Abstract
The railroad service called “Tsukuba Express (TX)” started in August24, 2005, connecting Akihabara and Tsukuba i n the fastest 45 minutes. It is expected that for the retailers of Tsukuba, the population of the city will increase, leading to the expansion of the market size. However, it may also increase the number of consumers going shopping to Tokyo and Chiba.
In this paper, the market and consumer’s behaviors in Tsukuba, and their changes were analyzed in the light of opening of TX, where the effectiveness of service quality were investigated. First, we examined how the change in just the time distances from the start of TX has an effect on the purchase behaviors of the people living along TX on the basis of a retailing gravitation model (Modified Hubbard Model). In this model, the places to purchase were assumed to be Tsukuba, several areas along TX, and areas in Tokyo and Chiba. Second, a questionnaire survey was conducted to investigate the purchase behavior of people living along TX before starting TX, particularly focusing on Department Store A whichi is a well-known retailer in Tsukuba and Department Stores (including Shopping Centers) in Tokyo and Chiba.We examined how the consumers perceive several evaluation items such as loyalty, service quality, and overall customer satisfaction, and how their purchase intention after starting TX would be. Furthermore, covariance structure analysis was conducted to investigate which factors have an effect on the consumers’ loyalty. From these results, we discuss how service quality elements would be important in order
to improve the attractiveness of the retailers in Tsukuba.
