Emerging Issues in Car Purchasing Decision

The automotive industry is an important segment of the economy in any country as it links industries and services. It is the key driver of any growing economy. It plays an important role in growing the economy in each country and one way to strengthen the industry is to improve consumer insight into vehicle buying behaviour. Besides, competitive pressure of automotive companies arising in Malaysia has led the companies to look for an edge to be competitive in automotive industry. Both the local and foreign cars are competing to get attention from the consumers. Therefore, the objective of this study is to identify the factors influencing consumer buying behaviour towards national automobiles in the Malaysian perspective. The independent variables in this study consist of four dimensions, namely reliability, safety, fuel economy, and price. The sample sizes of this study are 171 out of 200 targeted respondents through online questionnaire with 85.5% return rate. The unit of analysis for this research consists of individual potential car buyers in Kuala Lumpur. In addition, this study focused on the determinant of consumers buying behaviour towards national cars in Kuala Lumpur with their rapid growth in car ownership. It is clear that the rapidly-expanding car market in the Federal Territory of Kuala Lumpur is a direct product of the spectacular economic performance of these areas. The car markets in Kuala Lumpur plays a huge economic role towards the general development of Malaysia. The result is tested by using descriptive (frequency analysis) and statistical analysis (reliability analysis, and simple linear regression analysis). The result indicates that the three independent variables of car’s reliability, safety, and price significantly influence consumer buying behaviour towards national cars in Kuala Lumpur. The result can assist the Malaysian automotive companies to increase their sales by focusing on those important factors.