Abstract
This chapter discusses how the Japanese luxury market has developed in a climate of rapid economic change in the 1960s, 1970s, and thereafter. The department stores made important contributions to expand the Japanese luxury market through the introduction of affordable luxury products. In order to provide a comprehensive view of the democratisation of luxury in Japan, we examine the role of department stores, which have been the largest outlet for luxury goods in Japan, and the responses and behaviour of Japanese consumers since the 1980s. Finally, we use a quantitative approach to analyse the economic impact on the Japanese luxury market with data on luxury goods sales and disposable income from the ‘Family Income and Expenditure Survey’.
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- 1.
The Japanese asset price bubble (1986–1991) was an economic bubble during which real-estate and stock-market prices were greatly inflated. In early 1992, the price bubble collapsed. The bubble was characterised by the rapid acceleration of asset prices and overheated economic activity, as well as an uncontrolled money supply and credit expansion.
- 2.
Annual Reports for LVMH in 1989, 1992, and 1996.
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Acknowledgement
This chapter was supported by the DS-LAB Project (Practical science approaches for data mining business applications) at Kansai University, funded by Japanese Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology for Strategic Collaboration between Private Universities.
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Fujioka, R., Li, Z., Kaneko, Y. (2018). The Democratisation of Luxury and the Expansion of the Japanese Market, 1960–2010. In: Donzé, PY., Fujioka, R. (eds) Global Luxury. Palgrave, Singapore. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-981-10-5236-1_7
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-981-10-5236-1_7
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