consumer behavior student essay

Consumer Behavior - List of Essay Samples And Topic Ideas

An essay on consumer behavior can analyze the factors influencing consumers’ choices and purchasing decisions. It can discuss consumer psychology, marketing strategies, the impact of advertising, and the role of social, cultural, and economic factors in shaping consumer behavior, highlighting the complexities of understanding and predicting consumer choices. A substantial compilation of free essay instances related to Consumer Behavior you can find at PapersOwl Website. You can use our samples for inspiration to write your own essay, research paper, or just to explore a new topic for yourself.

My Consumer Behavior is Connected

I recently purchased a shirt from Express. Express is an American fashion brand mainly to young men and women. What motivated me to buy the shirt is I need to buy a shirt for the company’s annual gala celebration party at the end of the year. I think my consumer behavior is linked to my self-concept. According to the research, consumers tend to choose and use the brand personality consistent with their actual self-concept, although this matching may be based […]

Consumer Behavior Towards Purchase, Consumption and Disposal

Case studies serve as a useful method in obtaining an overview of a certain case by looking closely at the situation. More and more businesses are utilizing this approach to analyze consumers’ behavior because they serve as a crucial factor that influence the rise and fall of many market industries. When done properly, case study research provides the missing puzzle that enables businesses to analyze errors, find a solution, and yield marketable profits. One example of a case study that […]

The Evolution and Diversity of Pepsi Products

When one thinks of Pepsi, the first image that might spring to mind is a cool, refreshing cola drink. However, delving deeper into the vast world of PepsiCo reveals a diverse range of beverages and snacks that have touched the palates of consumers across the globe. With its origins in the late 19th century as a digestive aid concoction, Pepsi has grown to become an iconic brand that offers a multitude of products catering to varied tastes and preferences. The […]

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Social Psychology of Food Consumption, Health Sciences and Consumer Behavior

The usage behavior of information systems found in the research in the past twenty years has primarily been focused on the beginning of adoption and usage of these systems. In the research the intention-based models were largely used to see how users adopt a particular Information System. Although, the Information System adoption theory in the beginning is accepted in most recent researches but the post adoption usage and continuous behavior has substantive differences from adoption and continuous behavior. Understanding the […]

The Implications of Classical Conditioning for Consumer Behavior

When I think about learning, I picture students in a classroom or lecture hall, with books open on their desks and them listening intently to a teacher or professor in the front of the room. But in psychology, learning means something else. To psychologists, learning is a long-term change in behavior that is based on experience. Two of the main types of learning are called classical conditioning and operant conditioning. Classical conditioning is defined as, a learning process that occurs […]

Whether Consumers are Loyal to the Product Depending on the Area of Behavior

Brand Origin Knowledge or BoK is a term used to see if the customers can identify the product’s origin. It’s an important term in Consumer Behavior and is used to learn if the consumers are loyal towards a product based on its origin. If we specifically look at the “2016 Ranking of Top 100 Brand”, we can see that 5 out of the first 10 big brands comes under technology department. This shows how the category of technology is evolving […]

Data that Corporations Collect about Consumer Behavior

Resource consumption is a critical factor recognized by social scientists as contributing to environmental damage. It is also considered a major threat to the sustainability of the world's environmental systems (Brown). It's taken a century of research and data to convince the vast majority - even in the scientific community - that human activity can alter our entire planet's climate (History). Now it is more evident and efforts are being made to address climate change and to transition to a […]

Consumer Behavior and Responses to Situations

There are many reasons why contributing to academic research is important, including this survey we just completed. Considering the Psychology department here at Pace University is analyzing students and their life experiences / well being, who better to participate in the survey than actual students themselves. The difference in your average student vs. someone in the workfield or of younger generations is massive. Consumer behavior and responses to situations are indeed quite contrasting. Another contributing factor, is time. SIMMONS is […]

Mass Market and Consumer Culture Products

Industrialization was the cause for Modernity in today's Design because Industrisation gave way to Mass production in which goods could be produced more efficiently for Mass Market and goods could be afforded by the middle class in something known as Consumer Culture. These goods became objects of conspicuous consumption wherein one could display their class, social status or role in any given community. This rise in buying a practice and new opportunities led Designers to believe they had a greater […]

Type of Consumer Behavior

The topic of this paper will be minimalism, specifically minimalism as a movement in which people find meaning in life by consuming less and more responsibly. Minimalism challenges excessive consumption and unethical practices within capitalism. On an individual level, minimalism encourages consumers to think rationally and critically about their own purchases. Additionally, minimalism is often seen as a way to achieve happiness by decluttering and returning to important personal values. Many other terms have been proposed to define this type […]

Consumer Behavior Internet Exercise

Introduction  The purpose of this paper is to compare two general interest or entertainment websites, and two company websites that show advertisements. For each category, I will define each of the selected websites to describe what they entail and how each of these incorporate their ads. I will then select one of their ads and will discuss how that particular ad triggers problem recognition for their intended audience. General Interest / Entertainment Web Site The two general-interest and entertainment websites […]

Understanding Consumer Behavior: the PepsiCo and Frito-Lay Connection

In the panorama of the global snack food sector, Frito-Lay stands as a titan, with its offerings – ranging from the iconic Lay's potato chips to the cheesy delight of Cheetos – ubiquitous in grocery store aisles and snack cupboards worldwide. But who holds sway over this snack giant? The answer lies with the conglomerate synonymous not only with snack foods but also with a wide array of consumer goods: PepsiCo. The trajectory of Frito-Lay's journey to becoming a subsidiary […]

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Consumer Behavior Essay

Executive summary, consumer preference, budget constraint, consumer choice, works cited, key question.

The aim of this paper is to explain consumer behavior, in terms of how consumers allocate their limited incomes to buy various goods and services. The paper will focus on the factors that influence consumer behavior.

People have numerous wants, but their resources are limited. Consequently, they can not satisfy all their wants. Consumers have to decide on how to allocate the limited resources in order to satisfy the numerous wants. However, the right decision has to be made in order to avoid wastage of resources and to achieve the highest level of satisfaction.

Thus, it is important to investigate the factors that influence allocation of resources or consumer behavior. Additionally, understanding consumer behavior helps manufacturers to produce goods that meet the consumers’ expectations.

Consumer behavior will be analyzed by reviewing secondary literature. In particular, existing literature will be used to explain how consumer preference and budget constraint affect consumer choice. The secondary sources of information will include textbooks, journals and research reports on consumer behavior.

Discussion of Sources

A lot of written literature already exists on the factors that influence consumer behavior. The effect of consumer preference and budget constraint on consumer choice is extensively discussed in microeconomics textbooks and journals. Additionally, the relationship between the two concepts is well documented. However, literature on the exact definition of consumer behavior still lacks.

Key Conclusion

The research reveals that consumer behavior is, mainly, influenced by consumer preference and budget constraint. For a consumer to make the right choice, he must take into account his or her preferences and budget constraint.

Consumer Behavior

Consumer behavior is “the study of when, why, how and where people do or do not buy a product” (Arnold 34). Consumer behavior explains the purchase decision making process. Individuals have wants that are not only unlimited, but also differ in intensity. However, individuals have scarce resources or limited disposable income to spend on their wants.

Additionally, the available resources have competing alternative uses. Due to the scarcity of resources, individuals can not satisfy all their wants. Thus, the consumer has to make a choice on which wants to be satisfied first and those that can be satisfied later. The decision on what to buy is determined by the consumer’s preference.

Consumer preference describes the bundle of goods and services that a consumer prefers to purchase in the market (Krugman and Wells 56). Product preference arises because human beings, naturally, have different tastes and preferences (Champniss). Consumers’ preferences are linked to the experience of using the product in terms of the product’s functionality and benefits.

This means that the preferred product must satisfy the consumer’s demands such as personality and emotions (House, Gao and Spreen 450-464). Thus, consumer preference is determined by the level of satisfaction or utility derived from consuming the good or service. Utility refers to the ability of a product to satisfy the wants of the consumer.

In economics, the consumer is assumed to be a rational being. Thus, the consumer will aim at maximizing utility or satisfaction by spending his or her limited disposal income. The marginal utility derived from the use of a particular product diminishes as more of that product is consumed. Marginal utility refers to the additional utility obtained by consuming an extra unity of a product. However, the marginal utility of money is constant.

Apart from utility, consumer preference is also influenced by the consumer’s budget (Arnold 47). For example, when a person is purchasing an automobile, he or she must first decide on the preferred brand or model. This decision is often based on the performance or attributes of the available automobile models. However, the various types or models of automobile have different prices.

Besides, the consumer has limited cash to spend on the automobile. Thus, the consumer has to match his preference with his or her budget (Perner). In this context, the consumer may decide to purchase an automobile model that is associated with less satisfaction if the ideal model costs more than the consumer can afford. This is based on the fact that the consumer can not spend more than he or she has in terms of disposable income. Hence, consumers satisfy their wants or maximize utility subject to a budget constraint.

A budget constraint refers to the bundle of goods and services that can be purchased at the prevailing prices with the available disposable income (Krugman and Wells 56). The consumer normally chooses a combination of goods and services that he can purchase with the available income in order to achieve the highest level of satisfaction or utility.

Budget constraint depends on the consumer’s income. A consumer with low disposable income will have a highly constrained budget. This means that the consumer’s budget will allow him to purchase only a few goods and services. A consumer with a high disposable income, on the other hand, will have a less constrained budget. This implies that the consumer’s budget will enable him to purchase a relatively large number of goods.

Budgets are influenced by the prices of goods and services (Kim 203-205). According to the law of demand, the consumer will buy more of a product as the price of that product reduces and vice versa. Thus, in order to remain at the same level of satisfaction, a consumer facing a given budget constraint will consume less of a product whose price has increased (Kim 203-205).

Additionally, the consumer will increase the consumption of the product whose price has reduced. The consumer’s budget also determines the type of goods and services he can purchase. For example, the type of residence demanded by a university student depends on his disposable income.

A student with a lot of financial resources can choose to stay in a rented apartment. Assuming that a rented apartment is more comfortable than any other residential alternative, the student will be able to derive the highest level of utility since his budget is not financially constrained. A student with little financial resources can choose to stay in students’ hostels at the university. In this case, the student’s decision is informed by the fact that the financial constrain on his budget can not allow him to rent a better residence.

Finally, a student with no income to spend on accommodation can decide to stay at home and commute to the university on a daily basis. Thus, budget constraint influences the consumer’s product preference or the type of a product that the consumer can purchase. The influence of budget constraint is reflected in consumers’ choice.

Consumer choice refers to the ultimate decision on what to buy. It takes into account the consumer’s preferences and budget constraint (Krugman and Wells 65). As stated earlier, the consumer has unlimited wants and limited resources. Consequently, the consumer has to make a trade-off in his purchase decisions.

