15A- Figuring out Buyer Behavior #2

Segment: The segment I will be interviewing will be University of Florida students aged 18-22 whom eat on UF campus at least twice a week. In the first segment I chose, I focused on students who I knew eat healthy options when they eat out. However this week, I am testing to see exactly when students choose to eat a healthy meal given the other alternatives on campus.

Interview Questions:

1)      Are you a University of Florida Student?

2)      How old are you?

3)      Do you eat on campus at least twice a week?

4)      What restaurant do you feel you eat at the most?

5)      When you are choosing a restaurant to eat at, what characteristics do you value the most?

6)      Is food quality or price more important to you?

7)      Does the aesthetic of the restaurant impact whether you eat there or not?

8)      When choosing between the various restaurants on campus, how do you choose?

9)      Have you developed “customer loyalty” to any of the restaurants on campus?

10)   When eating out, do you eat in the restaurant or take it to go?

11)   When you order, do you place your order in person, online, by phone?

12)   Do you pay with cash or credit card?

13)   What determines whether you or not the meal was worth the money? Are there multiple factors?

14)   Does the meal, restaurant, service all determine whether it was worth the money?

15)   How do you determine if the meal was not in fact worth the money?

16)   After you have, do you ever feel you’d go back to that restraurant?

Interview #1: Harry

Harry is a 20-year-old University of Florida Biochemistry student. On average, Harry eats on campus 2-3 times a week and finds himself eating at Chick-Fil-a far more than any other restaurant. According to his interview, Harry takes several factors into account when choosing where he is going to eat, the most important being the quality of the meal. After meal quality, he values price and meal size. Although Harry does not value the aesthetic of the restaurant as much as other factors, he does care about general characteristics such as cleanliness and lighting. Finally, Harry often orders in person and pays with cash, and mainly ranks whether the meal was worth the money by quality.

Interview #2: Alexis

Alexis is an 18-year-old University of Florida Finance major. She eats on campus 2x a week and when she does, often finds herself eating at Pollo Tropical or Croutons. She takes several factors into account when choosing where to eat, the price of the food, the quality, and where the restaurant is located. Alexis did feel the aesthetic of the restaurant determines how much she appreciates the meal, and she often pays in cash or with her debit card. She determines of the meal was worth it mainly by how much she enjoyed the taste, but she also cares about how the food makes her feel after (too full, bloated, etc). She also rarely goes back to a restaurant after having a bad meal, as one time is enough.

Interview #3: Hugo

Hugo is a 21-year-old University of Florida student majoring in History. He often eats on campus 3x per week, and usually eats at the healthier restaurant options on campus, either Subway or Croutons. There are several factors he takes into consideration when he eats out, but the most important are health and taste. He has in fact developed customer loyalty at Croutons and many of the employees know his order. He often pays in cash and does not often care about the aesthetic of the restaurant if the service and food quality are high. He determines whether the meal was worth it by taking price, quality, and health of the meal into account.

Conclusions:

Based on these three interviews, it is quite clear that the segment pretty much values the same things in terms of alternative evaluation. All three members of the segment based their decision to eat at a restaurant on the quality of the food, price, and service by the restaurant. However, it was interesting to note that some members of this segment became regulars at the restaurants they eat, making bias in the decision of alternative evaluation. In terms of purchase evaluation and post-purchase evaluation, the members of this segment behaved how I was expecting them to. Most people determine the quality of their meal on the taste and service, however many members of my segment also valued how nutritional the meal was. One thing that surprised me after interviewing this segment was how much this segment valued how the meal made them feel after, as this is not something I thought about when determining if I appreciated the meal or not. In addition to this, the members of this segment paid with cash or card to purchase their meals, which was expected prior to interviewing them. Finally, post-purchase evaluation determined that if this segment ate at a restaurant with poor food quality, service, etc, they seldom returned to the restaurant. This is extremely enlightening information when opening my restaurant, as it means that I must deliver exceptional food and service every single time.