The fast food restaurants are now in the growing pace as it is convenience and suits the lifestyle of Malaysians citizens who are now having a more hectic and busy lifestyle. Fast food outlets in Malaysia provide a wide range of products and also delivery services that suits the preferences of various consumers. Fast food restaurants in Malaysia heavily promote themselves through media such as television, internet, newspaper and also brochures and pamphlets. Moreover, with the Malaysian population becoming more urban and affluent, along with media influence and foreign exposure which has resulted in growing taste for western food, fast food outlets in Malaysia such as Pizza Hut has a great future prospective.
The purposed of this report is to analyze buyer behavior of consumer in fast food industry. Marketers need to recognize that internal and external aspect of buyer behavior will influence consumers buying decision making in fast food industry. Thus, marketers can use various component of buyer behavior to segment their target market in order to cater their needs and preferences with different marketing mix strategy.
Furthermore, Market segmentation is also being outlined in this report. For fast food industry, segment such as demography, psychographics, socio cultural and benefit segmentation will be targeted. Moreover, in order to success in the market, Pizza Hut should understand and provide greater consumer satisfaction than its competitors. In this case, the main competitor of Pizza Hut in Malaysia is McDonald’s.
Finally, future recommendation on the improvement of the marketing activities of Pizza is also provided Benefit segmentation requires finding the major benefits people look for in the product class, the kinds of people who look for each benefit and the brands that deliver each benefit (Schiffman et al., 2005). With fast food restaurant, family can decide on impulse to go out and eat, and each family can select their own food.
Thus, the food preparer does not have to plan meals for the whole family (Darian and Cohen, 1995). Fast food restaurant are superior in providing this benefit especially to the very time-poor consumers that searching for this kind of benefit in selecting their food choices.
In order to understand consumers’ different perceptions and preferences of fast food outlets, it is important to understand their buyer behaviors. Understanding buyer behaviors and how they differ among consumers is very important for fast food industry to develop their marketing strategies (Kara, Kaynak and Kucukemiroglu, 1997).
Here, some aspects of buyers’ behavior which are vital in developing marketing strategy or making marketing decisions for fast food outlet will outline perception as being defined as the process by which an individual receives, select, and interprets stimuli to form a meaningful and coherent picture of the world.
Consumer perceptions are vital to marketers and often underlie the success and failure of products in the marketplace (Hanna & Wozniak, 2001). Fast food meals such as Pizza Hut, McDonalds and KFC tend to be perceived by customers as convenient but unhealthy. As the response to this, a number of fast food companies have reviewed the fat and sugar contents of their product ranges and reconsidered the size of portions they offer. New ³healthy options (e.g. salad) can now be purchase from fast food such outlets such as Pizza Hut and KFC.
Attitude is being defined as the way consumers think and feel about and act towards some aspect of the product, company, services or brands (Neal, Quester and Hawkins, 1999). Usually, attitudes are constant with behaviors, in this case; the consumer’s purchase behavior toward specific incentive (Schiffman et al., 2005). Different people have different attitude towards the offering in fast food restaurants. One group of people tends to think that time is an important component in selecting the place for dinner while another group only care on the quality of the food provided.
Moreover consumers are also having a negative attitude towards . fast food restaurants as it is perceived to be unhealthy. Hence, it is the marketer job to induce people with these attitudes towards its product and service using advertising campaign and special offers. As illustration, the marketers in fast food outlets such as Pizza Hut has long induce the attitude change towards fast food by providing healthier menu such as salad and also emphasize on the time guarantee.
How frequent do Malaysians consume fast food or what are their consumer patterns in regard to fast food?
Last twenty years have seen a revolution in consumer tastes, helped by cooking programs, overseas travel and growing cultural and ethnic diversity. These have broadened consumer tastes and helped make the takeaway and fast food market more sophisticated (Richardson and Aguir, 2003). Kara et al. (1995) found that a major food consumption trend in the USA and Canada was towards eating more meals outside homes. This trend was predicted to be accelerating and spreading to the rest of the world.
