The effects of packaging attributes on Vietnamese consumers purchase intention

As a result, not only package elements design (i.e. color, graphic, font, shape, size), the informational elements (i.e. product information, nutritional information) also place a s[r]

VIETNAM NATIONAL UNIVERSITY, HANOI

VIETNAM JAPAN UNIVERSITY

MASTER’S THESIS BUSINESS

ADMINISTRATION

Hanoi, 2019

VIETNAM NATIONAL UNIVERSITY, HANOI

VIETNAM JAPAN UNIVERSITY

CONSUMERS PURCHASE INTENTION

MAJOR: BUSINESS ADMINISTRATION

Code: 60340102

Research Supervisors Assoc Prof Kodo Yokozawa Assoc Prof Pham Thi Lien

Hanoi, 2019

ACKNOWLEDGEMENT

First of all, I would like to I want to send my sincere thanks to my Vietnamese and Japanese professors, Associate Professor Pham Thi Lien and Associate Professor Kodo Yokozawa who constantly giving me advices and orientation during my thesis process

Secondly, I would like to warmly thank to Hanh sensei, Matsui Sensei, Morita Sensei and Hino Sensei for giving me many meaningful recommendations helping me to improve my thesis writing in our Research Proposal Reports (on 25th December, 2018)

Thirdly, I would like to thank to participants who took part in my online survey and gave me many valuable recommends to help me complete my questionnaire successfully

Additionally, I would like send a big thank to Huong san who always support and remind us all procedure we need to do to complete your thesis smoothly

Last but not least, I would like to give a sincere thanks to my family and friends who always motivated spiritedly me when I felt struggling due to thesis

ABSTRACT Purpose – This study aims to measure Vietnamese instant oats packaging and its

influences on Vietnamese consumer’s buying intention

Design/ methodology/ approach – A quantitative research was conducted using an

online survey to collect primary data for hypothesis testing The questionnaire was transferred successfully to 147 respondents

Findings – The findings indicated the positive relationship between packaging

elements (i.e graphic, structural and verbal attributes) and consumer purchase intention based on the literature reviews and data analysis discussed precisely in this research Additionally, the moderation role of involvement level to the interaction of visual elements and purchase intention was also proved in this paper

Research limitation/ implication – the main limitation of this study is excluding

other important factors impact purchase intention such as price, promotion, etc The findings provide knowledge related to consumer behavior for relevant companies to increase them to design an effective communication tool – package

Practical implication - The findings of this study can be used by managers and

marketers to create an effective packaging to ensure their products stand out among competitors

Originality/ value – This study is one of the few quantitative researches measure the

impacts of graphic, structural and verbal elements on purchase intention simultaneously Furthermore, it emphasizes the communication role graphic, structural and verbal attributes which has been ignore in previous studies Additionally, this study also indicated that involvement level positively strengthens the interaction between structural package design and purchase intention which did not quantitatively proved in previous studies

Keywords Consumer’s purchase decision, packaging design, graphic elements,

structural element, verbal elements, involvement level

Paper type Research paper

Table of Contents

CHAPTER 1: INTRODUCTION 1

1.1 Research Motivation 1

1.2 Research Objectives 3

1.3 Research Scope 3

1.4 Research Structure 3

CHAPTER 2: LITERATURE REVIEW 5

2.1 Consumer Behavior 5

2.1.1 Customer behavior definition 5

2.1.2 Purchase decision making processes 6

2.2 Packaging 10

2.2.1 Package and packaging design 10

2.2.2 The role of packaging 11

2.2.3 Packaging Elements 13

2.2.4 Product involvement 13

2.3 Research Gap and Research Questions 14

2.4 Theoretical framework and research hypotheses 16

2.4.1 Variable definition 16

2.4.2 Measurement of Variables 18

2.4.3 Integration of literature review and hypothesis 19

CHAPTER 3: METHODOLYGY AND RESEARCH DESIGN 25

3.1 Research approach 25

3.2 Research design 26

3.3 Data selection 28

3.3.1 Secondary Data 28

3.3.2 Primary Data 28

3.3.2.1 Sampling design 28

3.3.2.2 Data Collection and participants characteristics 29

3.3.2.3 Questionnaire and Experimental Design 30

3.4 Data Analysis 33

3.4.1 Reliability Analysis 33

3.4.2 Continuous improvement cycle 33

3.4.3 Survey data analysis 34

3.4.3.1 Exploratory factor analysis (EFA) 34

3.4.3.2 Confirmatory factor analysis (CFA) 36

3.4.3.3 Structural equation modelling (SEM) 37

3.4.3.4 Hypothesis testing by SEM 39

CHAPTER 4: DATA ANALYSIS RESULTS 40

4.1 Measurement Scale Test 40

4.1.1 Cronbach’s Alpha 40

4.1.2 Exploratory Factor Analysis (EFA) 41

4.1.3 Confirmatory Factor Analysis (CFA) 44

4.2 Research Model Test 47

4.2.1 Hypothesis testing without moderation of involvement level 47

4.2.2 Involvement Level effect testing by SEM 49

CHAPTER 5: CONCLUSION 52

5.1 Discussion of findings 52

5.2 Managerial implication 54

5.3 Practical implication 55

5.4 Limitation and further research 55

REFFERENCES 57

APPENDIXES 1: ONLINE SURVEY 63

APPENDIXES 2: Descriptive analysis 109

APPENDIXES 3: Cronbach’s Alpha 110

APPENDIXES 4: EFA 113

APPENDIXES 5: CFA 115

APPENDIXES 6: SEM 122

APPENDIXES 7: MODERATOR 128

LIST OF TABLES

Table 2 1: Summarized literature review 14

Table 2 2: Measurement of variables 19

Z Table 3 1: Frequency of demographic information of respondents 30

Table 3 2: Study variable areas and corresponding section of the questionnaire 32

