Personal and Emotional Values Embedded in Thai-Consumers’ Perceptions: Key Factors for the Sustainability of Traditional Confectionery Businesses

Abstract

The confectionery market in Thailand is being overpowered by Western confectioneries. This study proposes and verifies a model of the factors that define consumer behaviour towards traditional Thai confectioneries and consumer willingness to support them. In recent years, there has been a boom in posting various aspects of Thai youth culture, including confectionery, on social networking services (SNS), especially Instagram. In major Thai cities, such as Bangkok, stores are being built with ‘Insta-image’ in mind, strengthening the younger generation’s inclination towards Western confectionery. Under these circumstances, the share of traditional confectioneries, which have long been familiar to Thai people, is declining. Based on survey data collected from 400 consumers in Bangkok, we designed a model to analyse the antecedent factors for consumers’ purchase intention and support behaviour for Thai traditional confectioneries, such as the word-of-mouth (WOM) approach and repeated purchase. Structural equation modelling (SEM) was conducted on the dataset to examine the antecedent factors’ impact on purchase intention and supportive actions. The results revealed that four latent factors, as determining antecedents of purchase intentions, had a significant impact on purchase intentions, resulting in loyalty and word-of-mouth behaviour. Among the determining factors, personal feelings and attachment to traditional confectionery were found to have the greatest impact, surpassing subjective norms. To expand the fan base of Thai traditional confectioneries and to support their businesses, appealing to the value of traditional confectioneries, nostalgic value and long-held Thai personal feelings to support traditional confectionery was found to be an effective marketing strategy for corporates. Such efforts are also meaningful in terms of maintaining the diversity of food culture in the face of increasing Westernisation and a decrease in unique food ingredients and food culture. Furthermore, according to this analysis, willingness to purchase is strongly linked to purchasing behaviour, and the cultivation and securing of loyal customers and their WOM recommendations are important for developing a customer base in the market. WOM recommendations by consumers can activate communication among customers and companies in the market, strengthen the community and stimulate the dissemination of information about traditional confectioneries. This study is expected to be a useful and valuable resource for the development of marketing strategies to ensure the sustainability of traditional confectionery in the Thai sweets market.