Identifying the Mental Patterns of Counterfeit Luxury Brands Buyers: A Discourse Analysis based on Q methodology

Today, for many reasons, the purchase of counterfeit luxury brands has become widespread and has a huge market. This will undermine the reputation of reputable brands. Knowing the reasons for buying counterfeit luxury brands can be a great help for these companies. Therefore, the present research has been conducted through Q - methodology to identify the counterfeit brand buyer's mentality. In this regard, after studying the theoretical foundations on the purchase of counterfeit luxury brands and conducting interviews with 10 fake brand buyers who were selected judgmentally, the discourse space was formed in the form of 43 phrases. In the quantitative part of the research, 54 individuals were selected for sorting out sample expressions that were selected in an improbable and available format. The statistical population of the study is students of Tarbiat Modares University. The reliability of Q categories was measured through a test-retest reliability, which correlated the responses between the initial test and the retest 0.889. Data were analyzed through SPSS-22 software. By performing Key factor analysis, seven mentalities were identified: 1) value-seekers, 2) influencers, 3) influence-takers, 4) low-expectants, 5) price-takers, 6) learners and 7) self-asserters. Also, At the end, identified mentalities were interpreted.