Consumer Preferences for Quality Foods from a South European Perspective: A Conjoint Analysis Implementation on Greek Olive Oil

摘要

The objective of the present study is to describe the preferences of younger, moreeducated and higher income Greek consumers for “quality” olive oil brands – qualitybeing defined as a bundle of extrinsic quality cues such as quality assurance labels,health-related information, country-of-origin indication, bottling material and price.The aim of the research is, with the implementation of a conjoint analysis task, todescribe and analyze consumer preferences using a random, stratified, sample ofurban consumers. The extrinsic quality attributes of olive oil, strongly linked to aprevious qualitative, Means-end Chains (MEC) analysis survey, is used as startingpoints for the development of conjoint profiles. Special emphasis is given to thedevelopment and evaluation of different quality marketing mixes and the analysisof the importance consumers attach to the series of extrinsic quality cues used. Theidentification of different consumer segments in terms of this importance and thedevelopment of their socio-demographic and behavioral profile is also emphasized.The final step of the research is the measurement of demand for quality through thecalculation of potentially larger market shares across segments of different quality(hypothetical) brands in comparison to the common (real).