In order to make the right trade-off, the consumer must combine his budget constraint and his preference (Parkinson and Goodall 236-244). In this context, the budget constraint represents what the consumer can afford while the preferences represent what the consumer would like to purchase or consume (Parkinson and Goodall 236-244). The trade-off involves consuming more units of one good and less units of another good in order to maintain the same level of satisfaction or utility.

The optimal choice of goods and services is one that enables the consumer to derive the highest level of utility. At the optimum position (choice), the marginal rate of substitution (MRS) is equivalent to the relative prices of the goods and services in the market. MRS refers to the rate at which an individual is willing to trade-off a given set of goods and services.

Consumer choice is determined by the consumer’s level of income. The financial constrain on the budget will reduce if the consumer’s income rises and vice versa (Arnold 67). Thus, consumers with a high income can choose from a wider variety of goods and services than consumers with low income. Additionally, the consumer with a higher income can purchase more goods and services than the consumer with low income (Arnold 58).

Consumer choice is also determined by the product prices since price changes affect the budget constraint (HKTDC). Price changes affect consumer’s choices in two ways namely, the substitution effect and income effect.

Substitution effect occurs when the consumer buys more of cheap goods and less of expensive goods. In a nutshell, the expensive goods are substituted with the cheap goods (Krugman and Wells 78). Income effect occurs when the price change affects the total amount of goods that can be purchased with the available disposable income.

For example, a rise in tuition fee by 2% will affect a student’s budget and expenditure choices. The rise in tuition fee means that the student will have less money to spend on other items such as clothes. Thus, in order to purchase clothes and pay the new tuition fee, the student has to reorganize his budget. The reorganization will involve making a trade-off between the tuition fee and the clothes. The student may reduce his expenditure on clothes in order to allocate more money for the new tuition fee.

The purpose of this paper was to analyze consumer behavior by investigating why people consider particular purchases and the factors that influence consumer’s purchase decisions. As discussed earlier, consumer behavior refers to the process of making purchase decisions (Krugman and Wells 45).

The purchase decisions are influenced by consumer preference and budget constraint. Consumer preference refers to the goods or services that a consumer would like to purchase. Budget constraint, on the other hand, refers to the amount of goods and services that the consumer can afford. Thus, the consumer’s choice must take into account the preference and budget constraint (House, Gao and Spreen 450-464). This involves making a trade-off between the goods to be bought with the limited income.

Arnold, Roger. Microeconomics. New York: McGraw-Hill, 2008. Print.

Champniss, Guy. How can we Change Consumer Behavior to Benefit the Environment? Guardian Sustainable Business, 3 Nov. 2011. Web.

HKTDC. Changes in Consumer Behavior in Traditional Markets and Implications for Hong Kong Exporters . HKTDC, 12 Sept. 2009. Web.

House, Lisa, Zhifery Gao and Thomas Spreen. “Consumer Preference for Mandrins: Implications for Sensory Analysis.” Agribusiness 27.4 (2011): 450-464. Print.

Kim, Youn. “Alternative Specifications of Consumer Intertemporal Budget Constraint and Measures of Wealth and Savings.” Applied Economics 7.3 (2000): 203-205. Print.

Krugman, Paul and Robin Wells. Microeconomics. New York: McGraw-Hill, 2010. Print.

Parkinson, Bonny and Stephen Goodall. “Considering Consumer Choices in the Economic Evaluations of Mandatory Health Programs.” Health Policy 101.3 (2011): 236-244. Print.

Perner, Lars. Consumer Behavior: The Psychology of Marketing . Encyclopedia of Psychology, 1 Jan. 2012. Web.

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Essay Samples on Consumer Behavior

The importance of brand loyalty in business success.

Brand loyalty reflects the connection between a product and a customer's willingness to repeatedly purchase it. A customer is considered loyal when they show commitment to a specific brand, indicating positive sentiments towards the product or company. Loyalty is demonstrated through consistent support for a...

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The Sharing Economy - a New Paradigm in Consumerism

With the rise in technology, people are able to communicate and conduct business through the use of the Internet and social networks. This has led to a sharing economy, where consumers can connect and exchange goods and services. Starting a company in a shared economy...

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Misleading Marketing Schemes in Australia and Their Impact

Marketing is the culprit of generating obesity. Marketing is detrimental to children’s health. Marketing is the culprit. Our country has been slammed with misleading marketing schemes and it is unacceptable. Marketers are using popular methods to wrongly entice young children to buy their products. An...

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The Role That Consumer Behavior Plays on Advertising and Cancel Culture

Society has been conditioned into a consumer culture by advertising outlets since the beginning of time. Advertising in mass media is common to all in America. The mediums for advertising include television, internet, radio, print media and mobile app platforms. Through various marketing methods, advertising...

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The Characteristics of a Consumer Society in the UK by Zygmunt Bauman and Sharon Zukin

From around the 1970’s and 1980’s, the society in the UK shifted their economy from one focused on industrial, mass production and consumption to a more services-based society characterised by what it consumed. Since then, society has become defined not only by what it consumes...

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Consumer Satisfaction and Brand Loyalty

Consumer satisfaction is basic to long pull trade achievement, and one of the most every now and research into subjects in marketing. Since consumer satisfaction has been respected a crucial determinant of long haul business achievement, a great part of the examination on consumer satisfaction...

Consumer Behavior and Satisfaction Toward Different Soap Brands

At this time of globalization, all industrial companies of many countries are competing vigorously at global level. Information technology, global communication and transportation has also become advance in global market. Global rivalry trend is not ending with open market economy. Brands are being sold all...

Usage Of Cultural Capital To Link Socioeconomic Position And Food

Literature Review: Cause Related Marketing In the post-modern era, where the consumers have so many options to choose from, it has become very problematic for organizations to differentiate themselves from the crowd. Thus, to separate itself from this clutter, companies have now started going in...

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The Political and Technological Intervention into the Dunkin' Donuts' Strategy

Dunkin Donuts was founded in 1950, when Bill Rosenberg, a local New Englander opened the first of many Dunkin’ Donuts restaurants in Quincy, Massachusetts. A couple of years done the road in 1955, the first Dunkin’ Donuts franchise was opened and since then the brand...

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Contouring and Highlighting Our Knowledge of Makeup

Makeup is a form art, it is a form of self-expression, self-love and self-confidence, it used to enhance one’s facial features to create their desired look. I will discuss the roots of makeup and how it has created a massive impact overtime and through recent...

Consumer Behavior of Gen X and Millenial Costumers Regarding Perfume Industry

Introduction “A good fragrance is really a powerful cocktail of memories and emotion” (Jeffrey Stepakoff, 2011). The understanding and selection of fragrances involve complications. It is not only simply choosing a fragrance for specific purposes such as party fragrance, job fragrance or casual fragrance for...

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Should Travel Agents Offer Discounted Rates on Black Friday

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Empowering Ethical Consumer Activism: A Transformation in Contemporary Society

In this essay, I shall argue and elucidate how the transformations in contemporary society have impacted the burgeoning concept of consumer activism. As a result, new risks and positive aspects have emerged for the involved stakeholders, including business organizations, consumers, and employees. Consumer activism encompasses...

The Conceptual Model of Transition-Self

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Benefits of Business Ethics Practices in Corporate Organisations

Business ethics is the study of suitable business policies and practices that influence behaviour. Business ethics, if adhered to, ensures a certain level of trust between consumers and corporations, guaranteeing the public fair and equal treatment (see Alexandra Twin, 2019). The concept of business ethics...

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A Study on Consumer Behaviour in Footwear Industry

Background of the Study Consumer market includes all the individuals and households who buy or acquire goods and services for personal consumption. According to Kotler and Armstrong (2010), currently, the world consumer market consists of more than 6.6 billion people who annually consume an estimated...

The Research on the Aftermath of Watching Television and Consumer Behavior

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Investigation Of "Nudges" Richard Thaler Argues About In Behavioral Economics And Marketing

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Relocation Of Consumables May Prove To Help Business

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The Factors Of Consumers’ Preferences To Streamable TV Vs Using Cable Companies

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The Use Of Nudge Theory To Influence Consumers

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Analyzing Consumer Behavior: The Role of Perceptions in Marketing

Perceptions play a crucial role in the field of marketing as they shape consumers' attitudes, beliefs, and behaviors towards products, brands, and organizations. Marketers understand that how consumers perceive their offerings can have a significant impact on their success in the marketplace. This essay delves...

Relationship Between Customer Satisfaction And Revisit Intention

When a customer visits a certain enterprise and holds the desire to visit the mentioned enterprise yet again then that intent of the customer is known as revisit intention (Bach and Eichner, 1999). This is the definition of the variable. Behavioral intention is regularly utilized...

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The Effects Of Beliefs And Attitudes On Consumers’ Decisions

The effects of beliefs and attitudes should not be underestimated as they can severely affect consumers’ decisions. As stated in the article, as a result of superstition, Chinese consumers gain a belief that the number ‘4’ is inauspicious. Hence they perceive that products associated with...

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The Effect Of Consumption Experience On Individuals And Society

Consumer behaviour is vital in aspect of marketing. It is the study of how and why people make decisions about what they need to purchase, use and dispose regarding goods, services or a company. This essay will examine the effect of consumption experience on individuals...

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Best topics on Consumer Behavior

1. The Importance of Brand Loyalty in Business Success

2. The Sharing Economy – a New Paradigm in Consumerism

3. Misleading Marketing Schemes in Australia and Their Impact

4. The Role That Consumer Behavior Plays on Advertising and Cancel Culture

5. The Characteristics of a Consumer Society in the UK by Zygmunt Bauman and Sharon Zukin

6. Consumer Satisfaction and Brand Loyalty

7. Consumer Behavior and Satisfaction Toward Different Soap Brands

8. Usage Of Cultural Capital To Link Socioeconomic Position And Food

9. The Political and Technological Intervention into the Dunkin’ Donuts’ Strategy

10. Contouring and Highlighting Our Knowledge of Makeup

11. Consumer Behavior of Gen X and Millenial Costumers Regarding Perfume Industry

12. Should Travel Agents Offer Discounted Rates on Black Friday

13. Empowering Ethical Consumer Activism: A Transformation in Contemporary Society

14. The Conceptual Model of Transition-Self

15. Benefits of Business Ethics Practices in Corporate Organisations

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Essay: Consumer Behaviour

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Consumer Behaviour

Perusal of the literature shows that a broad frame of reference for pricing and availability is not adequately developed in the context of study. These studies have focused on few aspects of consumer behaviour with differing perspective. Although researchers agree that the study of understanding contrasting factors defining buying behaviour in rural viz.-a-viz. setup is interesting and important, there is currently little agreement about how best to define these potentially different factors, and hence understand, the psychology of consumer behaviour from the angle of price sensitivity and availability, in particular. This thesis is an attempt to have an integrated and fresh look into the area. When suggesting that people may form buying habit by considering price, such behaviour is not irrational, In the current environmental setup, how consumer perceives price rises and alters their behaviour to insulate themselves from monetary losses, the impact of prices on consumption. It empirically attempts to verify this strong actual correlation. We examine another research stream whether buyer patronize products that are available, although sufficient literature exist in defining availability and related areas in specific context, however, referring the rich body of available literature, including earlier reviews that had relatively limited perspectives, we hypothesize that availability redefined may have its impact on forming consumption habits for the consumer.

