No abstract

Due in part to increasing diet-related health problems caused, among others, by obesity, nutritional labelling has been considered important, mainly because it can provide consumers with information that can be used to make informed and healthier food choices. Several studies have focused on the empirical perspective of nutritional label use. None of these studies, however, have focused on developing a theoretical economic model that would adequately describe nutritional label use based on a utility theoretic framework. We attempt to fill this void by developing a simple theoretical model of nutritional label use, incorporating the time a consumer spends reading labels as part of the food choice process. The demand equations of the model are then empirically tested. Results suggest the significant role of several variables that flow directly from the model which, to our knowledge, have not been used in any previous empirical work.

Many countries around the world have already mandated, or plan to mandate, the presence of nutrition related information on most pre-packaged food products. Health advocates and lobbyists would like to see similar laws mandating nutrition information in the restaurant and fast-food market as well. In fact, New York City has already taken a step forward and now requires all chain restaurants with 15 or more establishments anywhere in US to show calorie information on their menus and menu board. The benefits were estimated to be as much as 150,000 fewer obese New Yorkers over the next five years. Copyright 2009 Blackwell Publishing Ltd.

PurposeThis paper sets out to investigate the factors affecting product class involvement for food. Factors affecting specific aspects of involvement are also to be explored. The aim is to determine the factors that affect involvement with food and sketch the profile of consumers more likely to be involved or not involved with food. This paper also seeks to assess the factors affecting the importance attached to different aspects of food such as taste, price, nutrition, ease of preparation, and brand name.Design/methodology/approachBuilding on the literature a conceptual model is developed and empirically tested using survey data collected from supermarkets in Athens. Data were analyzed using probit and ordered probit analysis and marginal effects were calculated which show how much the level of involvement or importance is affected when a variable is changed.FindingsThis study finds that younger consumers, those with higher education and income who engage in nutritional label use behavior and do not prepare food for their household are more likely to have low involvement with food. Less distinctive characteristics are apparent for the highly involved consumers. Different consumer profiles are also associated with different aspects of food involvement based on importance attached to price, ease of preparation, nutrition, taste, and brand name.Research limitations/implicationsA caveat has to do with the localized nature of this study and therefore the limitations in generalizing results. Future research could use larger samples and other measures of product class involvement to test the robustness of these results.Practical implicationsThe study suggests that overall involvement with food, based on attribute importance, is affected by several socioeconomic and attitudinal variables. The findings also suggest that different profiles of consumers can be associated with different aspects or attributes of food such as taste, price, nutrition, ease of preparation, and brand name. The analysis can be used as a segmentation tool that can assist marketing management with marketing mix decisions, and in particular with promotional strategy in order to increase marketing efficiency.Originality/valueThe paper gives new insights on consumer segmentation. It provides the profile of consumers more likely to be involved or not involved with food based on specific aspects such as price, nutrition, taste, ease of preparation and brand name.

This article examines meat consumption patterns of households in Greece using data from family budget surveys. For that purpose the linear approximate Almost Ideal Demond System was employed to investigate the economics and demographic effects on the demand for four types of meat. Prices were adjusted for quality, and the demographic translation method was used to incorporate the demographic variables. Finally, the two-stage generalized Heckman procedure was employed to take into account censoring of the dependent variables. [EconLit citations: Q11, D12.] © 2003 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. Agribusiness 19: 43-59, 2003.