism and collectivism on national level of UK or France (Posey et al., 2010).
An explanatory approach is been used in this study which critically explains the impact of various types of cultures on the company. It also evaluates the behaviour of employees towards different type of customers and their respective cultures.
A survey research design is been used whereby, a questionnaire is been prepared and the responses of the employees are reported.
Quantitative methodology is been applied in conducting this research as it is more likely to be imperious in identifying the arrangements of value, standards, belief and practices that are unique for each group, society or community. The method adopted will result in differentiating the social disparities that will help in shaping the foundation of enlightening the Welsh Cymru Clothing.
Objectives of the Study
In order to complete the research, primary data is been collected by conducting a survey among some people. A sample is been selected from the universe that consists of both the males and females. The survey includes a questionnaire which consist of some eleven questions that are been asked to them with an intention to know about their behavior towards shopping and their shopping experience with Welsh Cymru clothing. The data collected from the survey is as follows:
The above graph shows the total number of respondents that participated in the survey and it reflects the ratio of male and female among them. As per the data collected, it is observed that total 75 people respond to the questionnaire, out of which 35 persons were male, that is comprising almost 47% of the total people. On the remaining part, 40 were females making 53% of the total respondents. It can be said that females were much interested in shopping and that is why their number was more than males.
Another question showcase the location from where different respondents belong to. The above graph clearly mentions that more than 35% people were localities that is residing in United Kingdom. Out of the total, 38% were from UK, 34% were from China, 11% were from Japan and only 4% people were from France. Mostly respondents from China and UK had participated in the survey followed by Japan.
In order to conduct a survey, different types of age groups were selected which are as follows:
- 18-28
- 28-38
- 38-48
- 48-58
- 58-65
Total respondents of first age group were 37, out of which only 49.33% respond to the questionnaire. Similarly, in age group of 28-38, there were 16 people in total out of which only 21.33% answered the questions. The least number of people were of 58-65 age group who are least interested in shopping and only 6.67% of the total people participated in the survey.
The above is one of the question asked to the people in questionnaire which gives an idea about their spending behavior. As per the survey, 18.67% people shop once in a week, 36% shop fortnightly and 45.33% people shop monthly. From this, it is analyzed that most of the persons goes for shopping every month followed by those who shop fortnightly.
This question shows the reasons why people choose Welsh Cymru clothing for purchasing their accessories, clothes and other materials. It is been noticed that out of 75 people, 20 people go for Welsh to shop because of the quality it offers in its products. The highest percentage is been given to the quality factor. It means many people prefer purchasing their clothing and other accessories from Welsh Cymru due to its high and best quality material available at reasonable prices. The second priority is been given to the affordability and availability of variety of products under one roof. Ten people believe that Welsh provides products at affordable prices and the different variety of products are easily available in the company’s stores. Lowest weightage is given to the service and atmosphere of the store.
Literature Review on Culture and Business
The above graph shows the sizes of clothing preferred by most of the respondents. It is observed that many of them go for large size clothing with a percentage of 49%. Following that, 21% people prefer medium size and 11% opt for clothing size number 24.
It can be depicted from the graph that 45% of the total respondents spend £250 to £300 pounds on shopping every month. The percentage of people spending between the ranges of £50 to £200 pounds is 20% and 25% respectively. Only 10% of total spend less than £50 pounds on clothing in a month.
From the research conducted, it is found that different people and their different culture do affect Welsh Cymru Clothing. Being operating in the fashion industry, the company is highly exposed to the risk of various types of cultures. Following are the findings of the research:
- It is been found that most of the people belong to China and the UK.
- People between the age group of 18-28 prefer to shop a lot as compared to other age groups.
- Generally, most of the individuals prefer to shop once a month.
- Welsh clothing is been chosen by many persons due to its quality products, affordability and availability of wide range of clothing and other accessories at one place.
The research report discusses the impact of different cultures and their differences on the working of a clothing company named as Welsh Cymru clothing. The literature review conducted was for corporate and national culture. The study of Kratzer and other authors focused on the fact the openness in the innovation and bringing the innovative culture does affect the corporate culture of the organization. It is been found out that, very less number of participants has chosen Wlesh Cymru for its fashion. This means the company needs to bring innovative products to the market. In addition to this, Han also highlights the fact that culture does affect the behaviour of the people. People from different cultures have different choices reflected in the variations of their reasons for choosing Welsh Cymru Clothing.
Conclusion
From the above report, the following points are been concluded which are summarised as follows:
- Talking about the international culture, the people participated in the survey are more from China and then from Japan and France. It is been observed that the culture of the UK and China is almost the same as the people of both the countries majorly prefer the quality and price of the product.
- As per the Hofstede model, there are various cultural difference between France and the UK. The fashion preferences of these people are also very different as observed.
- In order to achieve customer satisfaction, it is been concluded that Welsh must introduce innovative products according to the culture of various people, keeping the same quality and reasonable prices.
It is been recommend to the company that it should properly understand the behavior of consumers and their preferences before introducing any sort of a new product in the market. Welsh must observe and study the international cultural differences that affect its business and working.
Culture differences in the fashion industry is a very common issue, which has a wide scope of research. Several types of research are there in this context as the culture of people changes time-to-time and so as their taste and preferences for fashion. In the future, more studies in the same context can be introduced.
While conducting this research, I got to know a lot more about the behavior and shopping trends of the people on an international basis. The main key point I got to know is that variations in culture do influence the companies operating in the fashion industry. The research helps me in understanding the preferences and the choices of different people belonging to the different culture. In my opinion, research is necessary for the companies to operate the businesses internationally by analyzing various market trends and cultures.
References
Hao, N. (2014). The research of difference between the UK and China by Hofstede Model. China Journal of Chinese Materia Medica.
Kratzer, J., Meissner, D. and Roud, V. (2017). Open innovation and company culture: Internal openness makes the difference. Technological Forecasting and Social Change, 119, pp.128-138.
Minkov, M. (2011) Cultural Differences in a Globalizing World [eBook]. Emerald Group Publishing. Available at: https://books.google.co.uk/books?id=C_zLfq0q3j8C&printsec=frontcover&dq=cultural+differences&hl=en&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwi3o7vHn7rbAhWRXMAKHZEFAOAQ6AEIJzAA#v=onepage&q=cultural%20differences&f=false [Accessed 19 July 2018].
Posey, C., Lowry, P., Roberts, T. and Ellis, T. (2010). Proposing the online community self-disclosure model: the case of working professionals in France and the U.K. who use online communities. European Journal of Information Systems, 19(2), pp.181-195
Rivera, J., Bigne, E. and Curras-Perez, R. (2016). Effects of Corporate Social Responsibility perception on consumer satisfaction with the brand. Spanish Journal of Marketing – ESIC, 20(2), pp.104-114.
Welsh. (2018). Welsh Cymru Clothing. [Online]. Available at: https://www.welshcymruclothing.com/ [Accessed 19 July 2018].
Westbrook, R. and Oliver, R. (1991). The Dimensionality of Consumption Emotion Patterns and Consumer Satisfaction. Journal of Consumer Research, 18(1), p.84.
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