Factors affecting purchase intention in fast fashion clothing shopping: Generation Z case

Today, fast fashion has become a growing business model with high added value in the clothing and fashion industry. The main premise of the fast fashion industry is to respond to consumer needs and requests as soon as possible. The philosophy of the concept is based on the "speed" in the fast fashion supply chain and the "pleasure" that consumers get from their shopping experience. Generation Z consumers, who are one of the target audience of fast fashion, can have access to fashion collections made by famous designers during fashion weeks at a much lower cost and in a much shorter time. One of the main reasons why the 160 billion dollar fast fashion industry has grown so much is that fast fashion industry "reads" the consumer; and has a very good understanding of their psychological encodings. Within the entire fast fashion ecosystem, stakeholders are positioned to respond to the instant demands and needs of the consumer, from supply chain to logistics, from collection design to fashion retailing. In the academic literature, during the last 20 years, many studies have been conducted on fast fashion business models and strategies. These studies mainly focused on the supply value chain and related elements, which are the most important comnponents required in the success of the model. At the same time, there have been limited studies conducted on understanding consumer behavior. The aim of this research is to determine, from a holistic point of view, "why" the Z generation consumers, who have caused the industry to grow so much, buy fast fashion clothing products; and to analyze the factors affecting the purchase intention using scientific methods. In this study, based on the survey results of 1.257 Generation Z participants, gender identity, perceived customer value, hedonic motivations, attitude and habit factors that affect purchase intention were included in the research model. The results from our statistical analysis indicate that these factors have significant and positive effect on purchase intention.