The impact of brand authenticity of local mascots on purchase intention: A case study of Jinju City’s Hamo character

초록

Local governments increasingly use mascot characters as branding tools to strengthen regional identity and promote local consumption. This study examines how brand authenticity influences purchase intention in the context of Jinju City’s Hamo character, focusing on the mediating roles of brand trust, brand attachment, and brand loyalty. Survey data were collected from 189 consumers familiar with Hamo and analyzed using structural equation modeling. The results show that brand authenticity significantly increases brand trust, brand attachment, and brand loyalty. However, brand trust does not significantly affect brand loyalty, whereas brand attachment strongly enhances brand loyalty, which in turn leads to purchase intention. The mediation results confirm that brand authenticity influences purchase intention mainly through the sequential pathway of brand attachment and brand loyalty. The novelty of this study lies in extending brand authenticity research to the underexplored context of local public mascot branding and showing that emotional attachment is more important than cognitive trust in converting authenticity into purchase intention. However, because the analysis is based on a relatively small sample from a single local mascot case, the findings should be interpreted with caution and verified through larger and more diverse samples. © 2026 by author(s).

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