Table 3 3: Suggested procedure for improve measurement construct validity 34

Table 3 4: EFA requirement assumptions 35

Table 3 5: Model diagnostics in CFA 37

Table 3 6: Model fit indices 37

Z Table 4 1: Cronbach’s Alpha Results 40

Table 4 2: Removed variables 41

Table 4 3: Exploratory Factor Analysis Results 41

Table 4 4: Rotated components results 42

Table 4 5: The new latent variables 46

Table 4 6: Model fit indices 44

Table 4 7: Confirmatory Factor Analysis results 44

Table 4 8: Composite reliability and AVE results 45

Table 4 9: The model fit test of structural model 47

Table 4 10: Research model without moderator tested by SEM 47

Table 4 11: Hypotheses testing without moderator results 48

Table 4 12: Coding of variable computing 49

Table 4 13: Moderator effect model fit 50

Table 4 14: Hypothesis testing results 51

LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS

VS: Visual Elements

VB: Verbal Elements

SEM: Structural Equation Modeling

PI: Purchase intention

IL: Involvement Level

CHAPTER 1: INTRODUCTION

1.1 Research Motivation

Frazao (1995) claim that an improvement in dietary habit has high probability

to avoid 20% of diseases caused by cancer, cardio-vascularity and diabetes Thus, Vietnamese consumers concern more about healthy and nutritional issues, especially, food products consuming According to Nielsen’s 2016 survey on “Health and Sensitivity to Ingredients”, almost 70% of Vietnamese buyers consider the ingredients content of the food and beverage they consumed In this sense, as one of the healthiest grains on earth, oats meal became a popular choice of Vietnamese consumers who have high health consciousness but most of oats meal sold in Vietnam market are from foreign brands with higher price than traditional grains Catching this opportunity, many Vietnamese firms started joining this potential and sustainable market with more reasonable price range for oats meal products However, according

to Vietnamese buyers who consume oats meal for many years, Vietnamese oats meal product package have less detailed nutritional content than foreign products whilst that information are one of important conditions they consider when purchase oats meal As a result, not only package elements design (i.e color, graphic, font, shape, size), the informational elements (i.e product information, nutritional information) also place a significant role in attracting buyers in the store (Mutsikiwa, 2013), especially, in case of healthy food likes oats meal Additionally, due to the transformation from direct trade to self-service trade, packaging become an effective tool assist a certain product stand out among various alternative brand (Butkeviciene, 2008) Traditionally, package has 3 main role including product protection, usage supporting and message transition (Silayoi and Speece, 2004) Similarly, Rundh (2013) indicated that products package is used as marketing communication tool to provide product information, product usage instruction to buyers

Due to package is the first thing customer see at store, thus, package design is used as an effective tool attracting buyer’s attention and can boost consumer actual purchasing at the point-of-sale (Muhammad 2014) Accordingly, marketers should determine what visual and functional package to develop a suitable marketing strategy and enhance the relationship with targeted customers based on their needs and interest consideration (Kotler and Keller, 2008) In order to transfer products message, there has more than 2 package elements are required (Chou, 2012) In low involvement products, visual attributes place an important role in attracting buyer’s intention (Silayoi and Speece, 2007) In this sense, based on product value perception and consuming volume, Hingley et al (2007) claimed that food and beverage products are considered as low-involvement products because it has low value and high volume consuming Hence, in food and beverage products consuming, buyers tend to rely on package design to evaluate its quality while making a purchase decision (Steenkamp, 1990) In addition, among many factors that influence consumer purchase intention, product packaging has become an effective tool to be different and attracting consumer attention and stimulating them to purchase a particular product (Olga & Natalia, 2006; Vidales, 1995), especially in the current self-service economy However, domestic food products cannot compete with imported one due to local enterprises have not realized that packaging is a company’s branding function and possible potential of packaging design as a brand communication tool (Vietnam Financial Magazine, 2018) Thus, from perspective of

Mr Yoon Byung Soo - Director of Lotte Mart Vietnam's product strategy department, Vietnamese products food packaging is less attractive than Thailand, China or America (Vietnam Financial Magazine, 2018) Specifically, “While the international packaging tends to simplify with courteous color, Vietnamese package is too fancy” observed Yoon Byung Soo (Vietnam Financial Magazine, 2018) Obviously, the underdeveloped use of packaging design in Vietnamese food products is a one of the main reasons that made Vietnam food products are less competitive than imported products Vietnamese Marketers need to understand that package is a crucial element

to enhance point of purchase communication For above reasons, author decided to

consider “The effects of packaging attributes on Vietnamese consumers Instant Oats purchase intention” as personal thesis topic

1.2 Research Objectives

There exist very limited comprehensive practical studies have precisely analyzed packaging as a customer’s purchase communication tool in Vietnam from customer perspectives Hence, this paper aims to quantitatively analyze the impact of packaging design on consumer purchase intention then provide Vietnamese managers

a better understanding about the importance of packaging in differentiating among competitors on the shelves Particularly, the study has the following sub-objectives:

• To measure precisely the influences of packaging elements (i.e visual and verbal elements) on buying intention under the moderation of involvement level

• To identify which attributes should be concentrated while designing packaging

1.3 Research Scope

Due to the purpose of this research is focusing on the package influences only

on purchase intention, to control the price influences and promotion impacts, author chose Vietnamese instant oat brands which have the same price range is 100.000 VND for a 400 grams package without any promotion at the moment There have three Vietnamese instant oats brands including Xuan An, Vinamit and Union were used to packaging assessment In addition, to determine the suitable targeted group, author chose participants who have already consumed Vietnamese instant oats before collecting their feedback about a certain product