The literature on pricing & availability is classified on the basis of the contextual problem in forming buying habits. Researcher objective is to present a comprehensive integrated view on research problem to facilitate further research and practice. To meet this objective, we de’ne few relevant terms with review of earlier research or define them appropriately. .In this chapter, researcher summarize the research gaps identified in the literature on Pricing & Availability and their impact on consumption. It will describe the research questions in detail and explain the logic undergirding the theoretical framework of my research. Literature review will derive underpinning framework to establish justification for the study so that research is theoretically fertile and managerially relevant.

2.2 Consumer Behaviour (J. F. Engel, 1986) defines consumer behaviour as ‘those acts of individuals directly involved in obtaining, using, and disposing of economic goods and services, including the decision processes that precede and determine these acts’. An elementary observation of this definition contributes a limited wisdom into the complex nature of consumer choice process. Consumer Behaviour is the discipline developing to study ‘of the processes involved when either individuals or groups select, purchase, use, or dispose of products, services, ideas, or experiences to satisfy their needs and desires’ (Solomon, 1995). In perspective of marketing, the term ‘consumer’ refers the purchase action and aggregation of possible patterns pre-purchase and post purchase behaviour. Pre-purchase action includes the awareness and searching information to evaluate different products or services, which may potentially satisfy the need or want. Post purchase behaviour is an action essentially to evaluate the performance of purchased item viz.-a-viz. expectations thereof and lessen the angst. These behaviour have consequential implications on consumers repurchase behaviour, therefore they are agreeable to marketer, of course in different scale (Foxall, 1995). Social science researcher have been desiring for far more cultivated and refined theoretical concepts and techniques for analysing consumer behaviour. This provides for better understanding of behaviour, more accurate indicator of futuristic view and ensures effective discipline on consumer behaviour. (D. Marsden, 1998) suggests to elucidate conceptually undergirded framework for consumer behaviour, understanding of fundamenatal paradigms in consumer research and their sequential evolution is important. Paradigms can be safely studied as hypotheses researcher create to answer what to study and how to go about it (Kuhn, 1962). As discussed here, a set of dimensions can be classified to portray and explain contrasts in the various views on consumer behaviour. With advent and gradual evolution of discipline of consumer behavior, researcher drew from various disciplines such as psychology, sociology, psycho-sociology to social literature (Solomon, 1995). The reason for involving different discipline by social science researcher is to approach consumer issues from different angles and dimensions. Apart from many disciplinary approaches, fundamentally consumer behavior orientation can be safely bifurcated on the basis of their inherent emphasis on intrinsic forces, of which theories are taken from psychology and extrinsic forces have their underpinning in sociology discipline. Besides this focus of analysis ‘ consumer attitude differs is fundamental premise, and therefore, different aspects of consumption behavior are described by various approaches.

Consumer research has been looked as growing sub discipline of marketing with an ambition to establish its pivotal application in the area of marketing, thus, study of consumer behavior or consumer research has been regarded as discipline of applied social science. In this context, the evaluation of insight or understanding generated of consumer and their behaviour is solely on its pragmatic application to improve the efficacy of marketing.

With this understanding, marketing management essentially has bearing in few concepts of how consumers behave and their response to marketer’s product, price, promotion and distribution and its likely impact on the organizational objective. In developed and rich economies, the accomplishment of marketing is not driven as much by merely controlling marketing mix rather in addition is willingness of consumers to patronize, better then the competitor. Consumer orientation marketing is the result of abundant choices and discretionary power exercised by the consumer. (Foxall, Consumer Behaviour , 1987), choice decision taken by consumer do not have implication just for competing industries, rather, it is expanded beyond the conventional definition of traditional industry and markets.

2.2.1 The Traditional Perspectives on Consumer Research

First part primarily discusses the paradigms emerged in consumer research in the period of traditional positivism, and hence earlier developed buyer behavior models proposed by economists are exhibited and later will be pursued by conventional viewpoints. These perspectives are essentially observable by behavior, mental, character/attitudinal and situational lastly. Comprehensively, the ambition of this portion is to frame attributes and key arguments of these viewpoints. An analysis of perspective is following in part two, however conventional perspective with inherent diversity in many aspects is found to be similar in terms of their fundamentals; Philosophical and methodological while exploring consumer behavior, i.e. the platform foundation is rationalism and adhere to the principle of traditional positivism in consumer research.

2.2.2 The Rational Perspective

Traditionally, economists have influenced the buyer behavior modeling and economics viewed consumer behavior as solo act of purchasing and after purchase actions. This theory dictates that purchase decision is result of balanced and attentive economic calculations. Thus, buyer seeks to spend resources on those goods that will deliver the maximum utility (satisfaction) according to his preferences and relative price. The events of this viewpoint can be found in (A. Smith, 1776, A. Marshall, Principles of Economics., 1975) This theoretical work aimed to simplify acceptance and examine the effects of change in one variables I,e, price while keeping all other variables constant.

‘Marginal-Utility Model’ based on Marshal theory was pragmatic to give explanation of behavioral assumption that lower the price will result into higher sales of the goods, however this assumption does not hold valid when assuming all individuals are calculating machines while taking their purchase decision. The Marshal model overlooks the fundamental probe in, essentially, how product and brand preferences are formed.

(H.J.Westing, 1975) Pure economics cannot provide all logical explanations to alterations in sales numbers, various sub-viewpoints within the field are apt to offer explanations for psychological, preferential, and accumulated demand alterations. As an example, the empirical analysis of economic variable for choice has been good in providing rationally explaining the changes in consumer behaviors. (A. Lewis, 1995) Many research studies have Several studies have described the effect of price on brand preference, changes in product attributes and respective demand variation, price-demand elasticity and goods shortage on consumer choice behavior. Paradigm such as learning theory, reiterate that internal factors influence the consumer behavior rather than external factors, which fundamentally justifies the economic purview of behavior which forms the basis of rationalism.

2.2.3 The Behavioral Viewpoint

As discussed, an opposition to the economic view which highlights the significance of internal cognitive process, the behavioral viewpoint accentuates the role of external factors in learning which causes decision making. Therefore, consumer behavior is a conditioned response to external stimuli. Therefore, behavioral viewpoint emphasizes on external attributes such as advertising that catalyze consumer reaction with learning. (J.P. Peter, 1982) The long term focus of behavior theories, is to arrange behavior m for example, are to arrange a set of expanded behavior alteration tools which can be employed for influencing or controlling consumer behavior.

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The past, present, and future of consumer research

• Published: 13 June 2020
• Volume 31 , pages 137–149, ( 2020 )

Cite this article

• Maayan S. Malter   ORCID: orcid.org/0000-0003-0383-7925 1 ,
• Morris B. Holbrook 1 ,
• Barbara E. Kahn 2 ,
• Jeffrey R. Parker 3 &
• Donald R. Lehmann 1  

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In this article, we document the evolution of research trends (concepts, methods, and aims) within the field of consumer behavior, from the time of its early development to the present day, as a multidisciplinary area of research within marketing. We describe current changes in retailing and real-world consumption and offer suggestions on how to use observations of consumption phenomena to generate new and interesting consumer behavior research questions. Consumption continues to change with technological advancements and shifts in consumers’ values and goals. We cannot know the exact shape of things to come, but we polled a sample of leading scholars and summarize their predictions on where the field may be headed in the next twenty years.

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1 Introduction

Beginning in the late 1950s, business schools shifted from descriptive and practitioner-focused studies to more theoretically driven and academically rigorous research (Dahl et al. 1959 ). As the field expanded from an applied form of economics to embrace theories and methodologies from psychology, sociology, anthropology, and statistics, there was an increased emphasis on understanding the thoughts, desires, and experiences of individual consumers. For academic marketing, this meant that research not only focused on the decisions and strategies of marketing managers but also on the decisions and thought processes on the other side of the market—customers.

Since then, the academic study of consumer behavior has evolved and incorporated concepts and methods, not only from marketing at large but also from related social science disciplines, and from the ever-changing landscape of real-world consumption behavior. Its position as an area of study within a larger discipline that comprises researchers from diverse theoretical backgrounds and methodological training has stirred debates over its identity. One article describes consumer behavior as a multidisciplinary subdiscipline of marketing “characterized by the study of people operating in a consumer role involving acquisition, consumption, and disposition of marketplace products, services, and experiences” (MacInnis and Folkes 2009 , p. 900).

This article reviews the evolution of the field of consumer behavior over the past half century, describes its current status, and predicts how it may evolve over the next twenty years. Our review is by no means a comprehensive history of the field (see Schumann et al. 2008 ; Rapp and Hill 2015 ; Wang et al. 2015 ; Wilkie and Moore 2003 , to name a few) but rather focuses on a few key thematic developments. Though we observe many major shifts during this period, certain questions and debates have persisted: Does consumer behavior research need to be relevant to marketing managers or is there intrinsic value from studying the consumer as a project pursued for its own sake? What counts as consumption: only consumption from traditional marketplace transactions or also consumption in a broader sense of non-marketplace interactions? Which are the most appropriate theoretical traditions and methodological tools for addressing questions in consumer behavior research?

2 A brief history of consumer research over the past sixty years—1960 to 2020

In 1969, the Association for Consumer Research was founded and a yearly conference to share marketing research specifically from the consumer’s perspective was instituted. This event marked the culmination of the growing interest in the topic by formalizing it as an area of research within marketing (consumer psychology had become a formalized branch of psychology within the APA in 1960). So, what was consumer behavior before 1969? Scanning current consumer-behavior doctoral seminar syllabi reveals few works predating 1969, with most of those coming from psychology and economics, namely Herbert Simon’s A Behavioral Model of Rational Choice (1955), Abraham Maslow’s A Theory of Human Motivation (1943), and Ernest Dichter’s Handbook of Consumer Motivations (1964). In short, research that illuminated and informed our understanding of consumer behavior prior to 1969 rarely focused on marketing-specific topics, much less consumers or consumption (Dichter’s handbook being a notable exception). Yet, these works were crucial to the rise of consumer behavior research because, in the decades after 1969, there was a shift within academic marketing to thinking about research from a behavioral or decision science perspective (Wilkie and Moore 2003 ). The following section details some ways in which this shift occurred. We draw on a framework proposed by the philosopher Larry Laudan ( 1986 ), who distinguished among three inter-related aspects of scientific inquiry—namely, concepts (the relevant ideas, theories, hypotheses, and constructs); methods (the techniques employed to test and validate these concepts); and aims (the purposes or goals that motivate the investigation).

