Fashion Street Competitiveness in a Downtown Area of Small and Medium-sized Cities: A Case Study on Mokpo

Abstract

The culture and unique feature of a local city has the potential to attract consumers to an offline commercial district such as a fashion street. The main purpose of the study is to explore the potential for development, determinants of competitiveness, and characteristics of fashion streets in Mokpo. A literature review, field observation, and in-depth interview were conducted. Main fashion streets in Mokpo include Downtown Rodeo, Hadang Rose street, and Namak Central Park. In these fashion streets, it is the largest that the proportion of stores of mid-low price range fashion brands. The results show that main weakness of three fashion streets lies in the demand condition (i.e., population). Participants suggested development of unique themes, support of young entrepreneurship, and fashion education programs for local revitalization in Mokpo. This study can be helpful in in establishing a regional activation strategy based on mutual synergy across multidisciplinary such as fashion and tourism.