1.4 Research Structure

This study formulates a conceptual framework, of the interaction between packaging design and consumer buying intention, considering involvement level as mediator This research is divided into 5 fundamental chapters including literature review, research methodology, analysis results and conclusion

Chapter 1: Introduction

This chapter provides an introduction about study motivation, research objectives, research scope and research structure

Chapter 2: Literature Review

This chapter provides the summary and reviews existing research related to literature of packaging design and customer behavior and their relationship under the influence of mediator “Involvement level” Based on literature reviews, author propose research conceptual framework, research question and research hypothesis

Chapter 3: Research Methodology

In this chapter, author discussed about research design, data collection process and data analysis methods were used to measure the conceptual framework proposed

in chapter 2

Chapter 4: Analysis results

This chapter indicated research results was analyzed from data collection

Chapter 5: Conclusion

This chapter discussed about research findings then propose theoretical and practical implication for marketing literature Additionally, the limitation as well as future research orientation was shown in this chapter

CHAPTER 2: LITERATURE REVIEW

2.1 Consumer Behavior

2.1.1 Customer behavior definition

According to AMA (American Marketing Association), customer behavior is defined as “The dynamic interaction of affect and cognition, behavior, and environmental events by which human beings conduct the exchange aspects of their lives" In the other words In other words, customer behavior is consideration, emotion and reaction of customer in the consumer process (Satish K Batra and S H

H Kazmi, 2004) The behavior of customer is affected by many factors such as the opinions from family or friends, social media, advertising, product information, prices, packaging, product appearance can all affect the feelings, thoughts and behavior of customers

Research on consumer behavior is an important task that has a great influence

in the decision-making process of marketing strategies (Philip Kotler, 2001, p 198) Previously, marketers could understand consumers through their exposure, transaction and daily sales experiences However, due to the growth of market size, marketing managers no longer have direct contact with their customers and the information from sales department is becoming subjective As a result, many managers started using consumer behavioral research to have an appropriate and accurate information in order to attract more customers According to Peter Drucker, who is considered the "father" of modern business management said: "The ultimate goal of all business activities is to create customers And only two business tools can

197-do this is marketing and creativity ”(Vneconomy)

Practically, to build and develop an effective marketing strategy as well as launching a new product to market, managers need to study consumer behavior to construct an effective strategy which stimulate customer’s needs to purchase their products

2.1.2 Purchase decision making processes

Purchase decision making process is defined as the stage where the consumer actually purchase the product (Amstrong, 2012) The first purchase decision making processes, were introduced by Engel, Blackwell & Kollat, includes 5 stages:

“Problem recognition, Information search, Evaluation of alternatives, Purchase intention and Post-purchase behavior” These five stages are a good framework for assessing customer buying behavior However, customers do not always go through these five stages, they may skip or reverse one For example, if a customer feels they need to buy chocolate to eat, they can go to a store immediately to buy a chocolate bar without searching any information or considering alternatives in advance Meanwhile, in case of car’s purchase decision making, customer will thoroughly research product information as well as comparing to others similar car brands before making final buying decision In conclusion, the purchase decision making processes

is different among the amount of effort a consumer puts into a product while purchasing it

Problem recognition

The buying process starts with buyers being aware of demand The buyer feels there is a difference between the actual status and the desired status The buying demand is created from internal or external stimuli or both of them In the case of internal stimuli, the physiological needs such as hunger, thirst, sexuality gradually increases to a certain degree and becomes an urgent need Based on previous experience, people understand how to deal with the urgent need and its motives will lead to the actions can satisfy that need On the other hand, the needs are made from

an external stimulus, such as from newspapers, advertisements, friends, society, etc For example, a person passes a noodle shop and feels the smell of pho that has stimulated the person to feel hungry or a woman sees a beautiful dress of her neighborhood or watches a new perfume commercial, In short, all of these stimuli suggest a problem or need

At this stage, marketers need to identify what situations that often make consumers quickly recognize their problem They should study consumers behavior

to find out what kinds of feelings have generated problems or needs, explain what

makes them, and how they impact consumers to choose to buy a certain product

Information search

After recognizing needs stage, a consumer starts looking for information If the desire of buyers is strong enough and the products are available at that time, they tend to buy them immediately In contrast, if the desired products are not within the reach, the

If consumers' impulse is strong, and desired products are within reach, consumers will most likely buy immediately Otherwise, consumers will keep their needs in their subconscious Consumers may refuse to search for information, or find out basically products information, or actively seek information related to their needs

In case they want to search for information, there are usually the following sources

of information

• Family, friends, neighbors and acquaintances

• Commercial information collected through advertising, salesman, merchants, packaging or product displays

• Public information obtained from mass media and organizations

• Personal experience obtained through the interaction in daily life, survey or product usage

The relative influences of these sources of information on buyers purchase decisions are different by the type of product and buyer’s characteristics Generally, consumers receive most of the information about products from commercial sources which is controlled by marketers However, the most effective sources are from personal information sources because commercial information sources often perform notification functions while personal information sources perform the function of assessment and affirmation For example, computer programmers often know about

computer software products through commercial information sources, but discuss to programming experts about software products before final buying decision

Marketers need to understand the importance of the information source which

is usually referred by their target customers to strategically format information sources As a result, in order to create a marketing content which is effectively communicates to target markets, marketers should interview consumers to collect their first opinion about products, brand image and what sources they received information and the how consumers react to the differences between each source

Evaluation of alternatives

Before making a purchase decision, buyers process the collected information and then evaluate others similar brand The evaluation process is usually done based

on the following principles and sequences

Firstly, consumers consider a product with a set of attributes In particular, each attribute is assigned to a useful function that can bring satisfaction to consumers when they use it