2.1 Key concepts in the late - 1960s

During the late-1960s, we tended to view the buyer as a computer-like machine for processing information according to various formal rules that embody economic rationality to form a preference for one or another option in order to arrive at a purchase decision. This view tended to manifest itself in a couple of conspicuous ways. The first was a model of buyer behavior introduced by John Howard in 1963 in the second edition of his marketing textbook and quickly adopted by virtually every theorist working in our field—including, Howard and Sheth (of course), Engel-Kollat-&-Blackwell, Franco Nicosia, Alan Andreasen, Jim Bettman, and Joel Cohen. Howard’s great innovation—which he based on a scheme that he had found in the work of Plato (namely, the linkages among Cognition, Affect, and Conation)—took the form of a boxes-and-arrows formulation heavily influenced by the approach to organizational behavior theory that Howard (University of Pittsburgh) had picked up from Herbert Simon (Carnegie Melon University). The model represented a chain of events

where I = inputs of information (from advertising, word-of-mouth, brand features, etc.); C = cognitions (beliefs or perceptions about a brand); A = Affect (liking or preference for the brand); B = behavior (purchase of the brand); and S = satisfaction (post-purchase evaluation of the brand that feeds back onto earlier stages of the sequence, according to a learning model in which reinforced behavior tends to be repeated). This formulation lay at the heart of Howard’s work, which he updated, elaborated on, and streamlined over the remainder of his career. Importantly, it informed virtually every buyer-behavior model that blossomed forth during the last half of the twentieth century.

To represent the link between cognitions and affect, buyer-behavior researchers used various forms of the multi-attribute attitude model (MAAM), originally proposed by psychologists such as Fishbein and Rosenberg as part of what Fishbein and Ajzen ( 1975 ) called the theory of reasoned action. Under MAAM, cognitions (beliefs about brand attributes) are weighted by their importance and summed to create an explanation or prediction of affect (liking for a brand or preference for one brand versus another), which in turn determines behavior (choice of a brand or intention to purchase a brand). This took the work of economist Kelvin Lancaster (with whom Howard interacted), which assumed attitude was based on objective attributes, and extended it to include subjective ones (Lancaster 1966 ; Ratchford 1975 ). Overall, the set of concepts that prevailed in the late-1960s assumed the buyer exhibited economic rationality and acted as a computer-like information-processing machine when making purchase decisions.

2.2 Favored methods in the late-1960s

The methods favored during the late-1960s tended to be almost exclusively neo-positivistic in nature. That is, buyer-behavior research adopted the kinds of methodological rigor that we associate with the physical sciences and the hypothetico-deductive approaches advocated by the neo-positivistic philosophers of science.

Thus, the accepted approaches tended to be either experimental or survey based. For example, numerous laboratory studies tested variations of the MAAM and focused on questions about how to measure beliefs, how to weight the beliefs, how to combine the weighted beliefs, and so forth (e.g., Beckwith and Lehmann 1973 ). Here again, these assumed a rational economic decision-maker who processed information something like a computer.

Seeking rigor, buyer-behavior studies tended to be quantitative in their analyses, employing multivariate statistics, structural equation models, multidimensional scaling, conjoint analysis, and other mathematically sophisticated techniques. For example, various attempts to test the ICABS formulation developed simultaneous (now called structural) equation models such as those deployed by Farley and Ring ( 1970 , 1974 ) to test the Howard and Sheth ( 1969 ) model and by Beckwith and Lehmann ( 1973 ) to measure halo effects.

2.3 Aims in the late-1960s

During this time period, buyer-behavior research was still considered a subdivision of marketing research, the purpose of which was to provide insights useful to marketing managers in making strategic decisions. Essentially, every paper concluded with a section on “Implications for Marketing Managers.” Authors who failed to conform to this expectation could generally count on having their work rejected by leading journals such as the Journal of Marketing Research ( JMR ) and the Journal of Marketing ( JM ).

2.4 Summary—the three R’s in the late-1960s

Starting in the late-1960s to the early-1980s, virtually every buyer-behavior researcher followed the traditional approach to concepts, methods, and aims, now encapsulated under what we might call the three R’s —namely, rationality , rigor , and relevance . However, as we transitioned into the 1980s and beyond, that changed as some (though by no means all) consumer researchers began to expand their approaches and to evolve different perspectives.

2.5 Concepts after 1980

In some circles, the traditional emphasis on the buyer’s rationality—that is, a view of the buyer as a rational-economic, decision-oriented, information-processing, computer-like machine for making choices—began to evolve in at least two primary ways.

First, behavioral economics (originally studied in marketing under the label Behavioral Decision Theory)—developed in psychology by Kahneman and Tversky, in economics by Thaler, and applied in marketing by a number of forward-thinking theorists (e.g., Eric Johnson, Jim Bettman, John Payne, Itamar Simonson, Jay Russo, Joel Huber, and more recently, Dan Ariely)—challenged the rationality of consumers as decision-makers. It was shown that numerous commonly used decision heuristics depart from rational choice and are exceptions to the traditional assumptions of economic rationality. This trend shed light on understanding consumer financial decision-making (Prelec and Loewenstein 1998 ; Gourville 1998 ; Lynch Jr 2011 ) and how to develop “nudges” to help consumers make better decisions for their personal finances (summarized in Johnson et al. 2012 ).

Second, the emerging experiential view (anticipated by Alderson, Levy, and others; developed by Holbrook and Hirschman, and embellished by Schmitt, Pine, and Gilmore, and countless followers) regarded consumers as flesh-and-blood human beings (rather than as information-processing computer-like machines), focused on hedonic aspects of consumption, and expanded the concepts embodied by ICABS (Table 1 ).

2.6 Methods after 1980

The two burgeoning areas of research—behavioral economics and experiential theories—differed in their methodological approaches. The former relied on controlled randomized experiments with a focus on decision strategies and behavioral outcomes. For example, experiments tested the process by which consumers evaluate options using information display boards and “Mouselab” matrices of aspects and attributes (Payne et al. 1988 ). This school of thought also focused on behavioral dependent measures, such as choice (Huber et al. 1982 ; Simonson 1989 ; Iyengar and Lepper 2000 ).

The latter was influenced by post-positivistic philosophers of science—such as Thomas Kuhn, Paul Feyerabend, and Richard Rorty—and approaches expanded to include various qualitative techniques (interpretive, ethnographic, humanistic, and even introspective methods) not previously prominent in the field of consumer research. These included:

Interpretive approaches —such as those drawing on semiotics and hermeneutics—in an effort to gain a richer understanding of the symbolic meanings involved in consumption experiences;

Ethnographic approaches — borrowed from cultural anthropology—such as those illustrated by the influential Consumer Behavior Odyssey (Belk et al. 1989 ) and its discoveries about phenomena related to sacred aspects of consumption or the deep meanings of collections and other possessions;

Humanistic approaches —such as those borrowed from cultural studies or from literary criticism and more recently gathered together under the general heading of consumer culture theory ( CCT );

Introspective or autoethnographic approaches —such as those associated with a method called subjective personal introspection ( SPI ) that various consumer researchers like Sidney Levy and Steve Gould have pursued to gain insights based on their own private lives.

These qualitative approaches tended not to appear in the more traditional journals such as the Journal of Marketing , Journal of Marketing Research , or Marketing Science . However, newer journals such as Consumption, Markets, & Culture and Marketing Theory began to publish papers that drew on the various interpretive, ethnographic, humanistic, or introspective methods.

2.7 Aims after 1980

In 1974, consumer research finally got its own journal with the launch of the Journal of Consumer Research ( JCR ). The early editors of JCR —especially Bob Ferber, Hal Kassarjian, and Jim Bettman—held a rather divergent attitude about the importance or even the desirability of managerial relevance as a key goal of consumer studies. Under their influence, some researchers began to believe that consumer behavior is a phenomenon worthy of study in its own right—purely for the purpose of understanding it better. The journal incorporated articles from an array of methodologies: quantitative (both secondary data analysis and experimental techniques) and qualitative. The “right” balance between theoretical insight and substantive relevance—which are not in inherent conflict—is a matter of debate to this day and will likely continue to be debated well into the future.

2.8 Summary—the three I’s after 1980

In sum, beginning in the early-1980s, consumer research branched out. Much of the work in consumer studies remained within the earlier tradition of the three R’s—that is, rationality (an information-processing decision-oriented buyer), rigor (neo-positivistic experimental designs and quantitative techniques), and relevance (usefulness to marketing managers). Nonetheless, many studies embraced enlarged views of the three major aspects that might be called the three I’s —that is, irrationality (broadened perspectives that incorporate illogical, heuristic, experiential, or hedonic aspects of consumption), interpretation (various qualitative or “postmodern” approaches), and intrinsic motivation (the joy of pursuing a managerially irrelevant consumer study purely for the sake of satisfying one’s own curiosity, without concern for whether it does or does not help a marketing practitioner make a bigger profit).

3 The present—the consumer behavior field today

3.1 present concepts.

In recent years, technological changes have significantly influenced the nature of consumption as the customer journey has transitioned to include more interaction on digital platforms that complements interaction in physical stores. This shift poses a major conceptual challenge in understanding if and how these technological changes affect consumption. Does the medium through which consumption occurs fundamentally alter the psychological and social processes identified in earlier research? In addition, this shift allows us to collect more data at different stages of the customer journey, which further allows us to analyze behavior in ways that were not previously available.

Revisiting the ICABS framework, many of the previous concepts are still present, but we are now addressing them through a lens of technological change (Table 2 )

. In recent years, a number of concepts (e.g., identity, beliefs/lay theories, affect as information, self-control, time, psychological ownership, search for meaning and happiness, social belonging, creativity, and status) have emerged as integral factors that influence and are influenced by consumption. To better understand these concepts, a number of influential theories from social psychology have been adopted into consumer behavior research. Self-construal (Markus and Kitayama 1991 ), regulatory focus (Higgins 1998 ), construal level (Trope and Liberman 2010 ), and goal systems (Kruglanski et al. 2002 ) all provide social-cognition frameworks through which consumer behavior researchers study the psychological processes behind consumer behavior. This “adoption” of social psychological theories into consumer behavior is a symbiotic relationship that further enhances the theories. Tory Higgins happily stated that he learned more about his own theories from the work of marketing academics (he cited Angela Lee and Michel Pham) in further testing and extending them.

