The relative effects of country of origin image, brand and price on product evaluation and purchase intention

Consumers face with many purchase decision makings within their daily lives. In the stage of decision making, there are some vital elements that consumers take into consideration. One of these elements that affects decision making mechanism of the consumers is country of origin image. In developing product evaluation and purchase intention, along with the perceived country of origin image, consumers also take into account such elements as brand, price, product properties and store information related to the product. In the context of this study conducted in the automotive industry, the relative effects of country of origin image, brand and price on product evaluation and purchase intention are meant to be identified.Using convenience sampling, 417 respondents who are in the age interval between 18-60 and who belong to different income and education levels are added to the sample. Using structured equation modeling (SEM), the proposed model has been tested. As a result, it has been identified that Japan has a better country of origin image than France. With regard to the perceptions of quality, value and utility and purchase intention, it has been observed that the automobile brands preferred the most are respectively Toyota Corolla, Honda Civic, Renault Megane and Peugeot 308. It has been identified that country of origin is not the most important predictive variable. The variable that affects consumers' product evaluation and purchase intention the most is brand.