ALBERT

Notizen: Purpose - The paper proposes to investigate empirically consumers' quality perception of shrimps and cheese. Design/methodology/approach - A sample of 320 respondents was included in an experimental design in which two food products, shrimps and cheese, two price-levels, two levels of purchase involvement, and two types of physical surroundings, elegant and less elegant, were manipulated. The experiments included both simulated buying situations and simulated usage situations. Findings - The research finds that in the buying situation both experiments perceived price had a positive effect on expected eating quality for high-involved respondents but not for low-involved respondents. In the usage situation the effect of expected naturalness on experienced naturalness was in both experiments stronger for high-involved respondents than for low-involved respondents. In addition, experienced eating quality positively affected respondents' pleasure-feeling. The positive effect of experienced eating quality on pleasure-feeling was stronger for respondents exposed to elegant physical surroundings than for respondents exposed to less elegant surroundings. Research limitations/implications - This research concentrated on analyzing two food products, fresh-shelled shrimps and solid cheese. This could mean that the results may suffer from a lack of generalizability. A large cross-section of products ought to be studied to improve the generalizability of the results. Also, the manipulation of price and physical surroundings were confined to two different levels. Thus, this research offers no specific guidelines on how to set specific prices or how to establish specific physical surroundings for the purpose of manipulating, e.g. consumers' perceived quality. Practical implications - The results emphasize that food producers and retailers, among others, should seek an understanding of consumers' quality perception process in relation to both the buying and the usage situation. Originality/value - This paper empirically investigates consumers' quality perception in both buying and usage situations. Also, the paper includes purchase involvement and physical surroundings as moderating variables of the quality perception process.

Notizen: Purpose - To empirically investigate whether consumers who have adopted online grocery buying perceive this way of shopping differently from other online consumers. Design/methodology/approach - The data presented in this study were collected from an online (web-based) survey of US consumers using self-administered questionnaires. Data from 784 US online consumers are analyzed. Findings - Multiple discriminant results suggest that online grocery shopping adopters attach higher compatibility, higher relative advantage, more positive social norms, and lower complexity to internet grocery shopping both compared with consumers who have never bought anything on the internet yet and also compared with consumers who have purchased goods/services on the internet but not groceries. The results also suggest that online grocery shopping adopters have higher household incomes than non-adopters. Research limitations/implications - This research used a single respondent as a household representative. Since grocery buying concerns the entire household, this procedure assumes that the selected respondent provides answers which are representative of the household's opinion. Practical implications - Provides practical advice to online retail managers on how to attract different consumer online grocery segments. Originality/value - This paper investigates both experienced and inexperienced online grocery consumers. Thereby the paper adds to the understanding on how different groups of online consumers perceive characteristics of the online grocery channel.