As working consumers and those with children have less time, more adults are eating on the move, usually at the fast-food outlets and with takeaways. Platania and Donatella (2003) found that these outlets are often positioned at convenient locations, catering for these needs, e.g. the motorway service areas, roadsides, transport terminals, shopping malls as well as parks and, more recently, workplaces. According to Kara et al., (1995) the American consumers at the ages of 12 to 24 years looked for the variety, price, delivery service and location, whereas the Canadian consumers looked for prices and novelties. When identifying fast food restaurants, the age group of 46 to 55 years of Americans showed their concerns particularly on cleanliness, nutritional value, quality and taste. The Canadians gave preference to nutritional value and seating capacity. In the middle age group of 25 to 45 years, the Americans preferred speed and friendly personnel, whereas the Canadians looked for speed, quality and service. Not surprisingly, Brown et al., (2000) emphasized the need for nutritional awareness and fast food preferences of young consumers during their adolescent years. In a similar study conducted in London, Davis and Smith (2004) have examined the importance of nutritional values of fast-foods and suggested to provide information printed/disclosed by fast-food providers. Fast-foods have gained acceptance by the Malaysian palate after the multinational fast-food players adapted basic Malaysian food requirements to their preparation viz. excluding pork from the menu in line with Islamic teachings (Malaysia Fast Food Retail Market, 2008). The rise of disposable income and the public’s growing appetite for fast-foods have maintained the growth of the sector. Moreover, the growth of this sector has been contributed by the young adults who raise families and are likely to take their children to fast-food eateries, thus creating a new generation of fast-food lovers.
What are the motives of a Malaysian Consumer in regard to fast food?
1) Due to increased literacy rate and widespread of media, customers are extra aware about the food products as well as the ingredients and promotion schemes given by different retailers.
2) Many customers want to eat those food products which are of foreign origin but with Malaysian ingredients (According to their customs and traditions).
3) Young generation is a big consumer of fast food these days. Young people want to take fast food from those retail outlets where they can eat those products with their friends and can also get the home delivery of the same, so to meet these requirements of young customers; retailers have to invest more in their retail outlets.
4) Rapidly changing tastes of customers due to increased marketing and advertising. Generally, restaurants cater to the numerous ethnic groups in Malaysia, each of which has distinct food habits. However, foreign mass media have had an impact on the food habits of the Malaysian consumers. They are shifting away from traditional Malay food served in restaurants, and are increasingly turning to hotels and restaurants that serve foreign foods. Restaurant chains are creating awareness about their service and brands. As a result, specialty and theme restaurants are opening more frequently than typical traditional Malaysia food restaurants. Specialty restaurants in Malaysia serve a focused menu of Chinese, Italian, Thai, or Mexican food. The fast food industry, after a slow start, has registered prolific growth in recent years. Most U.S. fast food chains - McDonald's, KFC, Domino's Pizza, Pizza Hut, Pizza land - along with local chains such as Nirulas and Pizza Inn are doing a good business in major urban areas and are now spreading to smaller cities.
What factors influence fast food consumption in Malaysia?
According to the Keynote (2003), nine major factors affect fast-food consumption; Social Development, Economic Forces, Political Climate, Technological Development, Ecological Development, Market Forecasts, Buying Groups, Equilibrium of Power and Regulatory Framework (in short, SEPTEMBER). Among these factors, the societal development was treated as the most important affecting variable that included (i) time constraints – busy lifestyle, longer working hours, beanpole family and career women, (ii) new demographics – single person households, age re-targeting and the rise of the “sandwich” generation (iii) the health dynamic – search for healthier foods and food source (iv) away-from-home eating habits, and (v) new consumer tastes and eating habits. Richardson and Aguir (2003) have also examined the attributes affecting fast food consumption. They found that the main attributes regarding traditional fast food provision such as “taste”, “cleanliness”, “convenience”, “speed” and “predictability” were ranked high in the choice of a fast-food item. However, other attributes such as “healthiness”, “provision of choice” and “friendly staff” were relevant to consumers when they were thinking of alternative outlets. Richardson and Aguir’s (2003) focus was very much consumer oriented (micro perspective), while, the suggested SEPTEMBER (Keynote, 2003) factors have covered the overall fast food market and industry situation (macro perspective). Whereas, in the present study, 14 attributes: (i) price, (ii) quality, (iii) freshness, (iv) the taste suit to them, (v) local products, vs. international products, (vi) food safety, (vii) attractive packaging, (viii) “halal” status, (ix) healthy food, (x) the outlet within vicinity, (xi) easy to cook, (xii) advertisement, (xiii) influence of friends versus family members and (xiv) the influence of preferred brand have been chosen as to the major influential factors for fast food purchasing and consumption. These factors have been chosen on the basis of the previous literatures and few have been added additionally as it is assumed by the researchers that these factors would have been carried the greatest impact in regard of the Malaysian culture and socio-economic perspective.
