Can You Buy a Memorable Wedding? : How socio-economic determinants shape the consumption of wedding goods and services. A case study in China.

Sammanfattning: The main purpose of the study is to explore how certain socio-economic determinants shape the way consumers behave in the consumption of wedding goods and services. These socio-economic determinants include: price, education, family tradition, social constraints and self-expression. A set of questions related to the main research question was raised in order to better illustrate the relationship between these determinants and the consumption action, as well as to discover, reveal and comprehend the complexity of the Chinese wedding industry. Both a self-completion web-administered online survey and electronic interviews were carried out to collect primary data in order to get a confirmatory set of results. The results from both of the survey and the interviews have shown that these socio-economic factors are related to the individual behaviour in the consumption of wedding goods and services. But the impact is not as strong and obvious as expected. Respondents’ perceived satisfaction differ from each other but not necessarily link to their consumption tendency according to the survey. It also revealed the fact that social convention and family tradition can help shaping the decision-making process to a certain extent. However, interviewees showed their enthusiasm to the concept of self-expression and autonomy. They found the self concept more important than tradition and convention when making choices, despite that they admitted that it would be impossible to completely discard the traditions.