Americans Feel Guilty About Buying Imports : Retailing: A survey shows that the unease is increasing as the domestic economy weakens. But quality is still key to purchasing decisions.
More Americans are feeling guilty about buying foreign-made goods, especially those from Japan. But they’re not willing to give up their Sonys and Toyotas unless American manufacturers provide superior alternatives.
Yankelovich Clancy Shulman, a market research company based in Westport, Conn., asked 2,500 consumers whether they agreed or disagreed with the statement: “I feel somewhat guilty when buying non-American made products generally.”
In 1988, 44% agreed. The figure rose to 49% last year, and to 51% this year. The increase follows a decade in which about 40% of those surveyed agreed.
“Something in the back of Americans’ heads is saying that they do or ought to feel guilty,” said Susan Hayward, senior vice president of Yankelovich.
The rising sense of unease may provide some justification for companies that have appealed in their advertising to Americans’ sense of patriotism.
Chrysler Corp. Chairman Lee A. Iacocca, for example, appears in TV spots that favorably compare Chrysler’s cars and minivans to those made in Japan, while a textile industry group called Crafted With Pride has a series of ads that encourages consumers to buy garments bearing the label “Made in the USA.”
The survey results cheered at least one group, the Bethesda, Md.-based Made in the USA Foundation, which was established 18 months ago by a coalition of U.S. corporations and labor unions to promote American-made products here and abroad.
“We want Americans to feel guilty about buying foreign-made products,” said Joel Joseph, chairman of the foundation. Joseph said the survey results reflect a realization that “America is being bought by foreign companies. People suddenly woke up and saw that the Rockefeller Center has been bought by the Japanese. Columbia (Pictures) was bought by Sony.”
While guilt feelings about purchases of foreign goods may be rising, it does not appear that consumers automatically favor American manufacturers. A consistently high number of people--62% in this year’s survey--agreed with the statement, “It’s not worth it for me to pay more for a product just because it is American-made.”
“The message is that no one’s going to bail out a crummy product” just because it was produced domestically, Hayward said.
Yankelovich also reported a similar rise in guilt feelings when it asked respondents how they felt about products made in specific countries. Half of those surveyed this year agreed that they felt “somewhat guilty” when buying products from Japan. In 1988, the figure was only 41%, and last year it was 44%.
The figures rose at a proportionately faster rate when the country in question was South Korea: 47% of those surveyed this year felt some sort of guilt, compared to 38% two years ago.
