1.2. Consumer Behaviour
Consumer behaviour is complex. There are needs and attitudes, the
experience of previous usage, and external influences such
Consumer Behaviour 3
as advertising and promotion, retail availability, personal selling and word-of-mouth effects, and
differences in product-formulation, pack- aging and pricing. Decisions have to be made about
whether and what to buy, how much and at what cost, and when and where. Then there are various
usage or consumption activities and responses which gener- ate post-usage feelings of satisfaction
and changes in attitude. These various aspects of consumer behaviour are briefly touched on in
Chap- ter 11 but in the bulk of this book we consider only buyer behaviour in the
narrow sense of the buying act itself, and
buying in particular.
Repeat-buying is one aspect of the way in which consumers buy fast-moving goods. These are the
kinds of products which are bought fairly frequently, like the various lines of food and drink, of
soap and toiletries, of cigarettes and petrol, and so on, which tend to be generally available from
grocery and other retail outlets. In as far as the same person buys any particular item more
than once within a relatively short time-period, such as a week, a month, or a year, the notion
of repeat-buying becomes particularly relevant.
The factors involved in the buying situation are highly varied. The
kinds of products dealt with here are typically sold in pre-packaged branded form, but
they may be available in different types of packages, in different pack-sizes, in different
varieties (e.g. flavours), at different levels of quality and price (e.g. grades of petrol)
and under different manufacturers’ brand-names. The items are generally low-priced though
a purchase of several gallons of petrol, say, may be relatively costly). Some products are bought
more or less as necessities or staple commodities. (Most people tend to buy bread,
potatoes, meat, vegetables, soap, petrol if they have a car and so on). Others are
bought more for variety with an element of luxury (different types of breakfast cereals, or the
modern “convenience” foods, say). These various distinctions might affect the regularity
with which the items were bought, i.e. their repeat-buying patterns.
Further variations in the buying situation are that some products like tinned vegetables have a
long storage life and can be stocked up, others (like frozen vegetables) can be stored for a
relatively short time only (other than in a deep-freeze), and some can only be bought and stored
in limited amounts (like petrol). Some products are generally used up in one go once the package is
opened (e.g. frozen or tinned vegetables), others tend to be used in small amounts but may have a
relatively short storage life once opened (e.g. breakfast cereals or butter) or quite a long one
(e.g. toilet soap or toothpaste).