Research Framework
Research Methodology
Survey method using self administered questions have been used in this study as a tool
to determine respondents‟ opinion, preferences and perceptions towards fast-food. A
convenience sampling technique has used due to the availability and homogeneity of
the respondents without incurring higher cost and more time. Voluntary persons have
approached and invited to participate in the study. This approach is consistent with the
Respondents were students of public universities in Malaysia. They were approached at the faculty‟s lobby in between the class schedule, at the library and in their class before the class started. In total 50 students have participated in this study. However, only 30 questionnaires were used for the analysis, while the other4 responses were eliminated as some important data were missed or unanswered. The questionnaire was consisted of two parts. First part assessed respondents‟ preferences towards the types of fast food consumed, the place they make their purchase and the preferable characteristics of the fast foods. Items for influential factors were measured by using a Likert scale where “1” indicated „not important at all‟ and “5” as „very important‟. Respondents were asked to rank their ten most preferred brands. And the second part assessed reasons for not taking the fast food for the consumers who do not like to take fast-foods. Respondents were requested to answer the questions with the assistance of an enumerator.
Mall intercepts and other methods that allowed for easy access to sample elements. Most participants are surveyed around Kuala Lumpur area.All respondents were university students who were studying for their first degrees or at the post graduate levels. They were aged between 19 to 27 years. Consistent with themale-female ratio of university students in Malaysia (where females are accounted for around 62 percent) the respondents were dominated by females (64.2%). Fifty fourpercent respondents were Malays, 23 percent Chinese, 9 percent Indians and 14 percent others (including foreign students), whereas, 67 percent were Muslims, 23 percent Buddhists, 6 percent Christians and 4 percent Hindus.
Majority of the respondents(65%) lived in the university hostels, 34 percent lived in a shared accommodation and 11 percent lived with their families. The situation of living apart from the family wasone of the reasons for the students to purchase fast food. As suggested by Atkins and Bowler (2001), a busier (with study) lifestyle and a quick meal solution were the other reasons for the consumers to be dependent on fast food as their regular meals.
Almost all respondents were dependent on their families or scholarships for
their source of income with an average monthly allowance of RM316.00. Other than
that, only around 12 percent represented were working students with an income of more
than RM400. Almost half of the respondents (47 percent) came from the middle income
family earning between RM1500 and RM3500 per month. Respondents‟ income also
reflected their fast food purchasing. The higher the income, the more frequent they
would purchase fast food.
Hypothesis
- Frequently go for fast food
|Particular |No. of Respondents
|Yes |18
|No |32
Interpretation: from the above table we can easily judge that most of the rural people do not go for fast food frequently, out of 50, 18 respondents go for fast food frequently and 32 people go for fast food not so frequently. We can say that a less number of people go for a fast food twice or thrice in a week.
- Preference of food
|Particular |No. of respondents
|Home made |19
|Branded |31
Interpretation: from the above table we can easily judge that most of the rural people prefer branded fast food, out of 50, 31 respondents’ preferred branded fast food because rural people want to change and they have more tendency towards urbanization and only 19 people prefer a homemade fast food.
