Blind man's bluff: The ethics of quantity surcharges

Gupta, Omprakash K.; Rominger, Anna

doi:10.1007/bf00411815

Cited by 25 publications

(29 citation statements)

References 17 publications

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“…Although initially designed for protective purposes, packaging now plays a major role in product promotion, because it identi es brands, provides ingredients and directions, and conveys information regarding price, quality and quantity (Gupta and Rominger 1996). The problem is that these stimuli can overload consumers and cause them to ignore factual information.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…While surveys reveal that large proportions of consumers desire increasing amounts of product information (Cole and Gaeth 1990), eld experiments indicate that only a small fraction actually use the available information (Muller 1984(Muller , 1985 and that, where packages recommend a speci c usage quantity, consumers ignore such instructions 70 per cent of the time (Friedman 1988). The consumer's mistaken belief in the volume discount heuristic, wherein the unit price of goods packaged in larger quantities is thought to be less than that for smaller packages, is well documented (Nason and Della Bitta 1983;Gupta and Rominger 1996). The consumer's mistaken belief in the volume discount heuristic, wherein the unit price of goods packaged in larger quantities is thought to be less than that for smaller packages, is well documented (Nason and Della Bitta 1983;Gupta and Rominger 1996).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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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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Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

show abstract

“…However, new topics also burgeoned: ethical issues relating to price [PR] (e.g. Gupta and Rominger, 1996;Stieber, 1991), religion [RE] (e.g. Laczniak, 1999), vulnerable consumers [VC] e.g.…”

Section: The 1990smentioning

confidence: 99%

Half a Century of Marketing Ethics: Shifting Perspectives and Emerging Trends

2009

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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%

“…Source: Adapted from Gupta and Rominger (1996) of contact lens solutions. Recently, other disadvantages have been noted in the UK by retailers concerned about the information overload that will result from unit price markings in Sterling and Euros (e.g.…”

Section: Unit Pricing Researchmentioning

confidence: 99%

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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Blind man's bluff: The ethics of quantity surcharges

Cited by 25 publications

References 17 publications

Why consumers under-use food quantity indicators

Why consumers under-use food quantity indicators

Half a Century of Marketing Ethics: Shifting Perspectives and Emerging Trends

Consumer Awareness, Understanding and Usage of Unit Pricing

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