Understanding Consumer Reactions to Assortment Unavailability

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more. However, Aldi is known to be much cheaper than Albert Heijn, so in many cases, grocery shoppers make a trade-off among price, service, and assortment. In the report Consumenten Trends 2005 (EFMI and CBL 2005), grocery shoppers reported their most important criteria when choosing their primary supermarket (i.e., the supermarket from which they buy most of their grocery items); the top five are as follows: (1) low prices, (2) good quality, (3) wide assortment, (4) good promotions, and (5) many fresh products. Thus, in the top five selection criteria, two directly refer to the assortment offered: “wide assortment” (3) and “many fresh products” (5), while “good quality” (2) seems indirectly related to the assortment offered. Therefore, we again conclude that assortment is an important retail mix variable for attracting consumers. However, the importance of an extended assortment varies among customers. For example, if we were to compare the primary customers of hard discount stores (e.g., Aldi, Lidl) with the primary customers of service supermarkets (e.g., Albert Heijn, Super de Boer, C1000), we would find that primary customers of service supermarkets give relatively more weight to assortment variety than do the hard discount shoppers when they choose their primary supermarket (see Table 1.2). Hard discount shoppers, in contrast, are more interested in low prices and good promotions. Table 1.2: Relative importance of top five supermarket choice criteria (EFMI 2005) Importance of Choice Criteria when Choosing a Supermarket (% very important) Primarily Hard Discount Shoppers (n = 560) 17 Primarily Service Supermarket Shoppers (n = 4.179) Significance Low prices 71% 36% p < 0.001 Good quality 46% 57% p < 0.001 Extended assortment 18% 34% p < 0.001 Good promotions 44% 29% p < 0.001 Many fresh products 26% 42% p < 0.001 Thus, an extended assortment is an important variable for grocery shoppers when they are making decisions about which supermarket to visit. Furthermore, the level of the importance of assortment varies across customers. In general, those who shop primarily at service supermarkets
value assortment more than do those who usually patronize discount supermarkets. In summary, we conclude that assortment is a main consumer driver for supermarket choice. Because assortments continuously change, it is very important to understand how consumers react when their preferred items are not available. 1.4 Main research questions and research method In this thesis, we are mainly interested in the effects of temporary and permanent assortment unavailability on consumer reactions. Furthermore, we research some antecedents that might help explain these reactions. Thus, our main research question is as follows: What are the effects of temporary and permanent assortment unavailability on consumer reactions, and what are the main antecedents of these reactions? In the following three chapters, we present closely related studies that each aim to answer part of the main research question. Whereas Chapter 2 focuses on measuring and explaining consumer responses to a temporary assortment unavailability (out-of-stock), Chapters 3 and 4 deal with understanding (short- and long-term) consumer responses to permanent assortment unavailability (assortment reduction). In these studies, we distinguish several types of consumer reactions: • Cognitive, such as consumers’ perceived assortment variety and perceived assortment efficiency. • Affective, such as assortment and store satisfaction. • Behavioral, such as store switching, brand switching, and complaining behavior (individual consumer reactions) and category sales (aggregated consumer reactions). Furthermore, in the several studies we conducted to investigate these consumer reactions, we use various types of antecedents to explain consumer reactions to assortment unavailability (see also Campo, Gijsbrechts, and Nisol 2000). In our studies, we included and tested four main groups of antecedents of consumer reactions to assortment unavailability: (1) brand-related 18
Page 1 and 2: LAURENS SLOOT Understanding Consume
Page 4 and 5: UNDERSTANDING CONSUMER REACTIONS TO
Page 6 and 7: PREFACE (IN DUTCH) Begin 2001 schre
Page 8 and 9: TABLE OF CONTENTS Preface (in Dutch
Page 10 and 11: 3.7 Study 2 74 3.8 Hypotheses 74 3.
Page 12 and 13: CHAPTER 1: INTRODUCTION AND OVERVIE
Page 14 and 15: Most supply chain-oriented reductio
Page 16 and 17: 400 square meters) are disappearing
Page 20 and 21: antecedents, such as the brand equi
Page 22 and 23: of assortment reduction responses a
Page 24 and 25: assortment benefits and assortment
Page 26 and 27: 2.1 Introduction Out-of-stock (OOS)
Page 28 and 29: other explanatory studies, we study
Page 30 and 31: Studies that apply exploratory desi
Page 32 and 33: Table 2.2: Methodological overview
Page 34 and 35: Situation-related variables. Situat
Page 36 and 37: As noted, consumers generally prefe
Page 38 and 39: 2.3.3 The interaction of hedonic le
Page 40 and 41: For example, supermarkets are usual
Page 42 and 43: were selected for further analyses.
Page 44 and 45: example, a key utilitarian benefit
Page 46 and 47: The mathematical formulation of the
Page 48 and 49: Table 2.6: Correlation matrix depen
Page 50 and 51: correlation between the hedonic lev
Page 52 and 53: 2.6 Discussion In this study, we in
Page 54 and 55: Following the literature on promoti
Page 56 and 57: consider this finding when they att
Page 58 and 59: Appendix 2A: Overview and definitio
Page 60 and 61: CHAPTER 3 UNDERSTANDING THE IMPACT
Page 62 and 63: the Dutch food retailer Edah delist
Page 64 and 65: FMI (1993) conducts natural experim
Page 66 and 67: customers no longer or less frequen
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extent, comparable to the tendency
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Figure 3.1: Graphical display of as
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consumers evaluate assortments that
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Figure 3.3: Interaction effect of a
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SSI (H1). We expect that the brand
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3.8.4 Store-related antecedents Fin
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among the 10 specified product grou
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Retail assortment-related anteceden
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Table 3.4: Average, standard deviat
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3.10.2 Store switching intentions W
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effects indicated in Study 1 (β =
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3.12 Managerial implications Retail
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Appendix 3A: Overview and definitio
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4.1 Introduction Since the early 19
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changes in assortment perceptions (
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Negative sales effects may occur be
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therefore might question the existe
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Table 4.2: Overview of separate ana
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analogously. The resulting complete
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changes in the price level do not i
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Table 4.4: Estimated parameters for
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Table 4.5: Estimated parameters for
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infrequently in the sample stores a
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Measurement. Following Hoch, Bradlo
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4.7 Discussion In this collaborativ
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into consequences at the customer l
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eduction occurs, and the type of st
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Manufacturers in hedonic product gr
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2. When retailers set priorities fo
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References Aaker, David A. (1991),
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Broniarczyk, Susan M. and Wayne D.
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Franses, Philip Hans and Richard Pa
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Narasimhan, Chakravartthi, Scott A.
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Van Trijp, Hans C.M., Wayne D. Hoye
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de rol van het assortiment bij het
Page 138 and 139:
die het out-of-stock niveau binnen
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Campbell, R.A.J., Rethinking Risk i
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Langen, P.W. de, The Performance of
Page 144 and 145:
Slager, A.M.H., Banking across Bord
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