- Eat fast food in a week
|Particular |Observed values |Expected values
|Once |32 |12.5
|Twice |11 |12.5
|Thrice |5 |12.5
|More than thrice |2 |12.5
Ho: Rural people do not eat fast food once in a week
H1: Rural people eat fast food once in a week
Level of confidence is 95%
|chi square value |43.92
Result: - As the 95% level of confidence the table value is 0.352 which is less than the chi square value 43.92 so that, null hypothesis is rejected. It means most of the rural people eat fast food once in a week.
Interpretation: from the above table we can say that most of the rural people eat fast food only once in a week, out of 50, 32 respondents go for fast food once in week and only 2 people go for fast food more than thrice in a week.
- Factors affecting while purchasing fast food
|Factors |Observed values |Expected values
|Quality |15 |12.5
|Price |28 |12.5
|Quantity |7 |12.5
Ho: Rural people do not preferred price
H1: Rural people preferred price
|chi square value |22.14
Result: - As the 95% level of confidence the table value is 0.352 which is less than the chi square value 22.14 so that, null hypothesis is rejected. It means price factor more affected while purchasing fast food by rural people.
Interpretation: from the above table we can say that the price is considered the first preference factor while purchasing the fast food item by a rural consumer, because out of 50 respondents 28 respondents preferred price while purchasing fast food items and only 7 people consider quantity.
- Time to mostly take fast food
|Particular |Observed values |Expected values
|At the time of breakfast |6 |12.5
|At the time of lunch |22 |12.5
|At the time of dinner |8 |12.5
|Any other time (evening) |14 |12.5
Ho: Rural people do not take fast food at the time of lunch
H1: Rural people take fast food at the time of lunch
Level of confidence is 95%
|chi square value |12.4
Result: - As the 95% level of confidence the table value is 0.352 which is less than the chi square value 12.4 so that, null hypothesis is rejected.
Interpretation: from the above table we can say that most of the rural people eat fast food at the time of lunch, out of 50, 22 respondents take their fast food at the time of lunch and only 6 people take at the time of breakfast.
- Motive for getting consumer fast food
|Motives |Observed values |Expected values
|For change |27 |16.66
|For having spicy food |8 |16.66
|For taste |15 |16.66
- Adoption of fast food as a habit
|Particular |Observed values |Expected values
|Friends Company’s |31 |12.5
|Travelling job/ nature |16 |12.5
|Influence by company |3 |12.5
Ho: Friends companies do not influence to adopt fast food by rural people
H1: Friends companies do not influence to adopt fast food by rural people
Level of confidence is 95%
|chi square value |35.58 |
Result: - As the 95% level of confidence the table value is 0.352 which is less than the chi square value 35.58 so that, null hypothesis is rejected.
Interpretation: from the above table we can say that the friends company is considered the first influencing factor for adopting the fast food item by a rural consumer, because out of 50 respondents 31 respondents influenced by Friends Company for adopting fast food and only 3 people Influenced by company through their marketing information.
Findings
Table 1: Respondents’ profile
Respondents profile Frequency
Gender
Living situation
- Hostel 21
- Living with family 7
- Living with friends 22
Ethnic composition
- Malay 19
- Chinese 16
- Indian 10
- Others 5
Conclusion
Nevertheless, there are several limitations of this study. First, due to the time and cost constraints, non-probability (convenient) and snowball sampling were used, thus resulted to the less representativeness of the sample. Second, only 50 respondents are chosen to be a sample of this study and it is considered as a small for this kind of study. Therefore, it is important for further studies to avoid these problems in order to get more thoroughly and accurate result. It is suggested for further studies to use probability sampling method when selecting the sample of the study. This is to ensure that the study will be able to provide a more accurate result since the purpose of probability sampling method is to ensure that every single unit in the population is having an equal chance to be selected as the respondents of the study. At the same time, it is recommended to increase the sample size of the study so as the error from the findings will be Asgari on this project minimized as the reliability of the pilot test and 50.
