Country‐of‐Origin Stereotyping: A Case Study in the New Zealand Motor Vehicle Industry

Focuses on the issue of country of origin stereotyping by consumers in the New Zealand automobile market. The approach uses 275 mail questionnaires (with 150 of these being returned) containing bi‐polar adjectives to assess the current attitude of new car purchasers towards automobiles made in four different countries (France, Italy, Germany and Japan). These four countries were chosen on the basis of their brand and model representation in the New Zealand market. The results of the study indicate that there is a significant level of stereotyping in the New Zealand automobile market, with “made in Germany” emerging as a favourite place of origin among consumers. Also, the recent purchase of a brand of automobile from a particular country of origin tends to positively bias the individual′s perception of automobiles from that country. The perception of automobiles from the four tested countries differed among various demographic groups classified by age,income, occupation and sex.