International Journal of Innovative Research and Development

Abstract

An assessment was made of private label brand perception in two locations of Zimbabwe (1) Bulawayo, a city close to the Botswana border and (2) Harare and Bindura which are central cities/towns.  Bulawayo is situated 170km from Francistown (Botswana) whereas the distance between Francistown and Harare is 600km, for Bindura it is 685km.  It was hypothesized that being close to a border town and thus having access to a wider array of international retail chains would affect the perception of local private label brands.  Results from a regression analysis show that there was a significant effect of location (p=0.016) on private label brand perception.  Mean private label brand perception for central locations was 31.02% higher at 4.35 compared to that of the border town which was 3.32.  It was concluded that proximity to well-known and highly regarded South African retail chains in Botswana negatively affected local private label brand perceptions in Bulawayo.  This is because for some basic commodities, items in Botswana (both national brands and South African private label brands) tend to be cheaper than the same items in Zimbabwe.   It means that in border towns local private label brands can lose their competitiveness.  The authors recommended that retailers from border towns in Zimbabwe who are more likely to face stiffer competition from international retail chains should focus on providing premium private label brand products that are more competitive on the international market.

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