Chocolate choice motives and attitudes in foodservice market: Fine store product vs. manufactured product consumers

Abstract

ABSTRACTThis study aims to measure the influence of consumers’ chocolate choice motives on their attitude and repurchase intention. We propose a theoretical model to analyze differences between fine store product and manufactured product consumers and clarify market segmentation strategy. We collected data on 487 consumers who purchased chocolate and used structural equation modeling to analyze the data. The results indicated the positive influences of mood on craving and chocoholism, health on chocoholism, and craving on repurchase intention. The analysis of the moderating effect of the consumer type, effect of health and craving, and effect of health and chocoholism varied according to consumer type. The chocolate consumer influences the chocolate purchase decision based on psychological tendencies while evaluating the product. These findings have practical implications for marketing strategies of fine chocolate stores and chocolate manufacturing firms as well as academic implications from the perspective of the foodservice consumers.