Secondly, consumers tend to classify the attributes according to the levels of importance based on their needs to be satisfied Thirdly, consumers build themselves

a set of beliefs in brands as a framework for evaluating the attributes of product Consumers tend to choose the products which is has attributes satisfying their need the most However, the results of this assessment depend on the psychology, economic conditions and the specific context of the purchasing behavior of consumers Therefore, it is necessary to understand customers feedback in order to redesign the company's products to which have characteristics that consumers prefer; making buyers pay more attention to the added value of products; alter consumers' beliefs about the important characteristics of products they misjudge

Purchase intention

After the evaluation, the intention to purchase will be formed by the brand that received the highest rating and becoming to the purchase decision In addition, according to Aizen (1991), “intention represent moticational components of a behavior, that is, the degree of conscious effort that a person will exert to perform a behavior” There are two factors that can be intervened before consumers make the purchase intention as follows (Philip Kotler & Kevin Keller, 2011, Marketing management, p.170):

(Sources: Phillip Kotler & Kevin Keller, Marketing management, p.170)

Figure 2 1: The factors impact customer purchase intention

The purchase intention is affected by many factors such as location, brand, purchase method, time, price, payment method, packaging, promotion and previous experiences (Rehman, 2011) According to Mutsikiwa and Marumbwa (2013), a number of factors affecting consumer purchasing intentions including external factors (i.e “culture, group, situation, social class and family”), internal factors (i.e

“awareness, attitude, knowledge, personality, lifestyle, participation and society status”) and marketing factors (i.e “products, packaging, promotions, distribution, services and prices”) Purchasing decision is also significantly affected by product demographics, products categories and the feeling of customers (Kamaruddin & Kamarulzaman, 2009) According to Lee and Corsi (2017), the appearance of packaging has a strong impact on the consumer brand identification Product

packaging draws attention primarily through color and shape (Khan, Lee and Lockshin, 2017); The appearance of packaging may also affect the evaluation of core products (Kumar and Kapoor, 2017); and product packaging also affects consumers'

perceived quality and their purchase intentions (Rundh, 2016)

Post-purchase behavior

After purchasing, consumers can feel satisfied or dissatisfied with some products aspects and then take actions after buying or reacting to certain products or the using process If the characteristics and functions of the product meet their expectations, consumers will be likely to buy products again and introduce it to others

On the contrary, dissatisfied customer tend to return or say bad thing about the products with others and switch to products of competitors

According to an overview of consumer behaviors, with the affecting of others factors, such as price, promotion, distributions, cultural context, etc, packaging place

a main role in communicating to customer in the store (Gonzalez et al, 2007) Obviously, among five stage of purchase decision making process, packaging has significant influence on buyer purchase intention which is the fourth stage of the process

2.2 Packaging

2.2.1 Package and packaging design

Products package is known as a portion of the product itself as well as brand recognition Packaging has an important role in presenting products features and providing product information to customers From buyers’ perspectives, both package and products are the same on the shelves During the purchase decision making process, customer uses package as a supportive tool in evaluating products quality and its functions to make a right choice

The package design adds value not only to the package but also to the product Visual package design elements including pictures, colors, font, materials, size, shape

have a significant role in product perception Meanwhile, verbal package design elements importantly detailed product information At the point of purchase, the fundamental role of package and packaging design is to make buyers’ attention and

to be highlighted among compertitors in the store

Effective packaging and package design are the outcome of the collaboration between designers, marketers and customers Thus, packaging design is one of the marketing strategy tools for products itselfs According to Prone (1993), customer’s impulse buying is made by packaging which boosts products function, connects to company’s image and helps company brand stands out among competitors (Gaber & Jones, 2000) Hence, in the buying decision making process, packaging has an significant role in communicating with customers by providing goods-related information

Besides, packaging is also defined as product positioning which creates the company brand in the customers mind and emphasized the added value that differentiate products from alternatives Maggard (2976) claimed that product positioning induces marketing mix where the portions including pricing policy, place, products and promotion are involved” Considering positioning elements and competitors capability helps marketers to conduct an appropriate marketing strategy (Ampuero & Vila, 2006) The differences of the relevant element’s category depend

on positioning strategy’s aim i.e globalization or localization As the result, packaging performs in different functions to reach the different goals, however, stimulating customer purchasing a particular products is the main role of positioning Hence, while marketers use positioning to place products in the market, packaging and package design are used as assistant of company to attract customers’s attention

2.2.2 The role of packaging

Trationally, packaging is used to protect the actual products from damage caused by external factors including “climatic, bacteriological and transit hazards” (Stewart, 1995) Recently, package do not only have logistic and preservation

function but also psychological function i.e packaging communicate to customer Accrording to Bill Stewart (2004), there has three main functions of package is mentioned as below

To contain: Packaging acts in covering role which ensure the visual features,

original functions and the quality of product during the lead time A package, which has a good containing function, enhance the trust of customer about products

To protect: Packaging acts a protection part to keep actual products against

external effects including temperature, moisture, light, etc In this term, designers choose package material based on the characteristics of the goods, the transit process and the environmental risks that it will faced with Accordingly, if package performs this function well, the shelf life and the freshness of goods will be extended

To Identify: Packaging plays an important role in reminding customer about

the available of goods and providing products information to buyers Customers can easily access product information e.g ingredient, country of origin, production and expiry date, etc In addition, this function can stimulate customers actual purchasing and assist product standing out among alternatives

Marketing tool

Product design is described as an decisive tool to create marketing strategy for consumer goods (Rundh, 2009) To enhance a competitive marketing strategy, along with SWOT analyzing, the product design should involve the references from customers (Creusen et al, 2010) Packaging is an effective communication method helping marketers to show their product information and message to consumers (Silayoi & Speece, 2007)

Product design influences the success of consumer goods (Bloch, 2005) According to Holmes (2012), product design is not only an informational tool but also used to attract buyers’ intention and stimulate their sensation A unique

packaging assist product in differentiating consumer good from alternative products (Holmes et al, 2012)

