Purpose - The paper aims to examine the relationships among hedonic and utilitarian values, customer satisfaction and behavioral intentions in the fast-casual restaurant industry.Design methodology ...approach - The measures were developed based on a thorough review of the previous literature. Questionnaires were collected in classroom settings at a mid-western university in the USA. Anderson and Gerbing's two-step approach was employed to assess the measurement and structural models.Findings - The findings indicate that hedonic and utilitarian values significantly influence customer satisfaction, and customer satisfaction has a significant influence on behavioral intentions. Utilitarian value shows a greater influence on both customer satisfaction and behavioral intention than does hedonic value. This study also reveals that customer satisfaction acts as a partial mediator in the link between hedonic utilitarian value and behavioral intentions.Research limitations implications - Study findings will greatly help hospitality researchers and practitioners understand the roles of hedonic and utilitarian values in customer satisfaction and behavioral intentions in the fast-casual restaurant industry.Originality value - The paper is the first to explore the relationships among hedonic and utilitarian values and their effect on customer satisfaction and behavioral intentions in the fast-casual restaurant industry using Babin et al.'s two-dimensional measure of consumer value.
In order to address a lack of comprehensive evaluation of restaurant quality, this study extends Mehrabian and Russell's stimulus–organism–response framework by incorporating restaurant-specific ...stimuli and including restaurant-specific measures of emotion. Using structural equation modeling, this study shows that atmospherics and service function as stimuli that enhance positive emotions while product attributes, such as food quality, act to relieve negative emotional responses. Results also suggest that positive emotions mediate the relationship between atmospherics/services and future behavioral outcomes. The results are theoretically and practically meaningful because they address the relationships among three types of perceived quality (product, atmospherics, and service), customer emotions (positive/negative), and behavioral intentions in the restaurant consumption experience. Managerial implications, limitations, and future research directions are also suggested.
This study examines customers’ willingness to pay more for green practices in restaurants using hypothetical scenarios. The objective of this study is to investigate the characteristics of consumers ...with a higher willingness to pay more and examine the relationship between consumers’ perceptions of green brand image and their willingness to pay more for a restaurant’s green practices. A total of 334 responses showed that more than two-thirds of restaurant customers would be willing to pay extra money for green restaurant practices. Age, previous experience, involvement, and self-perception were found to be significant in accessing consumers’ willingness to pay more for green practices in restaurants. In addition, the results showed that customers with a strong likelihood to pay more for green practices had higher perceptions of green brand image than those who were less likely to pay extra.
This study empirically examined not only the relationship between perceived quality and satisfaction/loyalty, but also the role of customer perceptions of atmospherics in an ethnic restaurant ...segment. Specifically, this study, using hierarchical regression analyses, investigated the direct effects of service quality and food quality on customer satisfaction and loyalty as well as the moderating effect of the perception of atmospherics, in Korean restaurants. As expected, this study showed that service and food quality have positive and significant effects on customer satisfaction and loyalty. This suggested that, similar to other restaurant segments, employee service and food are of great importance for ethnic restaurants as well. Verifying the moderating role of atmospherics, however, this study found that good employee service can be more effective for increasing the satisfaction and loyalty of customers with a low perception of the atmospherics compared to those with a higher perception. Further, providing quality food is particularly critical for creating customer satisfaction in ethnic restaurants where atmospherics are not satisfactory. More detailed findings and implications are also discussed.
This study examines the effects of green practices at restaurants on customer-based brand equity formation. A survey of 512 American diners showed that implementing two aspects of green practices, ...food focused and environmentally focused, influenced customer perceptions of green brand image and behavioral intentions, whereas the effects of green practices on perceived quality were not significant. The relative impact of the two aspects of green practices differs by restaurant type. In upscale casual dining restaurants, green practices focused on foods were more effective in enhancing a green brand image and behavioral intentions as compared to those with an environmental focus. On the other hand, for casual dining customers the effects of green practices with an environmental focus were more convincing in terms of improving a restaurant's green brand image and behavioral intentions as compared to food focused initiatives. In relation to self-perception, the results indicated that diners with high health and environmental-consciousness responded more positively to restaurant green practices than those with a low self-perception of health and environmental-consciousness.