In nutshell, the consumption pattern among the respondents shows a great potential for
fast food industry in Malaysia. The busier lifestyle has developed the habit of eating
fast food. The demand of fast-food among youngsters is increasing day by day and
therefore, the number of QSR is also increasing in Malaysia. Chicken based fast-foods
are more preferable among the students in all races as it is free from religious
restrictions. Therefore, KFC became the first priority among the all respondents.
Though all races are consuming fast food now-a-days, still Indian consumers prefer to
eat the home cooked food. „Halal‟ status has been found as the main influential factor
for the Malay consumers to consider the purchase of fast-food, whereas, Chinese
consumers give more priority toward „food-safety‟ and Indians for „freshness‟. The
high demand and growth rate of eating habit among youngsters, especially the
university students is also determined by students‟ financial strength and professions.
Many professional students live apart from their family and have no time to prepare
their food and thus prefer to consume fast food.
Consumers like the fast-food outlet that is nearby their university and shopping
malls that give them the easy access and reduce time for dining-out. The increased
number of fast-food outlets also made them easy to access within the short distance. In
turn, these factors contribute to the higher demand of fast-food among university
students in Malaysia. Consequently, the demand of fast food has enhanced the
Malaysian food industry.
Questionnaire
1. Occupation: ______________
2. Age:
- 18-25 years
- 25-32 years
- 32-39 years
- 39-46 years
- 46 and above
3. Sex: a. Male b. Female
4. Ethnic composition:
- Malay
- Chinese
- Indian
- Other
5. What is your living situation?
- Hostel
- Living with family
- Living with friends
6. Do you go for fast food frequently?
Yes No
7. How many times in week you eat fast food?
- Once
- Twice
- Thrice
- More than thrice
8. What factors you consider most while purchasing fast food?
- Quality
- Price
- Quantity
- Packaging
9. Which fast food you prefer more?
- Home Made
- Branded
10. At what time you mostly take fast food?
- At the time of Breakfast
- As a substitute to your
- At the time of Lunch
- regular meal
- At the time of Dinner
- Any other Time
- If yes, when__________________________.
11. By which preference you go or consume fast food?
- For change
- For having spicy food
- For taste
- Cheep
- Quality
- Freshness
- Food safety
- ‘Halal’ states
- Health reason
- Advertising
- Brand
12. What type of fast-food you would prefer to purchase:
- Fries
- Roasted chicken
- Pastas
- Fish burgers
- Buns and breads
- Instant noodles
- Pizza’s
- Burger’s
- Fried chicken
13. What brand of fast-food you prefer:
- Mee Sedap
- Burger King
- A & W
- Domino Pizza
- Maggie Mee
- McDonald’s
- KFC
14. What made you to adopt fast food as a habit?
- Friends Company
- Travelling job / nature
- Non availability of food
15. How much is your income per month?
- RM200 - 300
- RM300 -400
- RM500 – 600
- RM600 – 700
- More than Rm 800 , please state ……………… .
References
Atkins, P. and Bowler, I. (2001), Food in Society: Economy, Culture and Geography,
Arnold, London.
Bowman, S.A. and Vinyard, B.T. (2004), “Fast Food Consumption of U.S. Adults:
Impact on Energy and Nutrient Intakes and Overweight Status”, Journal of the
American College of Nutrition, Vol. 23, No. 2, pp. 163-168.
Data Monitor (2005), “Fast food in Asia-Pacific: industry profile”. Available at:
www.datamoniter.com
English, S. (2002), “McDonald to Shut in 10 Nations”, Daily Telegraph, Fast food and
Health Related Issues. Available at: http://www.health.allrefer.com/health/fastfoods-
info.html.
Fast Food Consumption Trend in Malaysia (2008). Available at:
www.buyusa.gov/malaysia
Keynote (2003), “Fast Food and Home Delivery Outlets”, Market Intelligence Report,
Keynote, London,
Malaysia Fast Food Retail Market (2008). Available at:
www.commercecan.ic.gc.ca/scdt/bizmap/interface2.nsf/vDownload.