Additionally, as an element of product design, packaging design has a significant communitive role and a strong impact on consumer purchase intention (Salem, 2017), thus, packaging is an important instrument in marketing strategy

2.2.3 Packaging Elements

Based on previous related literature (Sonsino, 1990; Hine, 1995; Vila & Ampuero, 2007; Underwood, 2003), visual package design consists of two major attributes, such as graphic and structural elements Graphic component includes color, typographic, shape, image while the structural component consists of size and material used to cover actual products (Hine, 1995) Additionally, Silayoi and Speece (2004, 2007) added verbal component involving factors related to information or words such as brand name, product information, language used on package (Salem,

2017) In some aspects, three of them have influences customers purchase intention

In the other words, the level of involvement significantly affects consumer decision making processes (Quester and Smart, 1998) Additionally, Silayoi and Speece (2004) claimed that involvement level and the situation of consumption determine which product attributes are considered by buyers In consuming low involvement products, buyers tend to pay more intention on visual attributes while they carefully research before buying high involvement products

2.3 Research Gap and Research Questions

Table 2 1: Summarized literature review

Underwood (2001) The theoretical framework was conducted to understand the communicative effects of package image on brand attention According to the virtual reality simulation results,

package image positively influences consumer's brand attention in private label brand

These qualitative papers mainly aim to explore the initial understanding of the relationship between packaging and purchase intention with the considering involvement level as its moderator However, they did not have any precise measurement the interaction among them Additionally, most of these papers just focused on the impact of visual element only, did not mentioned much

Underwood (2003) The exploratory qualitative study confirmed the role of packaging in enhancing the

relationship between consumer and brand in low involvement products

Silayoi (2004)

This is a qualitative approach research adopting a focus group method to understand consumer response to product packaging and packaging design influences on the consumer purchase decision The findings are that customers decision mostly affected by visual elements when they considered low involvement products under high time pressure

Ampuero (2007)

This paper study relationship between packaging graphic elements and positioning strategies from related previous study and found that the existing literatures mainly concentrated on the impacts of visual elements including color, shape, typography and image which is determined by corresponding positioning strategy

Butkeviciene et al

(2008) An empirical research found that non-verbal components enhances consumer impulsive purchasing while verbal components did not impact on repeated purchasing.

Mutsikiwa (2014) This paper aims to evaluate the influences of aesthetics package design on buyer's purchase decision in daily products consuming The analysis focused on package color,

material, instruction and typographic

These quantitative had objectively analyze the impacts

of package attributes

on purchase intention but there has no positive direct relationships among them

Muhammad (2014) This study used quantitative analysis to test the influence of verbal elements (i.e nutritional information, product information, country-of-origin) on consumer buying

behavior The findings revealed that product information has negative impact

Imiru (2017) The paper used correlation and regression to analysis the relationship between packaging attributes on consumer purchase decision As the result, there has no relationship between

package color and material

To fill these research gap, this study aims to investigate the positive relationship between packaging elements and purchase intention by adding involvement level as moderator of their interactions According to Quester and Smart (1998), involvement level strongly influences consumer buying decision making processes Additionally, in case of low involvement level, consumer normally affected by visual packaging design while buyers pay more intention to the product itself in case of high involvement (Grossman and Wiseblit, 1999) In general, this paper purpose to precisely measure the relationship between packaging design and purchase intention under moderated by involvement level with following research questions

1 Is there a positive relationship between packaging design and consumer purchase intention?

2 Does involvement level influence the relationship between packaging and consumer buying intention?

2.4 Theoretical framework and research hypotheses

Figure 2 2: The proposed research framework

2.4.1 Variable definition

2.4.1.1 Packaging Elements

Packaging is not only used for logistic purpose but also as critical communication tools of products (Hellstrom & Nilsson, 2011) In marketing literature, package is considered as the appearance of product (Chung e al, 2006), thus, it is the first thing consumers interact before actual goods usage in retail environments (Marchi, 2007) Obviously, most of consumer buying decisions are made in the store based on packaging elements (Salem, 2017) As a result, package place the tremendous role in interacting the relationship between buyers and certain brand (Salem, 2017) According

to Kotler & Keller (2011), product package is illustrated as the performance of designing and creating products container which do not only keep actual products from external hazard factors but also become a “silent salesman” to increase sales volume

There have many different definitions about the packaging elements In the related research of Smith and Taylor (2004), they divided packaging design into six parts including “color, size, form, materials, graphic and flavor” Besides, Kotler (2003) claims that product package involves similar six elements, such as “color, size, form, material, text and brand” These elements should be considered in package design process (Vila and Ampuero, 2007) Differently, Underwood (2003) separate packaging into two main attributes i.e structural attributes (“form, size of the containers and materials”) and graphic attributes (“color, shape, typography and image”) Obviously, similar to Underwood (2003), Smith & Taylor (2004) do not mention about verbal elements of packaging which has decisive influences on actual purchase of high-educated consumer (Mutsikiwa et al, 2013) To fill this gap, Rettie and Brew (2000) mentioned about positioning function of packaging, thus, they separated packaging to main groups: visual (e.g color, image, shape, font, size) and verbal (e.g brand name, slogans) elements Additionally, according to Silayoi and Speece (2004), packaging has two major elements: visual and informational elements Visual elements, includes graphics, size and shape of packaging, influence the affective aspect of purchase decision making of consumer Meanwhile, informational elements, which impact cognitive aspects, consists of product information (e.g the name of the firm, address, country of origin, production and expiry date)

Though both Rettie & Brew (2000) and Silayoi & Speece (2004) considered the importance of informational elements, they did not mention about the environmental effects of package materials which significant influence on customer’s food purchase intention (Rundh, 2005) due to the growth of environmental concerned consumers Not only that, they also did not indicate the role of printed language which may affect on the willingness to purchase of buyers (Salem, 2017)

