Consumers' Motivation for Accepting the Traditional Product of “Johnny’s”

As streaming media is to be used in the context of the Japanese music market, the purpose of this research is to explore the success factors of Japanese entertainment "Johnny's" non-streaming business model in the Japanese music industry which is dominated by streaming media. The research question addressed in this research is: In the era of streaming media, why do consumers accept an entertainment company “Johnny’s” that prefers to use physical albums to distribute music in the present market? The theoretical framework will introduce relevant concepts to connect idols, entertainment company, and consumers in the context of the Japanese music market. The methodology of this research is based on a qualitative perspective, using semi- structured interviews to examine the reasons for the success of traditional approaches to music consumption, interviews were conducted with 10 consumers who follow Johnny’s. The data collected from these interviews were analyzed with open coding using ATLAS.ti to obtain a Code Book based on the theoretical framework. The results of the analysis combined with the theory, on which a new framework was derived from the interviewer's perspective. There are five main directions of analysis: consumer preference, consumer loyalty, unique selling proposition, the significance of the traditional approaches to Johnny’s and Japanese consumers, and Johnny’s from the consumer's perspective. From the interviews, we can conclude that consumers accept the non-streaming model in the streaming media era because based on Johnny's monopoly in the Japanese music market and control of resources, consumers have more access to their idols and are familiar with Johnny’s as a brand. Idols not only exist in the market as products, but they also convey spiritual values to consumers through their music or performances, as well as the Junior system brings the joy of cultivating idols to consumers. In addition, the group activity-based strategy continues to solidify consumers' affection for the idols, the value that the idols bring out exceeds the drawbacks of the traditional approach.