5.1 Major Findings 23

5.2 Limitation of the Study 24

5.3 Recommendations for Future Research 24

References 27

Appendix 28

 An analysis of Consumption Motivation of Shiseido in Chinese Market

Chapter One Introduction

1.1 Background and significance

This chapter serves as an introduction to the organization of the present paper, in which both the background and the significance of the analysis of consumption motivation of Shiseido are also considered.

1.1.1 Background

With the improvement of living standards, people's quality of life also will be more and more high-end. At the same time, they have a deeper quest for the skin care, and the pursuit of the skin care products are increasingly showing a trend of high-end and international. Which means domestic products cannot satisfy the consumers’ requirement any more, particularly female consumers’ desire for consumption. They start to turn to the international market for more choices, with Japan becoming another choice after the United States and Europe. What can be seen from the development of domestic cosmetics industry is that the global skin care products are steadily developing.

1.1.2 Significance

Shiseido Group, the world's leading cosmetics maker, is one of the earliest foreign-funded enterprises to enter the Chinese market, whose business in China always has wonderful achievements, development and stability. At the same time, in the twentieth century, the pace of development of the cosmetic business in domestic brands such as Pechoin and KanS are not satisfying, particularly in the product structure, brand influence and other areas. Shiseido, relatively similar to Pechoin, now exceeded Pechoin in sales and market share in a few years already. What’s more, many well-known South Korean brands’ entry threatened domestic brands. Today, they are facing widening gap with many competitors such as Shiseido, and there may be more danger in latecomers’ catching up.