3.2 Present Methods

Not only have technological advancements changed the nature of consumption but they have also significantly influenced the methods used in consumer research by adding both new sources of data and improved analytical tools (Ding et al. 2020 ). Researchers continue to use traditional methods from psychology in empirical research (scale development, laboratory experiments, quantitative analyses, etc.) and interpretive approaches in qualitative research. Additionally, online experiments using participants from panels such as Amazon Mechanical Turk and Prolific have become commonplace in the last decade. While they raise concerns about the quality of the data and about the external validity of the results, these online experiments have greatly increased the speed and decreased the cost of collecting data, so researchers continue to use them, albeit with some caution. Reminiscent of the discussion in the 1970s and 1980s about the use of student subjects, the projectability of the online responses and of an increasingly conditioned “professional” group of online respondents (MTurkers) is a major concern.

Technology has also changed research methodology. Currently, there is a large increase in the use of secondary data thanks to the availability of Big Data about online and offline behavior. Methods in computer science have advanced our ability to analyze large corpuses of unstructured data (text, voice, visual images) in an efficient and rigorous way and, thus, to tap into a wealth of nuanced thoughts, feelings, and behaviors heretofore only accessible to qualitative researchers through laboriously conducted content analyses. There are also new neuro-marketing techniques like eye-tracking, fMRI’s, body arousal measures (e.g., heart rate, sweat), and emotion detectors that allow us to measure automatic responses. Lastly, there has been an increase in large-scale field experiments that can be run in online B2C marketplaces.

3.3 Present Aims

Along with a focus on real-world observations and data, there is a renewed emphasis on managerial relevance. Countless conference addresses and editorials in JCR , JCP , and other journals have emphasized the importance of making consumer research useful outside of academia—that is, to help companies, policy makers, and consumers. For instance, understanding how the “new” consumer interacts over time with other consumers and companies in the current marketplace is a key area for future research. As global and social concerns become more salient in all aspects of life, issues of long-term sustainability, social equality, and ethical business practices have also become more central research topics. Fortunately, despite this emphasis on relevance, theoretical contributions and novel ideas are still highly valued. An appropriate balance of theory and practice has become the holy grail of consumer research.

The effects of the current trends in real-world consumption will increase in magnitude with time as more consumers are digitally native. Therefore, a better understanding of current consumer behavior can give us insights and help predict how it will continue to evolve in the years to come.

4 The future—the consumer behavior field in 2040

The other papers use 2030 as a target year but we asked our survey respondents to make predictions for 2040 and thus we have a different future target year.

Niels Bohr once said, “Prediction is very difficult, especially if it’s about the future.” Indeed, it would be a fool’s errand for a single person to hazard a guess about the state of the consumer behavior field twenty years from now. Therefore, predictions from 34 active consumer researchers were collected to address this task. Here, we briefly summarize those predictions.

4.1 Future Concepts

While few respondents proffered guesses regarding specific concepts that would be of interest twenty years from now, many suggested broad topics and trends they expected to see in the field. Expectations for topics could largely be grouped into three main areas. Many suspected that we will be examining essentially the same core topics, perhaps at a finer-grained level, from different perspectives or in ways that we currently cannot utilize due to methodological limitations (more on methods below). A second contingent predicted that much research would center on the impending crises the world faces today, most mentioning environmental and social issues (the COVID-19 pandemic had not yet begun when these predictions were collected and, unsurprisingly, was not anticipated by any of our respondents). The last group, citing the widely expected profound impact of AI on consumers’ lives, argued that AI and other technology-related topics will be dominant subjects in consumer research circa 2040.

While the topic of technology is likely to be focal in the field, our current expectations for the impact of technology on consumers’ lives are narrower than it should be. Rather than merely offering innumerable conveniences and experiences, it seems likely that technology will begin to be integrated into consumers’ thoughts, identities, and personal relationships—probably sooner than we collectively expect. The integration of machines into humans’ bodies and lives will present the field with an expanding list of research questions that do not exist today. For example, how will the concepts of the self, identity, privacy, and goal pursuit change when web-connected technology seamlessly integrates with human consciousness and cognition? Major questions will also need to be answered regarding philosophy of mind, ethics, and social inequality. We suspect that the impact of technology on consumers and consumer research will be far broader than most consumer-behavior researchers anticipate.

As for broader trends within consumer research, there were two camps: (1) those who expect (or hope) that dominant theories (both current and yet to be developed) will become more integrated and comprehensive and (2) those who expect theoretical contributions to become smaller and smaller, to the point of becoming trivial. Both groups felt that current researchers are filling smaller cracks than before, but disagreed on how this would ultimately be resolved.

4.2 Future Methods

As was the case with concepts, respondents’ expectations regarding consumer-research methodologies in 2030 can also be divided into three broad baskets. Unsurprisingly, many indicated that we would be using many technologies not currently available or in wide use. Perhaps more surprising was that most cited the use of technology such as AI, machine-learning algorithms, and robots in designing—as opposed to executing or analyzing—experiments. (Some did point to the use of technologies such as virtual reality in the actual execution of experiments.) The second camp indicated that a focus on reliable and replicable results (discussed further below) will encourage a greater tendency for pre-registering studies, more use of “Big Data,” and a demand for more studies per paper (versus more papers per topic, which some believe is a more fruitful direction). Finally, the third lot indicated that “real data” would be in high demand, thereby necessitating the use of incentive-compatible, consequential dependent variables and a greater prevalence of field studies in consumer research.

As a result, young scholars would benefit from developing a “toolkit” of methodologies for collecting and analyzing the abundant new data of interest to the field. This includes (but is not limited to) a deep understanding of designing and implementing field studies (Gerber and Green 2012 ), data analysis software (R, Python, etc.), text mining and analysis (Humphreys and Wang 2018 ), and analytical tools for other unstructured forms of data such as image and sound. The replication crisis in experimental research means that future scholars will also need to take a more critical approach to validity (internal, external, construct), statistical power, and significance in their work.

4.3 Future Aims

While there was an air of existential concern about the future of the field, most agreed that the trend will be toward increasing the relevance and reliability of consumer research. Specifically, echoing calls from journals and thought leaders, the respondents felt that papers will need to offer more actionable implications for consumers, managers, or policy makers. However, few thought that this increased focus would come at the expense of theoretical insights, suggesting a more demanding overall standard for consumer research in 2040. Likewise, most felt that methodological transparency, open access to data and materials, and study pre-registration will become the norm as the field seeks to allay concerns about the reliability and meaningfulness of its research findings.

4.4 Summary - Future research questions and directions

Despite some well-justified pessimism, the future of consumer research is as bright as ever. As we revised this paper amidst the COVID-19 pandemic, it was clear that many aspects of marketplace behavior, consumption, and life in general will change as a result of this unprecedented global crisis. Given this, and the radical technological, social, and environmental changes that loom on the horizon, consumer researchers will have a treasure trove of topics to tackle in the next ten years, many of which will carry profound substantive importance. While research approaches will evolve, the core goals will remain consistent—namely, to generate theoretically insightful, empirically supported, and substantively impactful research (Table 3 ).

5 Conclusion

At any given moment in time, the focal concepts, methods, and aims of consumer-behavior scholarship reflect both the prior development of the field and trends in the larger scientific community. However, despite shifting trends, the core of the field has remained constant—namely, to understand the motivations, thought processes, and experiences of individuals as they consume goods, services, information, and other offerings, and to use these insights to develop interventions to improve both marketing strategy for firms and consumer welfare for individuals and groups. Amidst the excitement of new technologies, social trends, and consumption experiences, it is important to look back and remind ourselves of the insights the field has already generated. Effectively integrating these past findings with new observations and fresh research will help the field advance our understanding of consumer behavior.

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Maayan S. Malter, Morris B. Holbrook & Donald R. Lehmann

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Department of Marketing, University of Illinois at Chicago, Chicago, IL, USA

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Malter, M.S., Holbrook, M.B., Kahn, B.E. et al. The past, present, and future of consumer research. Mark Lett 31 , 137–149 (2020). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11002-020-09526-8

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Published : 13 June 2020

Issue Date : September 2020

DOI : https://doi.org/10.1007/s11002-020-09526-8

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100 Hot Consumer Behavior Essay Topics

In this article you will find a brief overview of consumer behavior research and consumer psychology examples as well as a practical guideline on how to write an essay on consumer behavior. Most importantly, this article will provide you with 100 hot consumer behavior essay topics that will make choosing a topic so much easier for you. This list is a real gem if you are looking for:

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Consumer Behavior Research

Consumer behavior is social science that involves marketing, psychology, sociology, ethnography, behavioral economics, and anthropology. The concept of consumer behavior involves intentions, decisions, and actions connected with purchasing goods and services, using them, and disposal activities. In essence, any behavior associated with purchasing anything can be considered as consumer behavior.

When we investigate consumer behavior, the topics of research include, but are not limited to:

• Motives of purchase
• Impact of the society/social group on purchase intentions
• Usage rates
• Possibility of repurchase
• Word of mouth
• Ethnographic factors of consumer behavior
• Methods of impacting and predicting consumer behavior
• Consumer decision styles
• Role of emotions in consumer behavior
• Customer loyalty

Consumer Psychology Examples

In the market environment, customers seek to purchase goods and services to meet their needs, while sellers strive to develop marketing strategies that would be the most impactful in motivating consumers to buy. That being said, marketing strategies are often designed to make the product more appealing to customers by influencing emotions and feelings.

Consumer psychology examples include the ways in which marketing campaigns influence consumer behavior. Appealing to customers by making a marketing campaign touching, emotional, or funny, are all examples of consumer psychology.

Let us consider several examples of consumer psychology, both good and bad, to get a better understanding of how marketing manipulates feelings of customers.

• Successful consumer psychology example

Procter & Gamble’s “Thank you, Mom” Campaign is emotional and strong, focusing on how mothers support their children no matter what. This campaign was tied to the 2018 Winter Olympics and promoted inclusion, diversity, and family values.

• Consumer psychology failure example  

One of the most notable marketing failures of the 2010s is, without a doubt, Pepsi commercial in 2017 . The ad exploited unity, freedom, and diversity as a way to communicate to every customer, depicting a carbonated soda as an element equally important as protest, democracy, and equality. An attempt to manipulate customer feelings was so obvious that the ad was taken down after a severe backlash.

How to Write an Essay on Consumer Behavior: Outline

Generally, just about any essay includes 3 major parts, namely introduction, body paragraph, and conclusion . Whichever of the hot consumer behavior essay topics you choose and whatever length your essay is, you can use the following outline to construct a logically structured essay that will engage your readers and will reflect your topic to the full.