Therefore, to fill above gaps, author considered the environmental influence of package materials as a part of structural elements (Hine, 1995) and the language as verbal elements (Salem, 2017) As the results, based on the references of existing literature, this paper divided packaging into three main elements: graphic elements (e.g

color, shape, font, picture), structural element (e.g size, material) and verbal elements (e.g brand name, product information, language)

Graphic elements: Graphics elements, are factors can be seen, comprised of

color combination, shape, background image and the font style used on packaging (Hine,

1995)

Structural elements: structural elements, are factors simultaneously designed

to display and protect the products effectively, consist of product size design and material should be used

Verbal elements: Verbal elements, are factors related to information or words,

include brand name, the information of product and the language used on packaging In the decision-making process, the verbal attributes influence the cognitive

2.4.1.3 Purchase Intention

According to Sproles & Kendall (1986), purchase intention is a “mental orientation characterizing a customer’s approach to making choice” Purchase intention associates with cognitive and affective process in decision making process Additionally, consumer purchase intention is likely influenced by three main packaging design components including graphic, structural and verbal elements

2.4.2 Measurement of Variables

Before conducting quantitative analysis, the measurement of each variable was referred from existing researches were indicated as following table:

Table 2 2: Measurement of variables Variable No of questions Measurement sources

Graphic

elements

Color 3 Olawepo (2015) Shape 2 Olawepo (2015) Font 3 Olawepo (2015) Picture 2 Olawepo (2015)

Structural

elements

Size 1 Salem (2017) Material 3 Salem (2017)

Verbal

elements

Brand name 3 Salem (2017) Product information 4 Salem (2017) Language 1 Salem (2017)

Involvement level 3 Mittal (1989)

Purchase intention 4 Weisstein (2017) Pei (2014) and

2.4.3 Integration of literature review and hypothesis

2.4.3.1 Graphic package elements and purchase intention

Color

Color has significant influence on consumer emotion (Salem, 2017), thus, color selection process is very importance to design an attractive package (Cheskin, 1957) Package color assists product differentiate from other brand and enhance consumer’s long-lasting memories about products Color is an effective design tool without cost, product attributes and function adjustments (Garber et al, 2000)

According to Steward (2004), each packaging color of a particular product has a transferred message to consumers Especially, for food products, package color has strong impact on customers perception about the food taste (Kauppinen, 2010; Koch&Koch, 2003; Gaber et al, 2000)

Each buyer has different feeling and interest in package color (Mutsikiwa et al., 2013) Hence, based on their psychological status, buyers may select some colors among others choices (Martindale and Moore, 1998) Additionally, consumers choose colors according to their cultural associations (Grossman and Wisenblit, 1999)

Therefore, to make the right choice of color, marketers should fully understand the meanings of each colors in different cultural context (Salem, 2017)

Shape

Interestingly, many customers confirm that they have potential to purchase a certain product without reading the label or product information (Salem, 2017) Previous marketing literature proved that the shape of package associating with message affect consumer feeling and perceived quality (Abdelsamie et al, 2013; Ruumpol, 2014) For instance, while male is impressed by linear angular shapes, female prefer curving line and round shape (Shimp, 1990) When considering two products with the same weight, buyers tend to choose the product which has taller shape because

in buyer’s mindset, the higher has larger volume (Silayoi et al, 2007) Additionally, an innovative package helps products enhance the attractiveness and stand out among similar brands (Salem, 2017) Unique packaging is a competitive tool used for differentiating and consequently increase products sales volume (Sherwood, 1999)

Background picture

According to Salem (2017), pictures and graphics affect consumer sensory the pictures, are printed on product packaging, describes the information related to the goods, such as products usage instructions and its functions where consumer can generally imagine what the product is (Pensasitorn, 2015) Hence, pictures on package places an important role in communicating to customer through transferring products information and imagined stimuli about products (Salem, 2017) In the other words, packaging image is an effective instrument to convey the functions of product and assist goods to be different from alternatives (Meyers and Lubliner, 1998)

Font Style

Font design has a significant role in catching buyer’s eyes (Salem, 2017) Possibly, due to small or unclear fonts, the information of goods is ambiguously described to buyers resulting to misunderstanding and concerning about product quality (Parmar et al, 2009) As a result, along with the development of design technology, to

have an innovative font style, many companies hire experts to design a creative and attractive font style used for their logos, slogans and product package (Imiru, 2017) Therefore, font style, is a powerful tool to draw consumers attention, has positive impact

on consumers purchase decision (Imiru, 2017)

In general, the graphic elements have significant impacts because they have a capability to influence the emotion and feeling of targeted customers (Silayoi and Speece, 2004) Thus, graphic elements positively impact on buyer’s purchase intention perceived quality (Saker, 2015) Based on discussion above, the first hypothesis was established as below:

H1: Graphic packaging elements positively influence consumer’s instance oats purchase intention

2.4.3.2 Structural package elements and purchase intention

Size

As package shape, buyers consider package sizes to make volume perception Hence, the size design should meet consumer’s demand (Makanjuola and Enujiugha, 2015) According to Benedetti et al (2014), marketers should understand target’s customers behavior before making product sizes decision Additionally, package sizes strongly influence on consumer buying choice when buyers cannot clearly evaluate product quality, thus, they are potential to buying smaller one for trial usage (Ksenia, 2013) Meanwhile, some buyers prefer the large size of products for saving cost Therefore, to meet different type of consumer demands, it would be better if goods are sold in various packaging size (Rundh, 2005)

