Purchase Decision Towards Suboptimal Food: An analysis of the influence of Consumer Preference in Selangor

Abstract

The suboptimal food products define that food may still be consumed but it appears to contrast from the optimal or normal in some aspects in the eyes of the consumer. By assuming consumer do not buy and consume suboptimal food, hence international trade regulation and also retailers have established product requirements that results in goods that do not fulfil such criteria being discarded. Several studies have published statistics on the quantity of food wasted along the food supply chain and in consumer households. Hence, to address the concern of this issue, this study conducted the drivers that influence consumer preferences to consume suboptimal food and also verified the consumer purchase decision. The questionnaire has been conducted with the quantitative method to accomplish the objectives of this research. The target population for this study was the society who live in Selangor, Malaysia. A purposive sample was used in this study and the researcher has targeted 399 respondents as a specific characteristic to do this study. From the data analysis, the hypothesis one and hypothesis two were supported. The result of Pearson correlation presented that it was important whether acceptance of product related with the suboptimal condition (attitude) and perceived quality and safety of food. The results of the study showed that consumer purchase decisions toward the suboptimal foods are significantly related by the acceptance of products associated with suboptimal in appearance condition, date labelling, and its packaging, as well as by the consumer perspective towards the quality and safety of food perceived. Nevertheless, hypothesis three was not supported, whereas this study concluded that the personality measure of consumers towards environmental concern did not directly affect the consumer purchase decision. The future research recommendation were put forward in this research.