1. Introduction

• Hook – the first sentence or two in your introduction that grabs readers’ attention. Can be a quote, relevant statistical data, interesting fact about your topic, a question, or a strong statement. Hook is like a good ad campaign – it sells the rest of the essay to your readers and motivates them to continue reading. Hook also demonstrates your skills of presenting your topic of choice
• Presentation of the topic – reveal what you will write about. Make sure to be clear and concise
• Topic background – reveal the general perspective in which you will research specific concept or phenomenon
• Thesis statement – a sentence that contains the main idea of your essay
• Transitional hook – typically the last sentence in an introduction that smoothly connects the introduction with body paragraph. Refer to what you will write about in the body paragraph to bridge the introduction with the rest of the paper

2. Body paragraph – the number of body paragraphs can vary depending on essay length, while their general structure and elements are uniform

• Topic sentence – reveal in the nutshell what the paragraph is about
• Details about the sub-topic , such as statistical data, findings from relevant and credible sources, interim conclusions, etc.
• Concluding sentence – summarize the paragraph
• Transition sentence – ensure logical transition between body paragraphs. Concluding and transition sentences can be merged into one sentence.

3. Conclusion – summary of your essay. Don’t simply rewrite your main findings, but reveal them in logical sequence, demonstrating connection among facts, cause and effect relationships, and concepts. Restate your thesis statement with regard to the findings you write about in your body paragraphs.

How to Research Consumer Behavior

Here is a list of 7 unconventional sources of information about consumer behavior that will help you find out more about your chosen topic:

• Customer review websites and customer reviews for different products
• Conduct a survey on survey website, such as Survey Monkey
• Interview your friends, family, or basically anyone you would like to
• Social media pages of brands and customer comments on them
• Blogs on products and brands
• Newspaper articles on market trends
• Your own experience – you are a customer and your opinion is a source of information that matters

Consumer Behavior Essay Do’s and Don’ts

• Research your topic in various sources
• Outline your essay before writing
• Reconsider thesis statement after writing every body paragraph
• Don’t simply paraphrase thesis statement in conclusion, but restate it with regard to information you’ve researched in body paragraph
• Make introduction and conclusion clear and concise, optimal length for each is around 10% of the essay
• Use citations not only to avoid plagiarism, but to demonstrate your dedication and hard work researching your topic
• Write your introduction after completing the body paragraph and conclusion – this is a secure way to write an introduction that represents your paper in the best way possible because you know what the paper is about
• Proofread your essay to make sure you avoid grammar mistakes
• Rely solely on your opinion, opinions of your interviewees, or results of a survey if you conduct one – it is unprofessional and you will most likely miss a lot of aspects of the topic
• Write lengthy intros and conclusions – your intro is supposed to intrigue and interest, while conclusion remind of major points rather than include actual research
• Avoid topic sentences – these are important elements of essay structure
• Ignore coordinating thesis statement after writing the paper – it can turn out to be out of touch with your body paragraph content

The topics below are designed to be versatile, interesting, topical, and truly compelling for essays, presentations, assignments, and projects.

Let’s get started!  

• Influence of price on consumer behavior
• Price change and consumer behavior in luxury goods market
• Customer luxury value perception
• Mass marketing of luxury and consumer behavior
• Prestige-seeking consumer behavior
• Customer behavior and marketing strategy in luxury segment
• Review and analysis of successful/unsuccessful examples of marketing strategies in luxury segment
• Self-concept in consumer behavior
• Symbolism and market behavior
• Impulsive purchasing
• Attachment and consumer behavior
• Cross-cultural consumer behavior
• Cultural dimensions and consumer behavior: the role of indulgence
• Convergence and divergence in consumer behavior
• Greenwashing as a marketing strategy
• Consumer reaction to “green” brand claims
• Current problems in consumer behavior
• Consumerism as a form of consumer behavior
• Risk taking in consumer behavior
• Consumer value and consumer behavior
• Consumer behavior trends in online shopping
• Sensory marketing and consumer behavior
• Consumer perception of price
• Consumer perception of quality
• Brand extensions and brand relatedness
• Mainstream vs trendy products and consumer behavior
• Personal values and consumer behavior
• Word of mouth and electronic word of mouth as a factor influencing consumer behavior
• Brand ambassadors and consumer behavior
• Corporate social responsibility as a factor influencing consumer behavior
• Brand image and consumer behavior
• The role of customer trust in consumer behavior
• The impact of negative online reviews on product perception and purchase intention
• The role of social media peer communication in shaping consumer behavior
• Is consumer behavior rational?
• The role of value maximization in consumer behavior
• Maslow’s hierarchy of needs and consumer behavior
• Impact of prior experience on purchase intention
• Neuromarketing in consumer behavior
• Neuromarketing and ethics
• The role of aesthetic taste in consumer behavior
• Customer retention methods
• Effects of sexual advertising on consumer purchase intentions
• The role of packaging in consumer purchase intention
• Brand sustainability as a positive factor of consumer purchase intention
• Product placement and its effect on consumer behavior
• Innovations as a factor influencing consumer behavior
• Color-emotion associations
• Pink for girls, blue for boys: gender differentiation of children’s’ goods
• Marketing power of emotions
• Emotions and brand attitude
• Measures of purchase intention
• Customer satisfaction measures
• Customer satisfaction and customer loyalty
• Customer loyalty and repurchase intentions
• Brand familiarity and purchase intention
• Smartphones, e-waste, and disposal activities
• How fast fashion brands attract customers
• Perceived quality and purchase intention
• Organic food customer perception
• Purchase intention and celebrity endorsements
• Social media influencers and consumer behavior
• Do customers care about business ethics?
• Purchase intention and controversial products
• Consumer animosity
• Impact of the country of origin image on consumer behavior
• Determinants of purchase intention
• Repurchase intention in services
• Customer satisfaction and repurchase intention
• Consumer clothing disposal behaviors
• Personal factors of consumer disposal tendencies
• Masstige brands and consumer behavior
• Brand advocacy development
• Customer relationship management trends
• Purchasing power and consumer behavior
• Economic conditions and consumer behavior
• Education level of consumer behavior
• Consumer decision style overview
• Hedonistic decision style
• Brand-conscious customer choice
• Social status and consumer behavior
• Impact of sales associates on consumer purchase intention and behavior
• Product life cycle and consumer behavior
• New product adoption types
• Factors that cause brand-switching
• Online consumer behavior types
• Guerilla marketing and consumer behavior
• Concept of brand awareness and its impact on consumer behavior
• Impact of the Internet on buying process
• Perfectionist consumer decision style
• Behavior of a healthcare customer
• Consumer behavior of Generation Y
• Shopping behavior of baby boomers
• Generation Y vs Baby Boomer consumer behavior
• Brand loyalty of Millenials
• Brand awareness and social media
• Generation Z consumer behavior
• Future consumer trends 2020
• Situational variables and consumer behavior
• Methods of predicting consumer behavior

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Consumer Behavior Research Paper Topics

Consumer behavior research paper topics are essential to students studying this field. This comprehensive guide from iResearchNet provides a comprehensive list of consumer behavior research paper topics divided into 10 categories, expert advice on selecting a relevant topic, and a step-by-step guide on writing a successful research paper. Additionally, iResearchNet offers writing services with expert degree-holding writers, custom written works, in-depth research, custom formatting, top quality, customized solutions, flexible pricing, short deadlines, timely delivery, 24/7 support, absolute privacy, easy order tracking, and a money-back guarantee. By following the expert advice provided and using iResearchNet’s writing services, students can produce high-quality research papers that make meaningful contributions to the field of consumer behavior.

Understanding Consumer Behavior Research

Consumer behavior research is an essential field of study that explores the processes and activities that individuals undertake when making decisions related to purchasing goods and services. This field is particularly important for marketers, advertisers, and sales professionals who seek to understand how consumers make purchasing decisions and how they can influence these decisions.

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For students studying consumer behavior, research papers are a common assignment that require them to explore various topics related to this field. However, selecting a relevant and feasible research paper topic can be challenging. Furthermore, writing a successful research paper requires attention to detail and adherence to academic standards. This comprehensive guide from iResearchNet is designed to assist students in selecting appropriate consumer behavior research paper topics and providing expert advice on how to write a successful research paper. The guide also provides information on iResearchNet’s writing services, which offer students a valuable resource for producing high-quality research papers that meet the academic standards of their instructors. By following the guidelines and using iResearchNet’s writing services, students can produce research papers that make meaningful contributions to the field of consumer behavior.

100 Consumer Behavior Research Paper Topics

Consumer behavior research encompasses a wide range of topics, each of which explores different aspects of how individuals make decisions related to purchasing goods and services. Here are ten categories of consumer behavior research paper topics that students can consider when selecting a research topic, along with ten sample topics for each category:

Perception and consumer behavior:

• The impact of package design on consumer perception of food products
• The effect of product display on consumer attention and purchase intention
• The role of brand familiarity in consumer perception of luxury goods
• The influence of product color on consumer perception and behavior
• The effect of music in advertising on consumer perception and recall
• The impact of celebrity endorsement on consumer perception of products
• The effect of font type on consumer perception of brand personality
• The role of scent in retail environments on consumer behavior
• The influence of product label claims on consumer perception of health and wellness
• The impact of product design on consumer perception of eco-friendliness

Motivation and consumer behavior:

• The influence of brand personality on consumer motivation to purchase
• The role of scarcity in marketing on consumer motivation and behavior
• The impact of rewards and incentives on consumer motivation and loyalty
• The effect of social proof on consumer motivation to purchase
• The influence of emotions on consumer motivation to purchase
• The role of self-congruity in consumer motivation and brand preference
• The impact of brand trust on consumer motivation to purchase
• The effect of personalized marketing on consumer motivation and engagement
• The influence of product involvement on consumer motivation and purchase intention
• The role of value perception in consumer motivation and price sensitivity

Attitudes and consumer behavior:

• The impact of brand image on consumer attitudes and loyalty
• The role of social responsibility in consumer attitudes towards brands
• The influence of culture on consumer attitudes towards luxury goods
• The effect of perceived risk on consumer attitudes and behavior
• The impact of celebrity endorsement on consumer attitudes towards products
• The role of nostalgia in shaping consumer attitudes towards brands
• The influence of brand authenticity on consumer attitudes and behavior
• The effect of word-of-mouth communication on consumer attitudes and behavior
• The impact of service quality on consumer attitudes and loyalty
• The role of price perception in shaping consumer attitudes towards products

Learning and consumer behavior:

• The impact of advertising on consumer learning and recall
• The role of sensory marketing in consumer learning and behavior
• The influence of online reviews on consumer learning and purchase decisions
• The effect of product placement in movies on consumer learning and recall
• The impact of social media on consumer learning and brand awareness
• The role of brand familiarity in consumer learning and recall
• The influence of product packaging on consumer learning and memory
• The effect of information overload on consumer learning and decision making
• The impact of brand slogans on consumer learning and recall
• The role of perceived value in consumer learning and purchase behavior

Memory and consumer behavior:

• The influence of brand familiarity on consumer memory and recall
• The role of nostalgia in consumer memory and brand preference
• The impact of product design on consumer memory and recall
• The effect of advertising repetition on consumer memory and brand awareness
• The influence of mood on consumer memory and recall of advertising
• The role of social media in consumer memory and brand awareness
• The impact of story-telling in advertising on consumer memory and recall
• The effect of novelty in advertising on consumer memory and recall
• The influence of age on consumer memory and recall of advertising
• The role of emotions in consumer memory and recall of advertising

Culture and consumer behavior:

• The impact of cultural differences on consumer behavior and preferences
• The role of religion in shaping consumer behavior and preferences
• The influence of gender roles on consumer behavior and preferences
• The effect of country-of-origin on consumer behavior and brand perception
• The impact of subcultures on consumer behavior and preferences
• The role of ethnicity in shaping consumer behavior and preferences
• The influence of language on consumer behavior and perception
• The effect of cross-cultural marketing on consumer behavior and perception
• The impact of cultural values on consumer behavior and decision making
• The role of consumer ethnocentrism in shaping consumer behavior and preferences

Emotions and consumer behavior:

• The impact of emotions on consumer decision making and behavior
• The role of mood on consumer decision making and purchase intention
• The influence of emotional branding on consumer behavior and loyalty
• The effect of emotional appeals in advertising on consumer behavior
• The impact of emotions on consumer satisfaction and loyalty
• The role of self-expression in shaping consumer emotional responses to brands
• The influence of nostalgia on consumer emotional responses to brands
• The effect of humor in advertising on consumer emotional responses and behavior
• The impact of product design on consumer emotional responses and behavior
• The role of perceived authenticity in shaping consumer emotional responses to brands

Social Influence and consumer behavior:

• The impact of social norms on consumer behavior and preferences
• The role of social comparison in shaping consumer behavior and preferences
• The influence of reference groups on consumer behavior and brand perception
• The effect of social media on consumer behavior and decision making
• The impact of social identity on consumer behavior and brand loyalty
• The role of social class in shaping consumer behavior and preferences
• The influence of social networks on consumer behavior and brand perception
• The effect of social proof in marketing on consumer behavior and preferences
• The impact of peer pressure on consumer behavior and decision making
• The role of social responsibility in shaping consumer behavior and brand perception

Decision Making and consumer behavior:

• The impact of information overload on consumer decision making
• The role of decision heuristics in shaping consumer behavior and preferences
• The influence of product complexity on consumer decision making and preferences
• The effect of decision context on consumer decision making and behavior
• The impact of decision fatigue on consumer behavior and decision making
• The role of decision-making style in shaping consumer behavior and preferences
• The influence of decision-making strategies on consumer behavior and preferences
• The effect of cognitive dissonance on consumer behavior and decision making
• The impact of choice architecture on consumer decision making and behavior
• The role of decision framing in shaping consumer behavior and preferences

Ethics and consumer behavior:

• The impact of corporate social responsibility on consumer behavior and brand perception
• The role of ethical consumption in shaping consumer behavior and preferences
• The influence of perceived ethicality on consumer behavior and brand loyalty
• The effect of green marketing on consumer behavior and purchase intention
• The impact of fair trade on consumer behavior and brand perception
• The role of animal welfare in shaping consumer behavior and preferences
• The influence of social justice issues on consumer behavior and brand perception
• The effect of cause-related marketing on consumer behavior and brand loyalty
• The impact of transparency in marketing on consumer behavior and trust
• The role of consumer activism in shaping consumer behavior and preferences

These ten categories provide a broad range of consumer behavior research paper topics for students to explore within the field of consumer behavior. By selecting a topic that aligns with their interests and research goals, students can produce a high-quality research paper that contributes to the knowledge base of consumer behavior.

Choosing a Consumer Behavior Topic

Choosing a topic for a research paper in consumer behavior can be a challenging task, especially given the vast array of potential topics. To help students navigate this process, it is important to consider a few key factors when selecting a topic.

• First , it is essential to choose a topic that aligns with your interests and passions. When you are passionate about a topic, it is easier to stay engaged throughout the research process and to produce high-quality work. Additionally, having a personal connection to the topic can inspire new and unique perspectives, leading to original research.
• Second , consider the relevance and significance of the topic. The best research papers are those that make a meaningful contribution to the field of consumer behavior. Look for topics that are timely, relevant, and offer a new perspective on existing theories or practices. A topic that is of current interest to industry professionals, policymakers, or academics can also provide opportunities for real-world impact.
• Third , consider the available resources and access to data. Research papers require a significant amount of data and research, so it is important to choose a topic that allows for access to relevant data and resources. Consider the availability of data sources, academic journals, and industry reports that may be needed to support your research.
• Fourth , consider the scope and focus of the research paper. A topic that is too broad or too narrow can make the research process more challenging. It is essential to identify a specific research question or hypothesis that can be effectively addressed within the scope of the research paper. Additionally, it is important to consider the level of analysis, such as individual or group-level behaviors, and whether the research will be qualitative, quantitative, or mixed methods.
• Fifth , consider seeking guidance from your instructor or a research advisor. They can provide valuable insight and feedback on potential topics and can help guide the research process. Additionally, they may be able to offer suggestions for data sources or research methodologies that can strengthen the research paper.

Ultimately, the key to choosing a successful topic for a consumer behavior research paper is to identify a topic that aligns with your interests, offers relevance and significance, has available data sources and resources, has a focused research question or hypothesis, and seeks guidance from a research advisor or instructor. By carefully considering these factors, students can select a topic that inspires them and leads to a high-quality research paper.

How to Write a Consumer Behavior Research Paper

When it comes to writing a research paper on consumer behavior, there are several key steps to follow to ensure a successful outcome. Here are some tips to help guide you through the writing process:

• Develop a clear and concise research question : The first step in writing a research paper on consumer behavior is to develop a clear and concise research question. This question should be focused and specific, and should guide your research and analysis throughout the writing process.
• Conduct a thorough literature review : Before beginning your research, it is important to conduct a thorough literature review to identify existing theories and research related to your topic. This review will help you to identify any gaps in the existing research that your paper can address.
• Choose appropriate research methods : There are a variety of research methods that can be used in consumer behavior research, including surveys, experiments, and case studies. Choose the appropriate method(s) based on your research question and the data you are trying to collect.
• Collect and analyze data : Once you have identified your research question and chosen your research method, it is time to collect and analyze your data. This may involve conducting surveys or experiments, analyzing existing data sets, or conducting interviews or focus groups.
• Organize and present your findings : After analyzing your data, it is important to organize your findings in a clear and concise manner. This may involve creating charts or graphs to visually represent your data, or using tables to compare and contrast your findings. It is also important to provide a clear and concise summary of your findings in your conclusion.
• Use appropriate formatting and citation styles : When writing a research paper on consumer behavior, it is important to use appropriate formatting and citation styles. Most papers in this field will use either APA or MLA style formatting and citations.
• Revise and edit your paper : Once you have completed your first draft, it is important to revise and edit your paper to ensure clarity, conciseness, and accuracy. This may involve reorganizing sections, cutting out extraneous information, or rephrasing sentences for clarity.

By following these steps, you can produce a high-quality research paper on consumer behavior that contributes to the field and provides valuable insights for academics, policymakers, and industry professionals alike.

iResearchNet Writing Services

At iResearchNet, we understand the challenges that students face when it comes to writing high-quality research papers on consumer behavior. That’s why we offer custom writing services designed to help students produce well-researched, well-written papers on any topic related to consumer behavior.

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• Expert writers : Our team of writers includes experienced professionals with advanced degrees in marketing, consumer behavior, and related fields. They have the expertise and knowledge to produce high-quality, original research papers that meet your specific requirements.
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• In-depth research : Our writers will conduct extensive research to ensure that your paper is well-supported with data and evidence from credible sources.
• Custom formatting : Our writers are well-versed in a variety of formatting styles and will ensure that your paper meets the specific requirements of your instructor or academic program.
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In conclusion, writing a research paper on consumer behavior can be a challenging task, but it is also a rewarding one. By following the steps outlined in this guide, you can produce a high-quality research paper that contributes to the field and provides valuable insights for academics, policymakers, and industry professionals alike.

Remember to choose a clear and concise research question, conduct a thorough literature review, choose appropriate research methods, collect and analyze data, and organize and present your findings in a clear and concise manner. Additionally, using appropriate formatting and citation styles and revising and editing your paper are also important steps in producing a successful research paper on consumer behavior.

If you need additional help with your research paper, iResearchNet offers custom writing services designed to help students produce high-quality, well-researched papers on any topic related to consumer behavior. Our team of expert writers has the knowledge and expertise to help you produce a paper that meets your specific needs and exceeds your expectations.

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Consumer Behavior College Essays Samples For Students

116 samples of this type

Do you feel the need to check out some previously written College Essays on Consumer Behavior before you begin writing an own piece? In this free catalog of Consumer Behavior College Essay examples, you are given an exciting opportunity to discover meaningful topics, content structuring techniques, text flow, formatting styles, and other academically acclaimed writing practices. Using them while crafting your own Consumer Behavior College Essay will definitely allow you to complete the piece faster.

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In this report, the consumer spending diary of the author will be recounted in detail. Over the course of several weeks, the author was asked to record all spending that was not a daily staple, as well as the reasons why these purchases were made. Following the diary, an overall analysis of the spending behaviour is provided, with aspects of cognitive and behavioural theories of consumer behaviour weighed against the author’s recorded spending habits. These are used to determine the level to which marketing and advertising play a part in these spending decisions.

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Understanding the ever-evolving, always-surprising consumer

For many consumers around the world, a return to normalcy feels so close, yet so far away, in light of the alarming spread of COVID-19 variants. Although it’s unclear what the next 12 to 24 months will bring, what’s almost certain is that consumers won’t simply revert to doing exactly what they did in 2019. In this episode of the McKinsey on Consumer and Retail podcast, three consumer-behavior experts share their insights into how consumers’ spending patterns and purchasing behaviors are changing, and what companies should do given those changes. An edited transcript of the conversation with executive editor Monica Toriello follows. Subscribe to the podcast .

Monica Toriello: Over the past several weeks, people in some parts of the world have resumed their prepandemic habits. Maybe you’ve recently seen a movie at a theater, or flown on an airplane, or even just stopped for a cup of coffee on your way to the office for the first time in over a year. But a return to “normal” won’t look the same for everyone. Today, we’ll hear from three people who intensively study consumer behavior. They’ll share fascinating insights into how consumers are changing and what companies should do about it.

Kari Alldredge is a McKinsey partner based in Minneapolis. Kari has been advising consumer-goods companies for more than 20 years on a variety of topics, and she leads McKinsey’s work in consumer-goods growth transformation. She is an author of several articles, including a recent one on COVID-19’s impact on demand and costs in the consumer-packaged-goods [CPG] industry .

