Quantity Surcharges on Groceries

Agrawal, Jagdish; Grimm, Pamela E.

doi:10.1111/j.1745-6606.1993.tb00752.x

Cited by 26 publications

(32 citation statements)

References 30 publications

(33 reference statements)

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“…different concentrations of washing powder, i.e. number of washes, number of scoops for dosage instructions (which can vary for powders, concentrates and compacts), different densities of soups when they are sold by weight not volume, different ply constructions of toilet tissue, different strengths USA (1981) 29 Walker and Cude (1983) Jackson, Illinois, USA 19 McGoldrick and Marks (1985) Manchester, UK 11 Moore and Heller (1992) Ontario, Canada 12 Agrawal, Grimm and Srinivasan (1993) Western New York State, USA 16 Zotos and Lysonski (1993) Thessaloniki, Greece 18 Gupta and Rominger (1996) Northwest Indiana, USA 18…”

Section: Unit Pricing Researchmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Consumer Awareness, Understanding and Usage of Unit Pricing

Mitchell

Lennard

McGoldrick

2003

British J of Management

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The debate continues over whether prescribed quantities or unit pricing offers the best method to enable consumers to make value‐for‐money comparisons. In theory, the ‘informed’ consumer should benefit from being given unit‐price information to identify optimum purchases; in practice, however, it would appear that many consumers do not use the data. Although unit pricing can reduce the level of confusion caused by large product ranges and large numbers of unique size–price combinations, results of a survey of over 1000 people showed that: 31% of the sample did not understand how unit pricing was meant to help them compare products; 35% could not be bothered to look at unit prices and 28% stated that unit pricing was too difficult to use. Those least likely to look at unit prices are women, the least educated and consumers aged 18–34. The research investigated why consumers do not use unit‐price information and found: some consumers do not possess the cognitive ability to process the information and feel unit pricing is too complicated to use; some products are not comparable, which makes unit prices misleading; many shops do not provide unit‐price information; unit‐price information was felt unnecessary when evaluating products with few or no alternative sizes or brands; unit‐price comparisons take too much time; consumers use simpler strategies for getting value for money, e.g. volume discount heuristic, own brands, special offers, x% free, reward points, etc. The paper explores policy and retailer implications for unit pricing and examines recommendations for government.

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Section: Unit Pricing Researchmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…However, the extent of this belief has not been measured. This is important because of quantity surcharges which exist when the unit cost of a given brand is higher for a large package than that of a smaller one (Agrawal, Grimm and Srinivasan, 1993). Although quantity surcharges were recognized in early unit-price research, (e.g.…”

Section: Quantity Surchargesmentioning

confidence: 99%

Consumer Awareness, Understanding and Usage of Unit Pricing

Mitchell

Lennard

McGoldrick

2003

British J of Management

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“…Consumers' quantity decisions are usually governed by their consumption needs, along with other factors such as household demographics, storage requirements and product perishability (Blattberg et al 1978;Agrawal et al 178 The International Review of Retail, Distribution and Consumer Research Downloaded by [Baskent Universitesi] at 16:30 22 December 2014 Lennard et al: Why consumers under-use food quantity indicators 179 Downloaded by [Baskent Universitesi] at 16:30 22 December 2014…”

Section: Product Quantities Decisions and Information Searchmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Recent UK research suggests that the majority of consumers fail to utilize quantity indications when purchasing (MORI 1997), 1 which raises questions about the consumer's ability to: buy the correct size, obtain the best value for money, identify product downsizing. Although some academic and practitioner material exists on consumer understanding, knowledge and usage of product quantity weight indications (Granger and Billson 1972;Jacoby 1974;OECD 1975;Wade 1985;Agrawal et al 1993;Wansink 1995;MORI 1997), previous research has been somewhat myopic in approach by focusing on speci c subject matter, e.g. The consumer is therefore vulnerable in this relationship, which is asymmetrical and balanced in favour of the supplier's information.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Why consumers under-use food quantity indicators

Lennard¹,

Mitchell²,

McGoldrick³

et al. 2001

The International Review of Retail, Distribution and Consumer R

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Recent UK research suggests that the majority of consumers fail to utilize unit prices or quantity indications when purchasing pre-packaged foodstuffs. This failure reduces their ability to identify optimal purchases and to protect themselves against oversized packaging, product downsizing and quantity surcharges. Previous work on quantity has been non-UK based (e.g. Wansink 1996), suffered from methodological aws and/ or lacked speci c focus on quantity. This research investigates why quantity indications are not utilized and adopts a more comprehensive multi-method approach using accompanied shopping interviews, simulated tasks (n 5 230) and an in-store questionnaire (n 5 1000). The results show consumers are: generally unaware of quantity indicators; confused because they are overloaded with product information; unable to process the volume and diversity of the quantity information generated by large numbers of products and brands; unwilling to make the effort to make comparisons; do not understand different measurement systems, quantity terms and expressions; do not care about small quantity differences; use package size or tactile weight instead; believe that the law protects them suf ciently; do not have time to make comparisons; are unable to locate and assimilate unclear quantity information. The results raise important consumer education issues and implications for retailers relating to clearer and more consistent quantity indicators. Downloaded by [Baskent Universitesi] at 16:30 22 December 2014 Product quantities decisions and information searchConsumers' quantity decisions are usually governed by their consumption needs, along with other factors such as household demographics, storage requirements and product perishability (Blattberg et al. 1978;Agrawal et al. 178 The International Review of Retail, Distribution and Consumer Research Downloaded by [Baskent Universitesi] at 16:30 22 December 2014 Lennard et al.: Why consumers under-use food quantity indicators 179 Downloaded by [Baskent Universitesi] at 16:30 22 December 2014

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“…2 Several studies have been conducted to examine the incidence of quantity price surcharges in the food sector. However, most of the empirical work undertaken has been on the United States food sector (Agrawal, Grimm, & Srinivasan, 1993;Gerstner & Hess, 1987;Gupta & Rominger, 1996;Manning, Sprott, & Miyazaki, 1998;Nason & Della Bitta, 1983;Sprott, Manning, & Miyazaki, 2003;Widrick, 1979). Most of these studies show evidence of quantity price surcharges in the U.S. food sector, with surcharges ranging from 7 to 34% of the investigated products.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Empirical investigation of price setting and quantity surcharges in the German food sector

2009

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In this study, the authors examined the incidence and determinants of quantity price discounts and quantity price surcharges in the German food sector through a bivariate probit model, using recent consumer scanner survey data. Selectivity bias was corrected for in estimating the magnitude of quantity price surcharges and quantity price discounts, using Heckman's procedure. The findings reveal that almost 10% of the investigated products attract higher unit prices for larger package sizes, although the extent of price surcharges varied among product categories. Quantity price discounts were found to dominate in the firms' pricing strategies. The econometric results showed that the number of package sizes, the average package size, the packaging and storage forms, as well as the price image of a product are all significant determinants of the decision to impose both quantity price surcharges and quantity price discounts. [JEL classification: D40, L11] © 2009 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.

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Quantity Surcharges on Groceries

Cited by 26 publications

References 30 publications

Consumer Awareness, Understanding and Usage of Unit Pricing

Consumer Awareness, Understanding and Usage of Unit Pricing

Why consumers under-use food quantity indicators

Empirical investigation of price setting and quantity surcharges in the German food sector

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