THE MAIN FACTOR AFFECTING CONSUMER BEHAVIOR IS THE PURCHASE OF READY TO EAT FOOD CATEGORY DURING EATING OCCASION IN A DAY. The purpose of this study was to test the hypothesis of the five factors that influence consumer behavior during the dining experience in a day. Hypotheses were tested with descriptive analyses, factor analytic correlations, and linear regression analyzes of 140 respondents who had ever purchased ready-to-eat food in a day.
The result of this study showed that the most motivation to eat ready-to-eat food is "convenience". Compared to the past, consumer behavior is changing rapidly with consumer food choice issues. To understand consumer behavior for eating various food categories during specifying opportunities to explore new trend or opportunity in food category.
The study will focus on the category of ready-to-eat foods, which is contribution 7% of the food industry, including beverages, cooking, ready-to-eat foods and Impulse, and continuously growing 5% in 2016. Eating occasions is becoming a factor of consumers' choice of foods where there are fulfilled in two main meals including main meal and snack meals (or mini meals) as detailed as outlined in Figure 1.2, therefore the variety of food choices is greatly increasing since some years ago. Thai consumers are moving to change their behavior from eating snack to healthy snack in every eating event of the day, especially in working consumers who are easier to keep up with trend and sociability.
The study will provide a better understanding of consumers' purchasing behavior of food selection at different dining occasions in Bangkok, Thailand.
Problem Statement
Research Questions
Research Objective
Research Scope
Potential Output
LITERATURE REVIEW
- Characteristics of the main eating throughout a day
- Choices of different foods category for main meals and snacks meals In the research of Motivation for food consumption during specific eating
- Motivations associated with consumer’s decision
- Hypotheses and framework
While analyzing the eating patterns in Figure 1.4, participants were asked to report the eating occasion and the name of the eating occasion in which they consumed each food or dish. In addition, based on ACNielsen's research, they studied eating opportunities in Thailand, which became a factor in the consumer's choice of foods, where they fulfill two main tasks of the consumer, including the main meal and snacks (or mini meals). Breakfast, pre-lunch snack, lunch, early afternoon snack, late afternoon snack, dinner and late night snack as shown in Figure 2.2.
Most food items (107 items) were reported for dinner followed by breakfast (77 items), late night snack (57 items), lunch (48 items) and afternoon snack (15 items), respectively. Based on that, we are focusing on the ready-to-eat category, so this research will identify and use more sub-categories in Ready-to-Eat Foods, e.g. breakfast cereal, cup yogurt, instant noodles, rice porridge and soup, breaded, canned fish, canned goods. Pickled mustard, canned vegetables, fruit in syrup, honey, processed RTE food, sauce, sandwich bread, frozen RTE food and canned soup or other as described in figure 1.1. Habits, need and hunger, health, comfort, pleasure, traditional food, natural concerns, restriction and variety seeking as depicted in Figure 2.3.
Breakfast and dinner had similar patterns of food motivations that included need and hunger, liking, and natural concerns, while motivations for lunch choices included sociability, variety seeking, and social norms. Likeability has been found to be an important factor in choosing foods for meals or snacks. Health was equally important for all food choices, while sociability was the main factor for sweets, soups and vegetables.
Meals and snacks vary in the number of motifs included in each selection. Meal choices are more complex, involving more motivational factors and different food groups, while snack choices involve fewer motivational factors and fewer food groups. Regardless of the eating context, a food must meet certain expectations regarding its perceived sensory properties (taste) in order to be chosen.
After liking it, foods for breakfast and lunch are chosen mainly because of need and penchant, convenience and habits. Choices for morning and afternoon snacks are made based on the concerns of weight control and health, but late night snack choices are often made based on the concerns of pleasure and visual appeal. The key factor influencing consumer behavior is the purchase of food category during dining event in a day, as details as below.
RESEARCH METHODOLOGY
Research Design
Data Collection Methodology
- The population
- Sampling
- Data collection
Common question will examine target purchase behavior in consumption behavior in each dining occasion, Place (where do they buy that product?), what leads you to see that product (In-store media). Specific question will delve deep into the detail of variable according to the framework and define motivations to choose food choice in each occasion.
Data Analysis
RESEARCH FINDINGS
- The respondents demographic
- The most importation of the eating occasions throughout a day Based on the seven eating occasion throughout a day, breakfast seems the
- Ready to eat foods consumption during each eating occasion
- Motivations associated with consumer’s decision
It shows the level of the import meal in the morning to afternoon periods, which is covered from 08:00 to 13:00. The reports show that the consumption of convenience foods in the morning is the highest percentage with 47% and after dinner with 41.1%, while late night and late afternoon can mean the high consumption of convenience food products with 31.4% and 30% respectively. . However, lunch, late breakfast and early afternoon are low consumption of the convenience food category.
Exploratory factor analysis using principal component analysis as the principal component extraction method with varimax rotation was used to summarize the common variants of the 37 motivation scales asked in the survey. The KMO was reported as .768, which passed the minimum level criterion of .600, indicating that this study had a strong number of participants to conduct EFA. This study used the eigenvalue criterion (more than one) as an important threshold for deciding the number of factors to retain, viz.
The rotation matrix was converged in five iterations and each component was highly loaded on the number of attributes as presented in the table below. Since the first component consists of the largest number of statements, it also explained the most variance (31.286%) of this data. Correlation analysis was used to test the association with stated purchase intention in the next three months (dependent variable).
The correlation coefficients between purchase intention and health (0.250**), convenient (0.372**) and hunger needs (0.317**) goods were statistically significant at the alpha level of 0.05. Linear regression was used to identify significant predictors that could be used to predict future purported purchase intention. The dependent variable was claimed PI and there were five independent variables in the model that were derived from factor analysis.
This means that the proposed model can be used to explain variance in claimed PI scores around 33.3 percent. The r square value can be improved by adding significant and relevant independent variables in the regression model. In other words, at least one predictor in the proposed model can be used to statistically predict purported purchase intention.
As the good health component increased by one unit, other components in the model remaining constant, claimed purchase intention scores would increase by 0.226 units [95% CI. The interpretation was the same for the remaining significant predictors in the model as the magnitude of the coefficients were all positive.
CONCLUSION AND RECOMMENDATION
Conclusion
The results also agree that the most motivation to consume ready-made foods is “convenience”, combined with being easy to prepare and easy to eat and carry. Followed by “need hunger,” consisted of two attributes including hunger and trying new and different things. The third is “good for health”, and consists of low fat, low calories, keep me in shape and safe and food quality.
Following the "social benefit" which, combined with getting them to spend time with other people, makes socializing more enjoyable and recommended by friends.
Recommendations
Limitations and suggestions for the future research
APPENDICES
Appendix A: Questionnaire
Preliminary interview questions
Questionnaire survey questions (Divide into 3 parts) Screening question
If you were to consume ready-to-eat foods, what would be your motivation for consuming them on these specific occasions. Please rank these reasons for buying ready to eat in a day. where 1 = the most important reason and 5 = the least reason). Below are the statements that describe the main reasons you buy ready-to-eat.
Rate each attribute in terms of its importance to your purchasing decision regarding ready-to-eat food products. where 1 = not at all important and 5 = extremely important).
