Casualwear shopping behaviour of college men in Georgia, USA

The expanding nature of the men’s casual apparel market represents a considerable economic growth area in the apparel industry. Of particular interest is the demand for casual clothing by college‐age men. The purpose of this paper is to investigate the influences of casualwear involvement (high, medium, low) on the purchasing behaviour of male students in relation to their shopping dimensions, personal characteristics, buying behaviour, shopping attributes and information sources. Data were collected using a questionnaire delivered by e‐mail to a systematically selected sample, with 176 male college students responding from 18 colleges in Georgia, USA. The results revealed that there were unique shopping patterns which differ according to casualwear involvement, indicating a deep interest in casualwear and appearance. Most male students had a medium to high casualwear involvement sum score; however, as age increased this score decreased. Both the personal and the market information sources indicated that customers with high involvement were more experienced than either the low or medium involvement groups. The medium involvement casualwear group was composed of consumers who were likely to make purchases during the sale season. The low involvement cohort was moderate casualwear buyers in terms of volume and purchased expensive casualwear. This study shows that classifying male college students by involvement can be helpful in marketing to this group. Apparel marketers are well advised to focus on this neglected cohort of male casualwear consumers.