Material

According to Smith (2004), packaging material is designed according to products characteristics, functions and consumer’s needs In a research about packaging (Hollywood, 2013), buyers confirm that they will not purchase products which has low quality and cannot keep the freshness of foods Obviously, the packaging material have positive affect on consumers perceived quality of products, especially, in case of food

products (Silayoi & Speece, 2004) In addition, many today consumers more concern about environmental issues (Rundh, 2005) Accordingly, buyers potentially choose products which have environment friendly, recycle and ease-reuse packaging (Rundh, 2005)

Based on previous literature review, to understand more the influences of structural elements will be thoroughly analyzed in the following section; thus, the second hypothesis was conducted as following:

H2: Structural packaging elements positively influence consumer’s instance oats purchase intention

2.4.3.3 Verbal package elements and purchase intention

Product information

Packaging places a major role in conveying the information related to products which enhance the cognitive process of consumers (Salem, 2017) In some country, there exist the regulations about packaging printed content, such as the name of the firm, address, country of origin, production and expiry date (Ahmed et al, 2014) Due to the increase of healthy eating trend, customer concern more about food ingredients and nutrition (Coulson, 2000), thus, they more carefully consider product information available on package The package has appropriate products information assist enhance consumers’ reliability and boost purchase decision making process (Silayoi and Speece, 2004) In the store, package maybe the only instruments helping product communicate with buyers (Gonzalez et al, 2007) Accordingly, packaging is considered as the fundamental elements in consumer purchase intention

Brand elements

Brand elements (i.e brand name, slogans, logos, symbols and flavor) is illustrated as the intangible treasure of the firm (Kotler & Keller, 2012) At the point of sale, buyers are willing to choose famous brand’s products because in their mind, reputational brand corresponding to high quality and positively reviewed (Aker, 1991) Based on previous paper related to packaging, brand components considered as the core

elements of product information (Silayoi and Speece, 2004) Brand identification helps buyers to reduce searching time when they purchase food products (Bassin, 1988) With other information-related-to products, brand elements visibly evoke consumers interests and boost their purchase decision process (Mutsikiwa et al, 2013)

Language

De Run and Fah (2006) indicated that using mother language on package assists buyer easily understand products functionalities and usage instructions, thus, buyers are likelihood to purchase products has printed information in mother language Hence, to globalize effectively, marketers should eliminate the language barrier which is one of the major of cultural barriers (Hall & Hall, 1987) Additionally, under cultural context, the ways to describe a sentences or words are different among local languages (Doole

& Lowe, 1999) Local people will have a positive sense that the certain foreign firm is seriously doing business in targeted country if their language is used on package (Hollensen, 1998) Adopting a suitable language for information contents or packages

is a very necessary mission to increase consumer purchase intention (Salem, 2017)

Whilst visual elements (e.g color, shape, size, font, picture, material) evoke buyer’s emotion and feeling, verbal elements (e.g products information, brand elements, language) significant impact on the cognitive process of customer (Silayoi & Speece, 2004) As a result, verbal elements also have impacts on buyer’s purchase intention (Salem, 2017) This led to the establishment of the third hypothesis:

H3: Verbal packaging elements positively influence consumer’s instance oats purchase intention

2.4.3.4 The effect of involvement level

According to Solomon (2002), to make an actual purchasing a certain products, consumers are likelihood to follow four stages: “(1) problem recognition, (2) information search, (3) evaluation of alternatives and (4) product choice” Recently, Kotler & Keller (2006) added more one step which is (5) post-purchase behavior However, this model cannot explain the consumer’s impulse buying decision (Clement, 2008) For example, in case of low-involvement products purchasing, obviously, above

process shows its limitation Recognizing that limitation, based on Kotler’s literature review, Patty & Cacioppe (1981) proposed two accessing contexts for high and low involvement products With high involvement products, buyers are likelihood to carefully search the information related to products, which follows the Kotler’s purchase decision making process (Patty and Cacioppe, 1981) For low involvement level, buyers easily are drawn by packaging design (Solomon, 2002; Silayoi & Speece, 2004)

On one hand, according to Silayoi and Speece (2004), packaging assist low involvement products evoking customer’s emotional action The expected outcome of purchase decision and the element evaluation of low involvement products are less important, thus, the role of packaging graphic and structural elements become more critical (Grossman & Wisenblit, 1999) Thus, it is possible the level of involvement has influenced the interaction between graphic or structural package elements and purchase intention, based on it, the fourth and fifth hypothesis were established as below:

H4: Involvement level is the moderator of the relationship between graphic package elements and purchase intention

H5: Involvement level is the moderator of the relationship between structural package elements and purchase intention

On the other hand, buyers do not care much about visual aspects when they are considering to purchase high involvement products (Kupiec & revell, 2001) Accordingly, they pay more attention with package informational elements (Silayoi & Speece, 2004) Obviously, level of involvement has impacted the relationship between verbal package elements and purchase intention, based on it, authors hypothesize the following:

H6: Involvement level is the moderator of the relationship between verbal

package elements and purchase intention

CHAPTER 3: METHODOLYGY AND RESEARCH DESIGN

Research methodology is the detailed procedures used in identifying, selecting, processing and analyzing data for answering research questions Research methodology

is the fundamental chapter of research writing This chapter describe specifically the study processes to address research issues and examine research hypotheses For instance, in this chapter, author discussed the methods related to research methodology determination as well as collecting data and analyzing instruments to conduct this research

3.1 Research approach

According to Sarantakos (2005), social science can be conducted in quantitative

or qualitative approach While qualitative approach tent to explore and understand the individual or social phenomenon by observation and involvement (Bryman & Bell, 2007), the quantitative research adopts statistic and numerical analysis methods to assess objectively theories Quantitative research concentrates on the “what” of the research topic rather than the “why” (qualitative approach) of the research topic In the other words, it focuses on describing the nature of a phenomenon instead of explaining further “why, when or how” it happened Due to this study aims to understand what extent packaging elements design (i.e visual and verbal elements) influence instant oats purchase intention of Vietnamese consumers which can be addressed by quantitative approach Additionally, Cavana et al (2008) indicated that quantitative research often uses deductive logic which is the process starts with developing hypotheses based on existing theory and then conduct a conclusion after hypotheses testing processes Deductive approach assists researchers to explain quantitatively the relationships between research concepts and variables that are corresponding with research objectives Therefore, quantitative and deductive approach are the most suitable approaches to conduct this study