Are religious consumers less wasteful? If so, to what extent and by what mechanisms does religiosity motivate consumers to reduce food waste? To address these questions, this study proposes a ...conceptual model and evaluates it empirically using PLS‐SEM and data from 583 consumers. The results reveal that religiosity encourages food waste reduction. Specifically, religiosity is positively related to consumer attitudes, activism and personal and subjective norms to reduce food waste. Consumers’ activism and personal norms are significant mediating mechanisms that convey the impact of religiosity on food waste reduction intentions. Interestingly, however, consumers’ attitudes and subjective norms show no significant effects on their food waste reduction intentions. In addition, perceived behavioural control (PBC) appears to be an important determinant of consumer intentions, but it plays a direct role rather than a moderating role. These results extend the previous literature by (a) proposing novel intervening mechanisms to explain the understudied religiosity‐consumer behaviour relationship and (b) shedding light on the controversy regarding the additive versus moderating effect of PBC. Ultimately, this study provides a basis for religious‐based interventions for policy makers and marketers as well as ideas to motivate food waste reduction at the consumer level.
Destination revisit intention has been viewed as an important research topic both in academia and the tourism industry. It is important to observe tourists’ revisit intentions from a time perspective ...because the intention often changes over time. To understand the formation of temporally changing destination revisit intention, this study explored the effects of tourists’ novelty-seeking and destination satisfaction on the revisit intentions measured on short-term, mid-term, and long-term bases. The results indicated that
satisfaction was a direct antecedent of short-term revisit intention, but not of mid-term or of long-term revisit intention, and that
novelty seeking was a significant antecedent of mid-term revisit intention that was connected to long-term revisit intention. The roles of novelty seeking and destination satisfaction in establishing and reinforcing destination revisit intention as well as developing long-term commitment were discussed as well.
This study examined the relationships among dining atmospherics, emotional responses, perceived value, and behavioral intentions, using Chinese restaurants as its research setting. Results of the ...study revealed that dining atmospherics had significant effects on customers’ positive emotions, negative emotions, and perceived value. Further, both positive and negative emotions and perceived value also influenced customers’ post-dining behavioral intentions. Perceived value not only functioned as the greatest contributor to behavioral intentions but also mediated the relationship between emotional responses and behavioral intentions. Positive emotions and negative emotions had asymmetric effects on perceived value. Positive emotions showed a stronger capability in predicting perceived value. Chinese restaurant managers must utilize the effects of restaurant atmospherics to improve customers’ perceived value of the restaurant and their revisit intentions. Other practical implications are discussed as well.
This study examines the causal relationship between tourism expansion and economic development in Taiwan. A Granger causality test is performed following the cointegration approach to reveal the ...direction of causality between economic growth and tourism expansion. Test results indicate a long-run equilibrium relationship and further a bi-directional causality between the two factors. In other words, in Taiwan, tourism and economic development reinforce each other. A discussion follows and managerial implications are identified based on the empirical findings.
Purpose
Given the increasing need after the outbreak of COVID-19 to encourage restaurant customers to dine in, the purpose of this paper is to examine the effects that anthropomorphic cues jointly ...with brand awareness and subjective social class have on restaurant-visit intention.
Design/methodology/approach
To better comprehend the use of anthropomorphic cues, this paper involved two studies that used two types of anthropomorphic cues: (1) non-food (a spoon) and (2) food ingredients. For each study, a 2 × 2 mixed factorial design was used.
Findings
Using three-way mixed ANOVAs, the results from Study 1 confirmed that adding anthropomorphic cues to a non-food object (a spoon) could induce positive effects for restaurants with lower brand awareness, especially among individuals with low subjective social class. In contrast, Study 2 showed that adding anthropomorphic cues to a food ingredient (e.g. tomato, lettuce and olive) had a weaker effect on restaurants with high brand awareness, especially among individuals with a high subjective social class.
Practical implications
Marketers should use anthropomorphism strategies based on their target customers, especially if their brand is less popular.
Originality/value
Using the theoretical framework from the elaboration likelihood model, this paper contributes to the anthropomorphism literature by showing how an anthropomorphized image that fits an individual’s interests could trigger a careful thinking process that leads to differential behaviors based on brand awareness.
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