Anne Grimmelt is a senior knowledge expert in McKinsey’s Consumer Packaged Goods Practice. She is based in Stamford, Connecticut. Anne has been one of the driving forces behind McKinsey’s consumer-sentiment survey , which was launched in 2008 and during the pandemic has expanded to 45 countries. It provides a rich fact base for how consumers are feeling about their finances and how their buying behavior is changing.

And our third guest is Anjali Lai, a senior analyst at Forrester. Anjali, who is based in New York, helps chief marketing officers [CMOs] and other business leaders to understand the shifts in consumer behavior and consumer decision making and then to figure out what these changes mean for the future of brands and industries.

[To comply with Forrester’s Citation Policy, this transcript excludes Anjali Lai’s comments. Listen to the full episode on McKinsey.com or on Apple, Google, and other podcast platforms.]

A ‘reversal of fortune’ for big brands

Monica Toriello: Kari, Anne, Anjali, it’s great to have you here today. All three of you have been keeping your fingers on the pulse of consumers, both before and throughout the pandemic. Have there been any surprises? Are consumers doing things that you didn’t expect? Or is there anything that seemed to be going one way in, say, March or April 2020 but is going in a different direction today?

Kari Alldredge: In 2019 or early 2020, the topic on the minds of large branded consumer-packaged-goods manufacturers was portfolio shaping: how to reimagine their portfolios, how to move away from center-of-store food products and big brands and instead engage with consumers in very different, more targeted, niche-oriented ways. The degree to which the pandemic pushed people back toward big brands in the center of the store, and toward cooking at home, has been a complete turnaround, a reversal of fortune, for large CPG companies.

Some of those changes could have been anticipated, but others are quite shocking: the notion that bread baking would become a phenomenon among millennials, or that pet ownership would skyrocket to the extent that it has, and that those same millennials would be willing to spend more than they spend on their daily Starbucks to feed their new pets.

So, many of those companies that were desperately searching for growth 18 months ago now have the opposite problem: their supply chains can’t keep up . The big question for all of them is which of those consumer behaviors are truly going to persist  and be “sticky” coming out of this pandemic? Certainly, the dog that you adopted is likely to stay at your home. But when you go back to ordering your daily Starbucks and spending $7 a day on a coffee, are you going to spend the same amount to feed your pet? Those are the questions that are on many company leaders’ minds.

Anne Grimmelt: As Kari said, we saw a complete shift. Prepandemic, the growth was in smaller, niche brands, but early in the pandemic, it was large CPG players that really gained scale because their products were available on the shelf. They were also brands that were trusted by consumers, so consumers felt good buying them. If you look at point-of-sale data from IRI or Nielsen, you see that large companies—those with more than $2.5 billion in retail sales in the US market—picked up most of the share growth early in the pandemic, whereas smaller and midsize companies, as well as private label, were really not picking up growth.

In the second half of 2020 and in early 2021, small and midsize companies are regaining their sales growth. And we expect that private label is going to be powerful again , because if you dive into the why—why did consumers pick a new brand, and why did they pick the brands they chose?—it was about availability, it was about purpose, but it was also about value . It was about price points. Going forward, value is going to be even more important, and private label will gain strength in the future.

Trust as a strategic imperative

Monica Toriello: All three of you to some extent have written about customer loyalty: how to win it and how to retain it, particularly in an environment where people are willing to try new brands. Anne and Kari, you found that 39 percent of consumers tried new brands during the pandemic. And Anjali, in your research, you found that small brands are particularly good at earning consumers’ trust and consequently their loyalty. In a recent blog post, you wrote, “Now is the time for companies to embrace trust as a strategic imperative.” What does that mean? How should companies do that?

Even relatively mundane CPG companies are thinking about the end-to-end consumer journey, including consumer experience pre- and postpurchase. Kari Alldredge

Kari Alldredge: I’m seeing two interesting things in response to the trends you just talked about, Anjali. One is the degree to which even relatively mundane CPG companies are thinking about the end-to-end consumer journey, including consumer experience pre- and postpurchase, as they try to understand how to serve their existing consumers but also look for new ways to better meet consumer needs. The notion that there is a pre- and postpurchase experience related to a can of soda or a can of soup is a relatively novel idea, right? But, increasingly, the most forward-thinking companies are doing research across that entire journey to be able to understand the needs of consumers as they’re considering the range of options that are available to them—all the way through to satisfaction with usage and even disposal of the packaging of products.

Another interesting thing I’m seeing is a recognition that marketing is a dialogue, and a recognition of the degree to which consumers now “own” or shape the narratives of many brands. This, too, was happening before the pandemic but was vastly accelerated during the pandemic. The notion that a marketer positions the brand and delivers a message and a promise to consumers is really becoming quite an antiquated one, I think, as consumers themselves—through reviews, ratings , blogs, videos, and social-media posts—shape the identity of many of these brands. Recommendations from friends and family become part of the brand’s identity and are critical to shaping both loyalty and consumer trust.

We found in our research that about 33 percent of millennial and Gen Z consumers say they choose to buy a brand from a company that has their values, versus about 12 percent of baby boomers. Anne Grimmelt

Anne Grimmelt: Our research corroborates that. We found in our research that about 33 percent of millennial and Gen Z consumers  say they choose to buy a brand from a company that has their values, versus about 12 percent of baby boomers. But every demographic group is leaning toward that.

Another finding from our research is the reasons why consumers change to a new brand. It is definitely the younger generation that more often indicates that it’s because of purpose. It’s because of what the company stands for, how it treats its employees, et cetera.

Purpose: More than just a buzzword

Monica Toriello: We’ve been hearing a lot about purpose and values, but I also hear some skepticism in certain pockets of the corporate world as to whether an emphasis on corporate purpose  actually pays off. Because there is an attitude–behavior gap, right? What’s your response to a CEO who says, “Consumers like to say they care about purpose and values, but when they’re at the point of deciding to buy something, they truly only care about convenience or price or quality. Purpose is just a buzzword.”

Kari Alldredge: It’s necessary but not sufficient. I think there’s an increasing recognition that alignment with a consumer’s values may put you in the consideration set but won’t drive you over the line to purchase. You still have to have product superiority, whether that’s taste superiority, functional superiority, or a price-to-value equation that works for that particular consumer.

We talk a lot about the pandemic, which definitely shone a light on health in general, but there are other crises—like social justice  and climate change —that have come to light over the past year and a half and that have really shaken the corporate community. These crises have helped companies understand that some of these factors are fundamental in how consumers perceive themselves and the world around them, to the point where we now actually see some change happening.

One of the things that I was struck by was the speed and seriousness with which many of the household-cleaning companies responded to the pandemic and the heroic efforts to convert production capacity to manufacture things like wipes and sanitizer. Yes, some of that was for financial gain, but I think there really was an almost wartime mentality that I saw companies get new energy from.

I think about center-of-store food manufacturers who, prepandemic, maybe viewed themselves as being a bit sleepy and not exciting in terms of attracting the best talent. Now when you hear them talk about what they do, there’s real pride in the fact that they fed America, or they kept America safe. It really changed the way they think about the importance of what they do.

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Sources of insight.

Monica Toriello: All three of you are experts in consumer behavior. But consumers are changing fast and they’re changing constantly. Anjali, in another recent blog post, you wrote, “Rather than expect consumers to settle into a defined postpandemic normal, CMOs should prepare for a constant evolution of consumer needs and expectations over the next 12 to 24 months.” So beyond reading the latest consumer research and analysis, what are the best ways for CMOs and CEOs to understand where consumers are and where they’re headed?

Kari Alldredge: One of the best sources of insights is their online channel partners and their own D2C [direct to consumer] sites . Companies should mine online data to get a quick pulse on the way consumers are thinking or feeling. They should look at ratings and reviews using advanced analytics to understand and see trends and what’s selling on sites like Kroger.com, Walmart.com, or Amazon.com. They could even develop products that they can quickly test in an online environment and then change and adjust, as opposed to thinking about mass development of a product that gets pushed out to thousands and thousands of brick-and-mortar retail stores.

Consumers don’t always know what they want, and they can’t predict how their behavior will change. So traditional consumer research—which asks consumers how likely they are to purchase something—is becoming less relevant or reliable than actual data in market. That’s why data from e-commerce sites can be so valuable.

Anne Grimmelt: Another very powerful way to understand consumers  is by looking at what your peer companies do. You can go to industry conferences like the CAGNY [Consumer Analyst Group of New York] conference and hear a company like L’Oréal talk about how they use their D2C and their online-sales platform to see what type of color lipstick people try—not buy , but try —on their online platform. That information is critical for them to know where to innovate. What are the colors that people want and what are the products that people like to try out on the digital platform?

Similarly, I think it’s very important to keep an open mind beyond your own borders, to realize what’s happening elsewhere in the world. Going back to the topic of purpose, for instance, it is very much alive in the US but it’s also very much alive in Europe. Learning about the power of what consumers demand and how purpose is driving consumer decisions about CPG companies—and what companies in Europe are doing to meet consumer demand—can be valuable, wherever you are in the world.

Kari Alldredge: I think we also shouldn’t underestimate the resilience of consumers and the gravitational pull of life as we knew it before the pandemic. One thing that surprised me even in the past several weeks is the degree to which behaviors have bounced back. If there’s anything I’ve learned over the past 18 months it’s that I don’t have a crystal ball, or if I did, it is certainly broken—because there is no part of this last 18 months that I ever could have in a million years predicted.

At the beginning of the pandemic, one company I work with asked every board member, “When you look back, what’s the one thing that will be blazingly obvious that we either should always have done or never have been doing?” And one of the things that came up was shaking hands: “We’re never going to shake hands again.” But I attended a graduation ceremony in the beginning of June—so, early into the recovery—and what was striking to me is that the dean of that school shook the hand of, and physically embraced, every single one of the thousand students who crossed that stage. And this was at an institution that had been, like most educational institutions, incredibly thoughtful and conservative about their public-health response. Literally days after restrictions were lifted, the urge to connect was so strong that it looked as if the pandemic had never happened.

People are resilient. Hundreds of years of behavior certainly have been meaningfully changed by the past 18 months, but I think a lot of the old behaviors will bounce back pretty quickly.

Monica Toriello: So if you could gather all the CEOs and CMOs of consumer companies in one room and leave them with one message, what would it be? What is the one thing they need to do to position themselves for success in 2021 and 2022?

Anne Grimmelt: My one-liner would be, “Be open to change and be agile .”

Kari Alldredge: I would say, “Listen; don’t tell.”

Kari Alldredge is a partner in McKinsey’s Minneapolis office, and  Anne Grimmelt is a senior knowledge expert in the Stamford office.  Monica Toriello is an executive editor in the New York office.

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