3.2 Research design

According to Souna (2007), research design is defined as “the framework or guide used for the planning, implementation, and analysis of a study” The different of research questions or hypotheses lead to the different of research design, thus, understanding and distinguishing exactly the types of research design is an important mission while conducting a study Based on the researcher’s variables controlling level, quantitative research design is divided into 4 main types: descriptive, correlational, causal-comparative and experimental design

Causal-comparative design is adopted to create the cause-effect relationship among variables In this research design, independent variables are considered as causal factors while dependent variables are affected factors Causal-comparative design is a popular design used in social science to analyze human behavior through assessing the cause-effect relationship among groups

To research objectives, this study purpose to precisely check the impact of packaging design elements on consumer purchase intention Therefore, the usage of causal-comparative design is the most suitable solution Causal-comparative design is considered to widely used to examine in marketing research (Lynn, 2003) Based on above discussion, this research process is designed as figure 3.1, the process includes 5 main stages: literature review, research design, data collection, data analysis and conclusion

Figure 3 1: The research process flow chart

Editing/ coding data

Quantitative analysis

- EFA

- CFA

- SEM

Interpretation of results and findings

Conclusion and recommendation

3.3 Data selection

Research data has been collected from both secondary and primary sources According to Saunders (2009), secondary data is the information collected from existing sources including company reports, academic journals, scientific articles and media information Otherwise, primary data is gathered by researchers themselves to answers their research questions (Hox & Boeije, 2005) Saunders (2009) claimed that the reliability of data collection is very important to have a valuable result

3.3.1 Secondary Data

Secondary data has been gathered mainly from academic journals and scientific articles The secondary is used as references for gathering primary data and research questions Author purpose to find the suitable secondary data related to packaging design and its impacts on consumer purchase intentions In addition, to solve research problem, author used key words such as packaging elements, purchase decision and consumer involvement level to search expected secondary data The used database is belonging to Yokohama National University, Vietnam National University and Google Scholar

3.3.2 Primary Data

According to Churchill and Lacobucci (2010), researchers should consult the secondary research first then conduct the primary data to achieve a general knowledge about research topic The primary data was collected according to specific research purpose and research question (Mark Saunder, 2009) To gather primary data, this study used online survey built by google forms

3.3.2.1 Sampling design

According to Malhotra (2007), the kind of data analysis determine the required sample size Additionally, Tabachnick & Fidell (2007) indicated that CFA sensitively requires the certain sample size because it is inconsistent if the sample size is too small Unfortunately, there no any acceptable criteria for choosing a valid sample size for CFA which is used in this research (Hair et al., 2010) Hair et al (2010) also indicated that the minimum size can be 100 in case of the model containing under 5 constructs and

each of them consists of more than 3 items with high item communalities (> 0.6); 150

in case of model with at most 7 constructs have modest communalities (0.5); 300 in case of models involves at most 7 constructs with low item communalities (0.45) and over 500 for models consists a large number of constructs with low item communalities and under 3 measurements items Generally, 100 is the practical and acceptable size for SEM (Hair et al., 2010)

Furthermore, for SEM in using AMOS, Pallant (2005) claimed that the sample size should be “at least five times the number of question items Accordingly, the proposal model involves 2 independent variables, 1 moderate variable, 1 dependent variable containing 30 question items Specifically, 10 for “Graphic elements” variable,

4 for “Structural elements”, 8 for “Verbal elements”, 4 for “Involvement level” and 4 for “Purchase intention” Hence, there has 30 items in total (30 x 5 = 150) which mean that 150 is the minimum acceptable sample size Therefore, this study considered 150 for minimum sample size estimation

3.3.2.2 Data Collection and participants characteristics

Due to the conveniences and objectivity, survey became a popular tool to gather information from respondents Especially, along with the spreading of internet, online survey tends to be the more cost-effective than traditional method such as paper surveys

or face-to-face interviews Online survey assists researchers reduce the geographical dependence and connect to more hard-to-reach respondents in less developing time and money

Therefore, data of this study was collected by online surveys from March 29th to April 20th, 2019 The criteria for participating in this study was that the respondents who are considering to buy instant oats Hence, there was 250 people were sent the link

of the questionnaire via social media (Facebook, Instagram) and e-mail, however, 103 indicated that they did not plan to purchase instance oats As a result, only 147 responses who have specific characteristic shown in table 3.1, are validated for further analysis Although this result was not estimated sample size (150), this quantity is still larger than the acceptable minimum sample size for CFA (100) suggested by Hair et al (2010)

Table 3 1: Frequency of demographic information of respondents

3.3.2.3 Questionnaire and Experimental Design

According to Kothari (1985), the questionnaire is “mainly accumulation of inquiries that suit the study area and its targets, and the solution to which will give the information necessary to check the assumptions made for the research” To conduct questions, analyst need to consider thoroughly the research area (Yin, 2002), thus, the questionnaires are conducted from theoretical framework made in chapter two with research items are referred from literature review and modified by the pilot study The questionnaires were distributed to participants under multiple choice questions which syncs with their perception and opinion The questions originally design in English then translated to Vietnamese After the preliminary translation, to ensure the Vietnamese survey is easily to understand, author distributes the questionnaire to sample of 30 participants Based on group’s discussion, author has deleted, modified the question items to be more suitable for Vietnamese consumer context Additionally, to measure